How the Light Gets In

I like to read all kinds of books, and like most readers, have several going at a time.  Right now, I am reading O Heart, a poetry book by Claudia Keelan; The Decameron by Boccaccio; A Certain World (a commonplace book by W.H. Auden.)  What I am missing is a really good mystery.  The last excellent mystery I read was by Louise Penny, called How the Light Gets In.  The title is taken from a Leonard Cohen song and the verse she was inspired by goes like this:

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There's a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in.

At this period of my life, that verse really moves me.  And the other day, I found another moving illustration of the "cracks in everything" thanks to a  mention in a wonderful online magazine called the Kyoto Journal, itself a thing of beauty.  Kintsugi is the Japanese art of repairing cracks, but in a way that enhances the piece itself, while deepening the idea of the break in the piece as an integral part of the piece's history. The article and video are linked here:http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2014/05/kintsugi-the-art-of-broken-pieces/

Age in Making Art

    Feminine Wave by Hokusai

On the back of a greeting card: "According to Hokusai's autobiography, he began drawing when he was 6 years old.  At 19 he became an apprentice under Katsukawa Shunso, a noted painter and print designer of the time... At age 70 he produced the designs for his most famous set of prints, entitled Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji.