Summer ends now; now, barbarous in beauty, the
Stooks arise
Around; up above, what wind-walks! what
lovely behavior
Of silk-sack clouds! Has wilder, willful-waiver
Meal-drift molded ever and melted across the skies?
~Gerard Manley Hopkins, “Hurrahing in Harvest”
This afternoon was the colour of water falling through sunlight;
The trees glittered with the tumbling of leaves;
The sidewalks shone like alleys of dropped maple leaves,
And the houses ran along them laughing out of square, open windows.
Under a tree in the park,
Two little boys, lying flat on their faces,
Were carefully gathering red berries
To put in a pasteboard box.
Some day there will be no war,
Then I shall take out this afternoon
And turn it in my fingers,
And remark the sweet taste of it upon my palate,
And note the crisp variety of its flights of leaves.
To-day I can only gather it
And put it into my lunch-box,
For I have time for nothing
But the endeavour to balance myself
Upon a broken world.
~Amy Lowell “September 1918”
~Amy Lowell “September 1918”
Am I the only one who awakes this morning with a prayer asking
that today be a day of healing between peoples rather than conflict and pain,
that the barbaric become peaceable~
no missiles launched,
no one gunned down in the streets,
no vehicles used as weapons,
no child misused,
no one sold into slavery,
no one abandoned, homeless and starving.
that today be a day of healing between peoples rather than conflict and pain,
that the barbaric become peaceable~
no missiles launched,
no one gunned down in the streets,
no vehicles used as weapons,
no child misused,
no one sold into slavery,
no one abandoned, homeless and starving.
Am I the only one who awakes this morning and seeks only
to watch the clouds
to praise the heavens
to see the leaves turn color
to take out this day and taste it
and save it away somehow
so as to balance myself on this brokenness all around?
to watch the clouds
to praise the heavens
to see the leaves turn color
to take out this day and taste it
and save it away somehow
so as to balance myself on this brokenness all around?
I am not the only one.
I know I am not.
I know I am not.
Barnstorming 
You are not the only one.
LikeLike
A loving sentiment … artistically, as always, expressed.
— prh
LikeLike
Thank you for your beautiful words and pictures. Yes, my heart breaks open every day with tragedy and beauty.
LikeLike
Beautiful post!
LikeLike
Corpus Christi, says it all. What affects one of us affects us all. Yes we are.
LikeLike
No, dear Emily, you are not. You surely are not. As I go about my errands each day, again, it is in the eyes of those whom I see, and with whom I make brief contact – those just passing by, waiting for a bus, standing in line at checkout counters, usually silent – not because we are strangers – but because of the lost, nearly ‘dead’ look in their eyes that bespeaks the unspoken fear, emptiness, senseless killing on a massive scale, suffering that we see all around us — all of the reminders of the violent, uncaring God-less world that we encounter each day – being hammered into our minds by the incessant talking heads and censored ‘news’ reports constantly funneled into our being by the media. For me, at times, I feel totally overcome, in despair. I feel anger, hopelessness, dreadful fear for our children and the world that they may be inheriting….
I cry out (sometimes vehemently) at our omniscient, righteous God for relief, for an end to this madness. In the Hebrew Scriptures there are approximately 55 Psalms
(the people’s prayer book) variously classified by scholars by genre in just one category – Laments. There are 17 ‘Communal,’ 38 Individual. I find that very significant- a testament to the times that God’s children cry out to Him for help, vindication, righteousness.
Thank you, Emily, for your thoughts here today. What you have said so beautifully, so truthfully, is that WE ARE NOT ALONE!
LikeLike
No, you are not alone.
LikeLike