“There is no fundamental contrast between the spiritual and natural worlds” and we ought
“delight in the beauty of nature as perceived by the senses… being rooted in human experience.”
- Arthur Terry. The Poetry of Joan Maragall
This is a stone marker -- a signpost for the natural world. It is also a gravestone, but for no one. On many older gravestones, the message is clear: Memento Mori (remember your death). This
stone marker that has a different message: Remember your life and the beauty of the place you find yourself.
The poem quoted on the stone marker is by Catalan poet Joan Maragall. It was carved into a
curved piece of stone discovered in CACiS. The verse that was chosen is this one from his Cant Espiritual:
Aquest món, sia com sia,
tan divers, tan extens, tan
temporal,
aquesta terra, amb tot lo que
s'hi cria,
és ma pàtria,
Senyor, i no podria
ésser també una pàtria celestial?
This world, be it as it may,
so varied, so vast, so much of
time,
this earth, with all that grows
in it,
is my homeland,
Lord , and could it not also be a
heavenly home?
