Something Beautiful

Owl

For some reason, I absolutely love owls.

The Periodic Table

I found this paragraph over at the American Scholar site --

I could scarcely sleep for excitement the night after seeing the periodic table—it seemed to me an incredible achievement to have brought the whole, vast, and seemingly chaotic universe of chemistry to an all-embracing order. . . . To have perceived an overall organization, a superarching principle uniting and relating all the elements, had a quality of the miraculous, of genius. And this gave me, for the first time, a sense of the transcendent power of the human mind, and the fact that it might be equipped to discover or decipher the deepest secrets of nature, to read the mind of God.

(From “Mendeleev's Garden,” by Oliver Sacks, Autumn 2001)

It reminds me of something I once read about machines --

All machines, no matter how complex, are based on six simple elements: the inclined plane, the lever, the pulley, the screw, the wedge, and the wheel and axle.

Rose

Here's a lovely pink rose for your viewing pleasure. 

More flowers by this same photographer may be found in a set she has dubbed Flora. 

More in pink from the same set. 

His green eyes

South and north, sharing
A single mountain gate,
Above and below, two temples
Both named T’ien-chu.

Dwelling therein is
An old dharma master,
Built tall and skinny
Like a stork or swan.

I do not know what
Practice he engages in,
But his green eyes
Reflect the mountain valleys.

Just looking into them
Makes one feel fresh and pure,
As if all one’s baneful vexations had been cleansed.

-- Su Shih   (1073)

Robert Frost for everyone

An excellent speech by Dana Gioia at this year's Stanford University commencement.  (Idea and link shamelessly pilfered from the very fine Just Thinking blog.)