William Michaelian

Poems, Notes, and Drawings

Tag Archive for ‘Pilgrims’

A Flower for Marian

Today is the birthday of my father’s little sister, Marian. It is also the anniversary of my grandfather’s death in 1990 and the day the ancient orthodox Armenian Church observes Christmas — except in Jerusalem, where the Brotherhood at the Monastery of St. James follows an older calendar and Christmas falls on a later date. In the dimly lit, incense-laden sanctuary of St. James itself, there is a nook where […]

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Galileo One Day, Jesus the Next

Philosophers, poets, thinkers, mystics — if we really understood them, would we quote them so often? Or would we instead relate our own direct experience, through our own actions and in our own words, or in whichever way is most natural, such as making bread, playing with children, and planting flowers? Truth is timeless. Realization is always fresh and new: it’s both perishable and everlasting. Still, quotes serve a purpose. […]

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