Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

“Life is a bowl of cherries. Some cherries are rotten while others are good; its your job to throw out the rotten ones and forget about them while you enjoy eating the ones that are good! There are two kinds of people: those who choose to throw out the good cherries and wallow in all the rotten ones, and those who choose to throw out all the rotten ones and savor all the good ones.”
― C. JoyBell C.

“Why do we always begin to think about people when they die? I think we should think about people while they're still alive! That way, they can know that we're thinking about them! I always tell people when I'm thinking about them, or that I thought about them, or that I have been thinking about them and it almost always scares them away, but so what, I am practicing the art of life and if that is frightening to them then maybe they need to start living while they're still alive!”
― C. JoyBell C.

“Again, I am surprised why people seek to eliminate lust and cling to love; as they wish to ignore happiness and cleave unto joy! Now, now, let's not sugar-coat things! Lust has a lot more to do with life and what is the good of life if you do not carry much lust inside of you at all times? And joy is a noble thing, but happiness though fleeting can be found every day and in every small little way!”
― C. JoyBell C.

“What does it mean to be cultured? Who is the cultured person? The cultured individual is not defined nor determined by status in society nor by wealth; but the cultured individual is determined and defined by his or her sense for the art of life. And what is the art of life? The art of life is the reflection of the mind and the soul upon the world, upon other people, upon the respect and understanding of other people and upon the things that are in this world and beyond. There is a joy that is always sought in beautiful things. Being cultured is being conscious, reflective, understanding, feeling, aware. Knowing how to feel, to listen, to understand. A desire to find or to create joy in many thingsâ€� that is the art of life. And these things define a cultured person.”
― C. JoyBell C.

“If life is a bowl of cherries, what's inside of it?”
― Josh Stern, And That’s Why I’m Single

“Is it fair to say that traveling is life itself? It is like seeing endless beauty, pain, desolation, beautiful hearts and minds, and nature through the windows of a fast-moving train where everything is fleeting and impossible to capture."

[From “Can We Travel Without Being Tourists?â€� published on CounterPunch on March 15, 2024]”
― Louis Yako

“Yesterday I learned that hours are nothing but bodies
We kill upon confronting,
Or perhaps they are the ones
That backstab us as soon as they are behind.”
― Louis Yako, أنا زهرة برية [I am a Wildflower]

“Departure"
Everyone wants to leave
Those here want to go there,
and many there are eager to return here�
There are those who understood that living is not possible
neither here nor there,
so, you see them, in vain, searching for alternatives�
Few have understood that the impossibility of living
is a result of complicity not geography,
that most of those who stay or depart
never part ways with their complicity and tendency to surrender,
thus, they recreate the circumstances and the causes of departure
everywhere they go�
Few have understood that all places will remain unlivable
so long as the causes to depart are a result
of a complicit and defeated Self�


[Original poem published in Arabic on June 20, 2024 at ahewar.org]”
― Louis Yako