Why the Sun

How beauty touches our heart of hearts

I am sure you remember moments when something has touched you so deeply that it left a mark in you – it’s going to stay with you for the rest of your life. And for all the thinking you might do as to why that is, no doubt remains about the depth of your experience.

There is a magic about allowing yourself to let something touch you – be it a moment, a person, another being, a piece of art… Having had such an experience, the old question of „why?“ then turns into something different. Or maybe it is you who turns into someone different?

Chapters:

• 00:00:00 Intro
• 00:00:26 Why the Sun – Solo
• 00:03:00 Beauty is the face of the divine
• 00:07:40 Why the Sun (Remix)
• 00:14:00 Outro

Transcript

Why the Sun

Why does the rooster crow?
Why does the river flow?
Why do eagles cry
in desperate beauty
as they soar
across the valley?
Why does the wolf howl
in the house of darkness
as the moon traverses
the cloud-filled sky?
Why do I burn
when I look into your eyes?
Why do I shiver
at your touch?
Why the longing
why the aching
why the lust?
Why do I love your kiss
so much?

Why does the sun shine
and warm us
give us life
and let us be?
Why does earth’s cradle
hold us
make us see?

No other reason
No other cause
It’s all for nothing
It’s all for love
It’s all for this
Just to be this
All the struggle
All the strain
All the whys
And all the cries
It’s all for love
It’s just because

©️ Laughing Brook/Peter Müller 2026

Beauty is the face of the divine

Hey. Thank you for making the time to listen to this podcast. Thank you for creating the space and environment to let this poem sink into you. I hope it will create inside of you a space which is wide and breathes some of the vastness and landscapes, some of the winds and skies and experiences that have coloured the layers of today’s poem.

May I invite you to pause even more, reflect for a moment – when was the last time you were struck by beauty? You know, one of those moments when, for example, you look at a sunset and the hue and shine of the celestial colour gradient that expands through the sky just blows you away, when you’re completely wowed by the beaming shine of yellows, oranges, reds, purples and blues against the white and grey of the clouds. When the landscape suddenly beams in a glow that feels almost otherworldly. 

Or maybe beauty touched you in another way, like in the form of a person, a piece of music you listened to, or, well now, in a poem?

Such moments are very curious. For very obviously they come upon me as an external event – a sunset, a person, a piece of music, a poem. Yet, while I am being deeply touched by this beauty, someone else may not register it at all and remain completely untouched. They might honk their horn at me to get going, while I’m all at awe about the magical spectacle that occurs in front of my windshield. They might be all occupied by getting home on time for supper, whereas I’ve just lost all sense of time, bathing in the beauty of this moment, wanting it to never end.

A moment of beauty is as much created as it is an event that comes upon me. After all, beauty is, as the proverb goes, in the eye of the beholder. To experience beauty, I need to slow down, or even pause. I need to let go of my goals and tasks and to-dos, the many things that keep me ever so busy. In slowing down, my focus changes and allows me to shift, to take in what is in-front and around of me. And this other – I let it sink into me, through my eyes, ears, my skin, through smell, really through all my senses. As I do, something deeper opens, which is not so easily put in words – maybe I could call it my heart, my imagination. It is a deeper sense of this other, which somehow always also includes me. There is a we dawning in my opening up to beauty.

The philosopher Martin Buber in his very famous and highly influencal little book named I and Thou says there are two kind of encounters we can have. One is about objectifying. I look in a room and see that there are eight people in this room, and 12 apples on the table. The room has three windows and it’s 6:45 five and the sun is setting. This is a very technical look, which can be useful for a lot of things, like determining whether all invitees for a meeting have arrived yet, whether there are enough apples on the table for everyone, and whether the room is lit enough for the meeting or whether we need to turn on lights. Martin Buber calls such an encounter with that scene an I–It encounter.I encounter everything in it as an object that is measurable, quantifiable, can be put into a category. In essence, it leaves me untouched, I mainly gain information from it.

Another way of looking at this scene can be to experience the solemn atmosphere in the room as everyone is being touched by the fiery, golden light streaming through the windows, enveloping the whole scene in a magical light that seems to permeate from the outside to the inside and is strong enough to stop the conversations and lead the whole group – including me, who just entered the room – into a sense of awe and pause. As I stand there, a sense of community arises which transcends anything words could have done, and as it fades we just look at each other with a very tender and gentle sense of both joy and intimacy. The meeting we were about to begin is going to start from a very different place now. None of us is the same, something inside of me, everyone else, and the atmosphere we are creating together as group has just shifted, is significantly changed. I am not the one I was when I approached that room, but a different version of myself. Martin Buber called this an I-Thou encounter. Those are not only moments of change, but very likely also moments of great meaning. Sometimes they are moments we remember for the rest of our lives.

In order to encounter and truly meet beauty, it needs such an I-Thou moment. Beauty as something objectifiable doesn’t have the same meaning as beauty that deeply touches me as I experience it. 

In his classic book about the journey to be come a man, Iron John, Robert Bly describes this scene during a holiday camp when he was sixteen, cleaning the dining room. The door opens and a girl enters the room. As he looks at her, he is completely wowed and enthralled by her beauty. As the adult man, reflecting about this moment, he notices how beauty does something to lead us into praise, out of ourselves and into something larger. He describes it very poignantly: Beauty is the face of the divine.

For many years I have pondered about that statement and compared it with my experiences, and as far as I’m concerned, he is pretty bang on with it. The awe I experience in moments of beauty, whether it’s a beautiful woman or the ever changing glow of a sunset, connects me with something that is otherworldly. It points to something which is beyond the actual moment, but also in a strange way is exactly in this very moment. Something shines through wich is deeper, bigger, vaster. Something with qualities like light, peace, wholeness, completeness, stillness, joy, happiness, love. 

Beauty is the face of the divine, and in those moments of allowing beauty to sink into me, I am touched by it. That’s when words cease and I am simply bathing in bliss and awe, the sheer joy of having this very moment. No more questions, no more searching. Just this moment, a moment, in which I feel – and am! – fully alive.

And maybe that is, because live itself is just touching me. For this is what the divine, in its essence, really is.

Outro:

Hey ho, we’ve reached the end of this episode. I would be curious to hear, by the way, what do you think? There’s a clean version and a remix of the poem I do in each episode. Kind of which one works better for you? If you please leave a message, like a comment, I’d love to hear from you. 

Well, thank you for listening. My name is Laughing Brook. I’m a poet, mystic, man-whisperer and the maker of this podcast. Thank you for listening and keep on flowing, bumping and jumping with the stream of life.