I sit beside the fire and think Of all that I have seen Of meadow flowers and butterflies In summers that have been
Of yellow leaves and gossamer In autumns that there were With morning mist and silver sun And wind upon my hair
I sit beside the fire and think Of how the world will be When winter comes without a spring That I shall ever see
For still there are so many things That I have never seen In every wood in every spring There is a different green
I sit beside the fire and think Of people long ago And people that will see a world That I shall never know
But all the while I sit and think Of times there were before I listen for returning feet And voices at the door ~J.R.R. Tolkien“Bilbo’s Song”
The lengthening days make me greedy for the transformation to come; I’m watching the sky change by the hour, brown winter fields greening from warming rains, buds forming, the ground yielding to new shoots.
Still I hunker down, waiting for winter to give up and move on. These quiet nights by the fire restore me as I listen for visitors at the door, for those returning feet, for the joy of our spending time together rebuilding dreams and memories.
О Greater Light, we praise Thee for the less; The eastern light our spires touch at morning, The light that slants upon our western doors at evening. The twilight over stagnant pools at batflight, Moon light and star light, owl and moth light, Glow-worm glowlight on a grassblade. О Light Invisible, we worship Thee! ~T.S. Eliot from “O Light Invisible”
Look, in the early light, Down to the infinite Depths at the deep grass-roots; Where the sun shoots In golden veins, as looking through A dear pool one sees it do; Where campion drifts Its bladders, iris-brinded, through the rifts Of rising, falling seed That the winds lightly scour— Down to the matted earth where over And over again crow’s-foot and clover And pink bindweed Dimly, steadily flower. ~Michael Field “The Depths of the Grass”
We wove hip-high field grass into tunnels
knotting the tops of bunched handfuls the drooping heads tied together.
My seven siblings and I sheltered ourselves
inside these labyrinths in a galaxy of grasses. ~Heather Cahoon “Shelter”
As a child I liked to go out far into our hay field and find the tallest patch of grass. There, like a dog turning circles before a nap, I’d trample down the tall waving stems that stretched up almost to my eyes, and create a grass nest, just cozy enough for me. I’d sit or lie down in this tall green fortress, gazing up at the blue sky, and watch the clouds lazily drift over top of me. I’d suck on a hollow stem or two, to savor the bitter grass juice. Time felt suspended.
Scattered around my grassy cage, looking out of place attached to the broad grass stems, would be innumerable clumps of white foam. I’d tease out the hidden green spit bugs with their little black eyes from their white frothy bubble encasement. I too felt “bubble-wrapped” in my green hide-a-way.
My grassy nest was a time of retreat from the world. I felt protected, surrounded, encompassed and free –at least until I heard my mother calling for me from the house, or a rain shower started, driving me to run for cover, or my dog found me by following my green path.
It has been decades since I hid away in a grass fort trying to defoam spit bugs. Surely, I’m overdue: instead of being determined to mow down and level the grass around me, I long for a galaxy of grassy bubble-wrap.
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In the afternoon of summer, sounds come through the window: a tractor muttering to itself as it
Pivots at the corner of the hay field, stalled for a moment as the green row feeds into the baler.
The wind slips a whisper behind an ear; the noise of the highway is like the dark green stem of a rose.
From the kitchen the blunt banging of cupboard doors and wooden chairs makes a lonely echo in the floor.
Somewhere, between the breeze and the faraway sound of a train, comes a line of birdsong, lightly threading the heavy cloth of dream. ~Joyce Sutphen, “Soundings” from Naming the Stars
As a young child, I remember waking from my summer afternoon naps to the sights and sounds of our rural community. I could hear tractors working fields in the distance, farm trucks rumbling by on the road, the cows and horses in the fields, a train whistle in the distance and the ever-present birdsong from dawn to dusk.
These were the sounds of contentment and productivity, both together. Surely this is how heaven must be: always a sense of something wonderful happening, always a reason to celebrate, always a profound sense of respite and sanctuary.
Even now, there is that moment of awakening of my heart and soul from a summer nap when I try to listen for the chorus of angels outside my open window.
photo by Harry Rodenberger
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Photo of Aaron Janicki haying with his Oberlander team in Skagit County courtesy of Tayler RaeBenjamin Janicki of Sedro Woolley raking hay with his team of Oberlanders
Travel as a backward step. You journey until you find a meadow where wildflowers grow with pre-factory-farming copiousness, a horse-drawn landscape where hay is saved in older ways, to revive the life you lived once, catch up with your past. ~Dennis O’Driscoll from Time Pieces (2002)
… The Amish have maintained what I like to think is a proper scale, largely by staying with the horse. The horse has restricted unlimited expansion. Not only does working with horses limit farm size, but horses are ideally suited to family life. With horses you unhitch at noon to water and feed the teams and then the family eats what we still call dinner. While the teams rest there is usually time for a short nap. And because God didn’t create the horse with headlights, we don’t work nights. Amish farmer David Kline in Great Possessions
photo by Tayler Rae
One evening I stopped by the field to watch the hay rake drawn toward me by two black, tall, ponderous horses who stepped like conquerors over the fallen oat stalks, light-shot dust at their heels, long shadows before them. At the ditch the driver turned back in a wide arc, the off-horse scrambling, the near-horse pivoting neatly. The big side-delivery rake came about with a shriek— its tines were crashing, the iron-bound tongue groaned aloud— then, Hup, Diamond! Hup, Duke! and they set off west, trace-deep in dust, going straight into the low sun.
The clangor grew faint, distance and light consumed them; a fiery chariot rolled away in a cloud of gold and faded slowly, brightness dying into brightness. The groaning iron, the prophesying wheels, the mighty horses with their necks like storms— all disappeared; nothing was left but a track of dust that climbed like smoke up the evening wind. ~Kate Barnes “The Hay Rake” from Where the Deer Are
My grandparents owned the land, worked the land, bound to the earth by seasons of planting and harvest.
They watched the sky, the habits of birds, hues of sunset, the moods of moon and clouds, the disposition of air. They inhaled the coming season, let it brighten their blood for the work ahead.
Soil sifted through their fingers imbedded beneath their nails and this is what they knew; this rhythm circling the years. They never left their land; each in their own time settled deeper. ~Lois Parker Edstrom “Almanac” from Night Beyond Black.
Nearing 68, I am old enough to have parents who both grew up on farms worked by horses, one raising wheat and lentils in the Palouse country of eastern Washington and the other logging in the woodlands of Fidalgo Island of western Washington. The horses were crucial to my grandfathers’ success in caring for and tilling the land, seeding and harvesting the crops and bringing supplies from town miles away. Theirs was a hardscrabble life in the early 20th century with few conveniences. Work was year round from dawn to dusk; caring for the animals came before any human comforts. Once night fell, work ceased and sleep was welcome respite for man and beast.
In the rural countryside where we live now, we’ve been fortunate enough to know people who still dabble in horse farming, whose draft teams are hitched to plows and mowers and manure spreaders as they head out to the fields to recapture the past. Watching a good team work with no diesel motor running means hearing bird calls from the field, the steady footfall of the horses, the harness chains jingling, the leather straps creaking, the machinery shushing quietly as gears turn and grass lays over in submission. No ear protection is needed. There is no clock needed to pace the day. There is a rhythm of nurture when animals instead of engines are part of the work day. The gauge for taking a break is the amount of foamy sweat on the horses and how fast they are breathing.It is time to stop and take a breather, it is time to start back up do a few more rows, it is time to water, it is time for a meal, it is time for a nap, it is time for a rest in a shady spot. This is gentle use of the land with four footed stewards who deposit right back to the soil the digested forage they have eaten only hours before.
Our modern agribusiness megafarm fossil-fuel-powered approach to food production has bypassed the small family farm which was so dependent on the muscle power of humans and animals. In our move away from horses worked by skilled teamsters, what has been gained in high production values has meant loss of self-sufficiency and dedicated stewardship of a particular plot of ground. Draft breeds, including the Haflinger horses we raise, now are bred for higher energy with lighter refined bone structure meant more for eye appeal and floating movement, rather than the sturdy conformation and unflappable low maintenance mindset needed for pulling work. Modern children are bred for different purpose as well, no longer raised to work together with other family members for a common purpose of daily survival. Their focus at school is waning as they have no morning farm chores when they get up, too little physical work to do before they arrive at their desks in the morning. Their physical energy, if directed at all, is directed to competitive sports, engaged in fantasy combat rather than winning a very real victory over hunger.
I am encouraged when young people still reach for horse collars and bridles, hitch up their horses and do the work as it used to be done. All is not lost if we can still make incremental daily progress, harnessed together as a team with our horses, tilling for truth and harvesting hope.
photo by Joel DeWaardphoto by Joel DeWaard
I like farming. I like the work. I like the livestock and the pastures and the woods. It’s not necessarily a good living, but it’s a good life. I now suspect that if we work with machines the world will seem to us to be a machine, but if we work with living creatures the world will appear to us as a living creature. That’s what I’ve spent my life doing, trying to create an authentic grounds for hope. ~Wendell Berry, horse farmer, essayist, poet, professor
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… why should I not sit, every morning of my life, on the hillside, looking into the shining world? Can one be passionate about the just, the ideal, the sublime, and the holy, and yet commit to no labor in its cause? I don’t think so.
How often do we miss the fainter note Or fail to see the more exquisite hue, Blind to the tiny streamlet at our feet, Eyes fixed upon some other, further view. What chimes of harmonies escape our ears, How many rainbows must elude our sight, We see a field but do not see the grass, Each blade a miracle of shade and light. How then to keep the greater end in eye And watch the sunlight on the distant peak, And yet not tread on any leaf of love, Nor miss a word the eager children speak? Ah, what demand upon the narrow heart, To seek the whole, yet not ignore the part. ~Philip Britts “Sonnet 1” from Water at the Roots
We are born nearly blinded, focused solely on our emptiness – a hunger to be filled and our need to be held. As we grow, our focus sharpens to fall in love with those who feed and nurture us.
Eventually we discover, challenge and worship He who made us. I need to seek out and harvest the beauty growing in each moment.
This world is often too much for me to take in as a whole — an exquisite view of shadow and light, color and gray, loneliness and embrace, sorrow and joy.
With more years and a broader vision, I scan for the finer details within the whole before it disappears with the changing light. Time’s a wasting (and so am I) as I try to capture it all with the lenses of our eyes and hearts.
The end of life comes too soon, when once again my vision blurs and the world fades away from view. I will hunger yet again to be filled and held.
And then heaven itself will seem almost too much to take in – my heart full to bursting with light and promise for the rest of eternity.
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Before the ordinary realities, ordinary failures: hunger, coldness, anger, longing, heat. Yet one day, a thought as small as a vetch flower opens. ~Jane Hirschfield from “Flowering Vetch”
Who would have thought it possible that a tiny little flower could preoccupy a person so completely that there simply wasn’t room for any other thought? ~ Sophie Scholl
Little flower, but if I could understand what you are, root and all in all, I should know what God and man is. ~ Alfred Lord Tennyson from “Flower in the Crannied Wall”
If seeds in the black earth can turn into such beautiful roses, what might not the heart of man become in its long journey toward the stars? —G.K. Chesterton
Am I root, or am I bud? Am I stem or am I leaf? All in all, I am but the merest image and tiniest thought of God’s fruiting glory destined for the heavens.
I am His tears shed when seed is strewn as He is broken apart and scattered, spreading the Word to yearning hearts everywhere.
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I came downstairs for Lavina’s scones, butter-ready from the oven, crusty and cratered, awaiting their dollop of jam.
The morning clouds had whipped themselves up to a billow, mounds of soft cream.
The plink plink song of a chaffinch dotted the air like currants. Daffodils, pats of butter on thin stems, did their little dance, and the edible world spread its feast before me on the fresh green tablecloth. Oh, how delicious, this sweet Irish spring. ~Barbara Crooker, “Morning Tea” from The Book of Kells
Northern IrelandWhatcom CountyNorthern IrelandHomeWhatcom CountyWhatcom County
It was nine years ago we visited Northern Ireland where we were surrounded by ever-delicious colors and landscape and gracious hospitality where ever we went.
As I look out at our own rolling green hills and billowy clouds of a Whatcom County springtime, I am filled as if it were all edible feast, reminded of the vibrant green of the Irish countryside, backed by the silhouettes of the nearby Mourne Mountains.
If only all the world could be blessed and tasty as fresh warm scones with jam and a pot of tea.
When I was a child I once sat sobbing on the floor Beside my mother’s piano As she played and sang For there was in her singing A shy yet solemn glory My smallness could not hold
And when I was asked Why I was crying I had no words for it I only shook my head And went on crying
Why is it that music At its most beautiful Opens a wound in us An ache a desolation Deep as a homesickness For some far-off And half-forgotten country
I’ve never understood Why this is so
But there’s an ancient legend From the other side of the world That gives away the secret Of this mysterious sorrow
For centuries on centuries We have been wandering But we were made for Paradise As deer for the forest
And when music comes to us With its heavenly beauty It brings us desolation For when we hear it We half remember That lost native country
We dimly remember the fields Their fragrant windswept clover The birdsongs in the orchards The wild white violets in the moss By the transparent streams
And shining at the heart of it Is the longed-for beauty Of the One who waits for us Who will always wait for us In those radiant meadows
Yet also came to live with us And wanders where we wander. ~Anne Porter “Music” from Living Things.
One evening, when our daughter was only a toddler, just learning the words to tell us what she needed, I was preparing dinner, humming along to a Celtic choral music piece playing in the background.
She sat on the kitchen floor, looking up at me, her eyes welling full with tears like pools of reflected light spilling over from some deep-remembered reservoir of sorrow.
At first I thought she was hurt or upset but then could see she was feeling an ache a desolation deep as a homesickness as she wept for wonder at the sad beauty of the music of the land her ancestors left long ago – it spoke for her the words she herself could not express:
Of the One who waits for us Who will always wait for us In those radiant meadows
Yet also came to live with us And wanders where we wander.
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I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope. My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning. Psalm 130: 5-6 from a Song of Ascents
Waiting is essential to the spiritual life. But waiting as a disciple of Jesus is not an empty waiting. It is a waiting with a promise in our hearts that makes already present what we are waiting for.
We wait during Advent for the birth of Jesus. We wait after Easter for the coming of the Spirit, and after the ascension of Jesus we wait for his coming again in glory.
It is this great absence that is like a presence, that compels me to address it without hope of a reply. It is a room I enter
from which someone has just gone, the vestibule for the arrival of one who has not yet come. I modernise the anachronism
of my language, but he is no more here than before. Genes and molecules have no more power to call him up than the incense of the Hebrews
at their altars. My equations fail as my words do. What resources have I other than the emptiness without him of my whole being, a vacuum he may not abhor? ~R.S. Thomas “The Absence”
To wait is hard when we know the value of the gift that awaits us. We know exactly what is in the package since we have watched it being carefully chosen, wrapped and presented to us to open.
We have seen His footprints on our landscape: in the hottest dessert, in the deepest snow, in the meadows and in the forests, in the mud and muck and mire of our lives; we know He has been here and wait for His return.
Not yet though, not quite yet. So we wait, and continue to wait.
Even more so, we wait and hope for what we do not see but know is coming, like a groaning in the labor of childbirth.
The waiting is never easy; it is painful to be patient, staying alert to possibility and hope when we are exhausted, barely able to function. Others won’t understand why we wait, nor do they comprehend what we could possibly be waiting for when it remains unseen, with only the footprints left behind to remind us.
Yet we persevere together, with patience, watching and hoping, like Mary and Joseph, like Elizabeth and Zechariah, like the shepherds, like the Magi of the east, like Simeon and Anna in the temple.
This is the meaning of Advent: we are a community groaning together in sweet anticipation and expectation of the gift of Morning to come.
photo by Josh Scholten
I pray my soul waits for the Lord My hope is in His word More than the watchman waits for dawn My soul waits for the Lord
1) Out of the depths I cry to You; From darkest places I will call. Incline Your ear to me anew, And hear my cry for mercy, Lord. Were You to count my sinful ways How could I come before Your throne? Yet full forgiveness meets my gaze – I stand redeemed by grace alone.
CHORUS I will wait for You, I will wait for You, On Your word I will rely. I will wait for You, surely wait for You Till my soul is satisfied.
2) So put Your hope in God alone, Take courage in His power to save; Completely and forever won By Christ emerging from the grave.
3) His steadfast love has made a way, And God Himself has paid the price, That all who trust in Him today Find healing in his sacrifice.
I will wait for You, I will wait for You Through the storm and through the night. I will wait for You, surely wait for You, For Your love is my delight.
Wait for the Lord, his day is near Wait for the Lord, be strong take heart Prepare the way for the Lord Make a straight path for Him The Glory of the Lord shall be revealed All the Earth will see the Lord Rejoice in the Lord always He is at Hand Joy and gladness for all who seek the Lord
This year’s Barnstorming Advent theme “… the Beginning shall remind us of the End” is taken from the final lines in T.S. Eliot’s poem “The Cultivation of Christmas Trees”
I have never been fishing on the Susquehanna or on any river for that matter to be perfectly honest.
Not in July or any month have I had the pleasure — if it is a pleasure — of fishing on the Susquehanna.
I am more likely to be found in a quiet room like this one — a painting of a woman on the wall, a bowl of tangerines on the table — trying to manufacture the sensation of fishing on the Susquehanna.
There is little doubt that others have been fishing on the Susquehanna,
rowing upstream in a wooden boat, sliding the oars under the water then raising them to drip in the light.
But the nearest I have ever come to fishing on the Susquehanna was one afternoon in a museum in Philadelphia,
when I balanced a little egg of time in front of a painting in which that river curled around a bend
under a blue cloud-ruffled sky, dense trees along the banks, and a fellow with a red bandana
sitting in a small, green flat-bottom boat holding the thin whip of a pole. That is something I am unlikely ever to do, I remember saying to myself and the person next to me.
Then I blinked and moved on to other American scenes of haystacks, water whitening over rocks,
even one of a brown hare who seemed so wired with alertness I imagined him springing right out of the frame. ~Billy Collins Fishing On The Susquehanna In July
A Hare in the Forest by Hans Hoffman (Getty Museum)Susquehanna by Jasper Francis Cropsey
I live a quiet life in a quiet place. There are many experiences not on my bucket list that I’m content to simply imagine.
I’m not a rock climber or a zip liner or willing to jump out of an airplane. I won’t ride a horse over a four foot jump or race one around a track. Not for me waterskis or unicycles or motorcycles.
I’m grateful there are those who are eagerly wired with alertness for the next experience: adventurers who seek out the extremes of life so the rest of us can sit back and admire their courage and applaud their explorations and achievement.
My mind’s eye and imagination is powerful enough, thanks to the words and pictures of others. I find I’m content to explore the corners of my quiet places, both inside and outside, to see what I can build from what I find right here under my nose.
When the light is right, and I’m open enough to it, what I see is ready to spring right out of the frame.
The difficulty to think at the end of day, When the shapeless shadow covers the sun And nothing is left except light on your fur—
….and August the most peaceful month.
To be, in the grass, in the peacefullest time, And to feel that the light is a rabbit-light In which everything is meant for you And nothing need be explained;
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