Category: solace

A Kind and Familiar Path

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I slip, grabbing twigs as I fall,
assaulting an innocent hemlock—
skinning my palms, arms, legs,
landing muddy-bruised and sore,
taken down by a path I thought kind—
a familiar wooded walk hiding its ice
beneath a sheath of old, dried leaves.
~Laura Foley, “Spring Treachery” from It’s This

“Tell us please, what treatment in an emergency is administered by ear?”
….I met his gaze and I did not blink.
“Words of comfort,” I said.
~Abraham Verghese from Cutting for Stone

I was walking a kind and familiar path, part of my usual daily walk, not paying much attention when I stepped on what appeared a solid and trustworthy surface.

The danger was hidden from my eyes; I had no idea it would take me down, put me on my knees, render me helpless.

I believed I couldn’t be rendered helpless by something I trusted like the back of my hand … or the interior of my heart vessels.

But treacherous surfaces are almost anywhere we are least expecting. And so are the helpers, ready and able and willing.

When I lost my grip, I felt hands and voices lifting and supporting me, pulling me to safety, encouraging me with hope and refuge.

And so I’m here to share this, richly blessed by those coming along side me – still walking this path I love, despite its hidden and sometimes deadly, dangers.

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Talk Softly to Your Heart

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The main thing is this– 
when you get up in the morning 
you must take your heart in your two hands. 
You must do this every morning. 
Then talk softly to your heart, don’t yell. 
Say anything but be respectful. 
Say–maybe say, Heart, little heart, 
beat softly but never forget your job, the blood. 
You can whisper also, Remember, remember. 
~Grace Paley from “The Art of Growing Older” in  Just As I Thought

Approaching seventy, she learns to live,
at last. She realizes she has not
accomplished half of what she struggled for,
that she surrendered too many battles
and seldom celebrated those she won.
Approaching seventy, she learns to live
without ambition: a calm lake face, not
a train bound for success and glory. For
the first time, she relaxes her hands on the
controls, leans back to watch the coming end.
Asked, she’d tell you her life is made out of
the things she didn’t do, as much as the
things she did do. Did she sing a love song?
Approaching seventy, she learns to live
without wanting much more than the light in
the catbird window seat where, watching the
voracious fist-sized tweets, she hums along.
~Marilyn Nelson “Bird Feeder” 

I’ve been learning in retirement to let go by relaxing my grip on the controls on the runaway train of ambition. This is a change for someone driven for decades to succeed in various professional and personal roles. 

I’m aware who I am is defined both by what I haven’t gotten done and what I managed to do. And now, at seventy years old, I hope I still have some time to explore some of those things I left undone.

Except I haven’t been as robust and healthy as I wish to be. For the past month, during very chilly weather and after a prolonged bout of bronchitis, I found I couldn’t tolerate the cold air outside or in the barn while I did daily chores. My chest strangely hurt.

I finally took myself to a cardiologist who was concerned with a number of risk factors in my family and my own history and arranged testing, which I flunked yesterday.

I ended up with two stents to open blockages in my main coronary artery, plus a night in the hospital. I spent the night thinking about blessings and what needs to happen in my life now:

Reflecting with gratitude on being alive by the grace of our Lord.
Holding my heart gently and treating it well.
Humming as I go. 
Just sitting when I wish but walking when I must.
Watching out the window for the real twitters and tweeters in this crazy noisy world.
Loving up those around me.

It’s sweet to remember why I’m here. I’ve been given a new chance to enjoy every moment.

So after a lifetime of getting mostly A’s, flunking isn’t always bad.

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A Solitary Habit

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It was winter, near freezing,
I’d walked through a forest of firs
when I saw issue out of the waterfall
a solitary bird.

It lit on a damp rock,
and, as water swept stupidly on,
wrung from its own throat
supple, undammable song.

It isn’t mine to give.
I can’t coax this bird to my hand
that knows the depth of the river
yet sings of it on land.
~Kathleen Jamie “The Dipper”

photo by Josh Scholten

All winter
the blue heron
slept among the horses.
I do not know
the custom of herons,
do not know
if the solitary habit
is their way,
or if he listened for
some missing one—
not knowing even
that was what he did—
in the blowing
sounds in the dark,
I know that
hope is the hardest
love we carry.
He slept
with his long neck
folded, like a letter
put away.
~Jane Hirshfield “Hope and Love” from The Lives of the Heart

I know what it is like to feel out of step with those around me, an alien in my own land, especially these days.

At times I wonder if I belong at all as I watch the choices others make.

I grew up this way, missing a connection that I could not find,
never quite fitting in, a solitary kid becoming a solitary adult.
The aloneness bothered me, but not in a “I’ve-got-to-become-like-them” kind of way.

I went my own way, never losing hope.

Somehow misfits find each other. Through the grace and acceptance of others, I found a soul mate and community. Even so, there are times when the old feeling of not-quite-belonging creeps in and I wonder whether I’ll be a misfit all the way to the cemetery, placed in the wrong plot in the wrong graveyard.

We disparate creatures are made for connection of some kind, trying to find those who look and think and act like us, and especially hoping to be accepted by those who are completely different.

I’ll keep on the lookout for my fellow misfits, just in case there is another one out there looking for company along this journey.

photo by Josh Scholten
photo by Josh Scholten
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A Fattening Rain

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Every valley drinks,
        Every dell and hollow:
    Where the kind rain sinks and sinks,
        Green of Spring will follow.
 
    Yet a lapse of weeks
        Buds will burst their edges,
    Strip their wool-coats, glue-coats, streaks,
        In the woods and hedges;

    But for fattening rain
        We should have no flowers,
    Never a bud or leaf again
        But for soaking showers;

    We should find no moss
        In the shadiest places,
    Find no waving meadow grass
        Pied with broad-eyed daisies:
 
    But miles of barren sand,
        With never a son or daughter,
    Not a lily on the land,
        Or lily on the water.
~Christina Georgina Rossetti from “Winter Rain” from  Poems of Christina Rossetti (1904)

Don’t be ashamed to weep; ’tis right to grieve.
Tears are only water, and flowers, trees, and
fruit cannot grow without water.
But there must be sunlight also.
A wounded heart will heal in time,
and when it does, the memory and love
of our lost ones is sealed inside to comfort us.
~ Brian Jacques from Taggerung

It has been too cold to rain for weeks,
a chilly dry spell with unmelted snow
still piled in drifts along the roads.

Today is warm enough
for bulbs to breathe more freely
as they break through the crust,
given permission to bloom and grow.

The world weeps when no longer
frozen in place.
A drizzle decorates with mist
to welcome forth the fattening rain.

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Is There a Cure?

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“Peasant women digging potatoes” Van Gogh 1885 Kröller-Müller Museum The Netherlands

“Do you know a cure for me?”
“Why yes,” he said, “I know a cure for everything. Salt water.”
“Salt water?” I asked him.
“Yes,” he said, “in one way or the other. Sweat, or tears, or the salt sea.”
~Isak Dinesen from Seven Gothic Tales

A good night sleep, or a ten minute bawl, or a pint of chocolate ice cream, or all three together, is good medicine.
~Ray Bradbury from Dandelion Wine

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,   
But I have promises to keep,   
And miles to go before I sleep,   
And miles to go before I sleep.
~Robert Frost from “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”

If there is anything I learned in 42 years of doctoring, it’s that physicians “practice” every day in the pursuit of getting it right. As much as MDs emphasize the science of what we do through “evidence-based” decision-making, there were still days when a fair amount of educated guessing and a gut feeling was based on past experience, along with my best hunch. 

Many patients don’t arrive with classic cookbook symptoms that fit the standardized diagnostic and treatment algorithms. The nuances of their stories require interpretation, discernment, and flexibility. A surprise once in awhile made me look at a patient in a new or unexpected way and taught me something I didn’t know before. It kept me coming back with more questions, to figure out the mystery and dig a little deeper.

I also learned that though much medical treatment comes through some intervention using surgical procedures, pills or injections, those aren’t the only options in our doctor bag.

A simple good night’s sleep can do wonders for what ails a mind and body, especially when we’ve kept our promises.

At times the most appropriate cure is simple salt water in all its forms – just feeling ocean waves lapping at our feet, or sweating it out with exertion, or feeling the flow of tears down our cheeks.

How many of us allow ourselves a good cry when we feel it welling up behind our eyes?  It could be a sentimental moment–a song that brings back bittersweet memories, a movie that touches just the right chord of feeling and connection. It may be a moment of frustration and anger when nothing seems to go right. It could be the pain of physical illness or injury or emotional turmoil. 

Or just maybe there is weeping when everything is absolutely perfect and there cannot be another moment just like it, so it is tough to let it go without our tears spilling over.

And lastly, aside from the obvious curative properties of salt water, the healing found in chocolate is unquestioned by this physician. It can fix most everything that ails a person – at least for an hour or so.

It doesn’t always take an M.D. degree to determine the best medicine. It just takes a degree in common sense.

Healing tools to consider when all else fails: 
sleep, weep, keep ( promises), and reap (chocolate!)

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Breathing a Prayer

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It was beautiful as God
must be beautiful: glacial
eyes that had looked on
violence and come to terms
with it; a body too huge
and majestic for the cage in which
it had been put; up
and down in the shadow
of its own bulk it went
lifting, as it turned,
the crumpled flower of its face
to look into my own
face without seeing me. It
was the colour of the moonlight
on snow and as quiet
as moonlight, but breathing
as you can imagine that
God breaths within the confines
of our definition of him, agonizing
over immensities that will not return.
~R.S. Thomas “The White Tiger”

There are nights that are so still
that I can hear the small owl calling
far off and a fox barking
miles away. It is then that I lie
in the lean hours awake listening
to the swell born somewhere in the Atlantic
rising and falling, rising and falling
wave on wave on the long shore
by the village that is without light
and companionless. And the thought comes
of that other being who is awake, too,
letting our prayers break on him,
not like this for a few hours,
but for days, years, for eternity.
~R.S.Thomas “The Other”

Angels, where you soar
Up to God’s own light,
Take my own lost bird
On your hearts tonight;
And as grief once more
Mounts to heaven and sings,
Let my love be heard
Whispering in your wings.
~Alfred Noyes “A Prayer”

We confine and cage our concept of God, trying to understand His power and beauty within our limited world. He tells us what He is capable of, yet we diminish His immensity to only what we are able to fathom.

He is an eternal mystery, allowing our beseeching prayers to break over Him again and again and again.

Our grief is carried on wings to God, our prayers desperate for His breath and comfort.

Let our love be heard, let our love be heard, let our love be heard –always and forever.

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Preparing Their Buds

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All the complicated details
of the attiring and
the disattiring are completed!
A liquid moon
moves gently among
the long branches.
Thus having prepared their buds
against a sure winter
the wise trees
stand sleeping in the cold.
~William Carlos Williams “Winter Trees”

Winter – a quiet, still time for trees,
a time for preparation for new attire,
a time for root-stretching and branch-reaching.

Unless there are windstorms
Unless there is frozen rain
Unless there is heavy burden of snowfall

A tree might be taken unawares in the night,
branches breaking like popping gunshots,
as if innocent prey is hunted.

Remnants lie waiting on the ground,
unaware of their brokenness,
still budding, hopeful for yet another spring.

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A Poem of the Air

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Out of the bosom of the Air,
Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken,
Over the woodlands brown and bare,
Over the harvest-fields forsaken
Silent, and soft, and slow
Descends the snow.

Even as our cloudy fancies take
Suddenly shape in some divine expression,
Even as the troubled heart doth make
In the white countenance confession,
The troubled sky reveals
The grief it feels.

This is the poem of the air,
Slowly in silent syllables recorded;
This is the secret of despair,
Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded,
Now whispered and revealed
To wood and field.
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow “Snow-Flakes”

Snowflakes cover all,
settling in around us,
drifting about the tucked corners
of a downy white comforter

Watching as heaven comes to earth,
plumps the pillows,
cushions the landscape,
and tries to lighten our grieving hearts.

I know dark clouds will gather ’round me
I know my way is hard and steep
But beauteous fields arise before me
Where God’s redeemed, their vigils keep
~from Wayfaring Stranger

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A Steady Center Holds

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Sometimes from sorrow, for no reason,
you sing. For no reason, you accept
the way of being lost, cutting loose
from all else and electing a world
where you go where you want to.

Arbitrary, a sound comes, a reminder
that a steady center is holding
all else. If you listen, that sound
will tell you where it is and you
can slide your way past trouble.

Certain twisted monsters
always bar the path—but that’s when
you get going best, glad to be lost,
learning how real it is
here on earth, again and again.
~William Stafford “Cutting Loose” from Dancing with Joy: 99 Poems

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere   
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst   
Are full of passionate intensity.
~William Butler Yeats from The Second Coming

Life is a hard battle anyway. If we laugh and sing a little as we fight the good fight of freedom, it makes it all go easier. I will not allow my life’s light to be determined by the darkness around me.
~Sojourner Truth

There are so many twists and turns in this life, we lose sight of the Center of all things. We don’t always know what is around the next corner. It can feel like things are falling apart, and we could be swallowed up.

Getting lost, tripping on rocks and falling into holes is part of reality. Bruises and scrapes remind us where we have been and what we have been through, yet we keep going.

We do not honor the arbitrary whims of bullies,
nor dim ourselves within the darkness where they dwell.

So we sing:

We shall overcome.
We’ll walk hand in hand.
We are not alone.
We are not afraid.
We shall all be free.
We shall live in peace.
Someday.

God will see us through.

Thank you to Parker Palmer and Carrie Newcomer who spoke about the Stafford poem “Cutting Loose” here

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Oh, deep in my heart
I do believe
We shall overcome some day

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Beginning an Uprising

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To clasp the hands in prayer is the beginning of an uprising against the disorder of the world.
~Karl Barth

sunrise81144

Whatever happens.
Whatever
what is is
is what I want.
Only that.
But that.
~Galway Kinnell “Prayer”

sunrise10915

Ah — a resting place,
where we come to understand
it is not required of us
to wrestle constantly and passionately
with our God —
nor pursue relentlessly
all God’s decrees as we understand them,
but only that we listen and wonder
and hope and pray,
that we might, perhaps,
make just a little difference,
one quiet grey day.
~Edwina Gateley “Just a Little Difference”

There is much shouting and gnashing of teeth going on in our country right now – some from the streets, some from computer keyboards and screens, and some from inside the echoing halls of government and a certain white house.

We need to stop shouting and clasp hands in prayer.

Nothing can right the world until we are right with God through talking to Him out of our depth of need and fear. Nothing can right the world until we submit ourselves wholly, bowed low, hands clasped, eyes closed, articulating the joy, the thanks, and the petitions weighing on our hearts.

An uprising is only possible when our voice comes alive, unashamed, unselfconscious, rising up from within us, uttering words that beseech and thank and praise. To rise up with hands clasped together calls upon a power needing no billions of funds and no weapons of destruction and no walls to keep people in or keep them out.

He is the Word, come to overcome and overwhelm the shambles left of our world. Nothing can be more victorious than the Amen, our Amen, at the end of our prayers.

So be it and so shall it be.

Amen.
And again…Amen.

sunrise109151
original 1918 photo by Eric Engstrom
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