In this short Life that only lasts an hour
How much – how little – is within our power
~Emily Dickinson (1292)
We think we can control so much in our short lives, but one novel virus tells us how little power we have.
May we turn over our need for control and instead relish the moment. It only comes once — blink and miss it. So don’t blink!
Oh do you have time
to linger
for just a little while
out of your busy
and very important day
for the goldfinches
that have gathered
in a field of thistles
for a musical battle,
to see who can sing
the highest note,
or the lowest,
or the most expressive of mirth,
or the most tender?
Their strong, blunt beaks
drink the air
as they strive
melodiously
not for your sake
and not for mine
and not for the sake of winning
but for sheer delight and gratitude –
believe us, they say,
it is a serious thing
just to be alive
on this fresh morning
in the broken world.
I beg of you,
do not walk by
without pausing
to attend to this
rather ridiculous performance.
It could mean something.
It could mean everything.
It could be what Rilke meant, when he wrote:
You must change your life.
~Mary Oliver “An Invitation”
…for here there is no place
that does not see you.
You must change your life.
~Rainer Maria Rilke from “Archaic Torso of Apollo”
Just to be alive means everything~~
Despite all the brokenness in this world
and our own cracks in need of glue,
we need healing.
I welcome the change; a new day
of delight and gratitude.
Do not walk by.
Pause.
Linger.
Change.
You are welcome.
Like the small soft unchanging flower
The words in silence speak;
Obedient to their ancient power
The tear stands on my cheek.
Though our world burns, the small dim words
Stand here in steadfast grace,
And sing, like the indifferent birds,
About a ruined place.
Though the tower fall, the day be done,
The night be drawing near,
Yet still the tearless tune pipes on,
And still evokes the tear.
The tearless tune, wiser than we,
As weak and strong as grass
Or the wild bracken-fern we see
Spring where the palace was.
~Ruth Pitter “On an Old Poem” from Poems 1926-1966
When I write
a poem, sometimes, there is a kind of daze
that lifts, and I can see
what I couldn’t before, as if my mind
was in a fog, a cloud,
and only wanted
a poem to lift it out. I wanted
the rhythm, just the right
word, the crescendo from whisper to loud
celebration, and found them in the days
of trying poems. And I don’t mind
telling you: poetry has brought complacency
to a (wanted) end, turned upside-down days
aright, settled my unquiet mind,
and allowed me to clearly see.
~Monica Sharman from “What Poetry Can Do”
When the world is topsy-turvy
and all seems immersed in fog and cobwebs,
it helps to put down images and words
to clarify and highlight.
Daily I need reminding to stay centered,
daily I acknowledge what makes me weep
and what is worth celebration.
It is a new day to illustrate with words and pictures
what is unchanging in my life:
thank God for a new day,
everyday.
Spring flew swiftly by, and summer came;
and if the village had been beautiful at first,
it was now in the full glow and luxuriance of its richness.
The great trees, which had looked shrunken and bare in the earlier months, had now burst into strong life and health;
and stretching forth their green arms over the thirsty ground,
converted open and naked spots into choice nooks,
where was a deep and pleasant shade
from which to look upon the wide prospect,
steeped in sunshine, which lay stretched out beyond.
The earth had donned her mantle of brightest green;
and shed her richest perfumes abroad.
It was the prime and vigour of the year;
all things were glad and flourishing.”
~ Charles Dickens from Oliver Twist
Despite a pandemic,
despite economic hardship,
despite racial tensions and in-the-street protests,
despite political maneuvering and posturing:
life is green and flourishing and vigorous
even when we feel gray and withered and weakened.
May we not forget why we are here.
May we never forget our calling and purpose
to steward the earth and care for one another.
Two whistles, one for each,
and familiar sounds draw close in darkness—
cadence of hoof on hardened bottomland,
twinned blowing of air through nostrils curious, flared.
They come deepened and muscular movements
conjured out of sleep: each small noise and scent
heavy with earth, simple beyond communion…
…and in the night, their mares’ eyes shine, reflecting stars,
the entire, outer light of the world here.
~Jane Hirschfield from “After Work”
It’s tempting to fall headfirst into their fathomless well –
Their eyes are what rivet me as they search my own,
This retinal magnet drawing me into
Such incalculable depths.
Yet I’m merely reflected like starlight;
Only dancing on this mirrored surface
When I long to dive deep to understand what they see in me:
To be so lost I must be found.
You love the roses – so do I. I wish
The sky would rain down roses, as they rain
From off the shaken bush. Why will it not?
Then all the valley would be pink and white
And soft to tread on. They would fall as light
As feathers, smelling sweet; and it would be
Like sleeping and like waking, all at once!
~George Eliot from “The Spanish Gypsy”
It was gardener/author Alphonse Karr in the mid-19th century who wrote that even though most people grumble about roses having thorns, he was grateful that thorns have roses.
There was a time when thorns were not part of our world, when we knew nothing of suffering and death. Yet in pursuing and desiring more than we were already generously given, we received more than we bargained for. We are still paying for that decision; we continue to reel under the thorns our choices produce — every day there is more bloodletting.
So a Rose was sent to adorn the thorns.
And what did we do? We chose thorns to make Him bleed and still do to this day.
A fragrant rose blooms beautiful,
bleeding amid the thorns,
raining down as we sleep and wake,
and will to the endless day.
Abandon entouré d’abandon, tendresse touchant aux tendresses…
C’est ton intérieur qui sans cesse se caresse, dirait-on;
se caresse en soi-même, par son propre reflet éclairé.
Ainsi tu inventes le thème du Narcisse exaucé.
~Rainer Maria Rilke “Dirait-on” from his French Poetry collection ‘Les chansons de la rose’
(Literal translation of “So They Say” from “The Song of the Rose”)
Abandon enveloping abandon, Tenderness brushing tendernesses,
Who you are sustains you eternally, so they say;
Your very being is nourished by its own enlightened reflection;
So you compose the theme of Narcissus redeemed.
http://www.classicalchops.org/videos/morten-lauridsen-how-he-wrote-dirait-on
It is possible, I suppose that sometime
we will learn everything
there is to learn: what the world is, for example,
and what it means. I think this as I am crossing
from one field to another…
At my feet the white-petalled daisies display
the small suns of their center piece, their – if you don’t
mind my saying so – their hearts. Of course
I could be wrong, perhaps their hearts are pale and
narrow and hidden in the roots. What do I know?
But this: it is heaven itself to take what is given,
to see what is plain; what the sun lights up willingly;
for example – I think this
as I reach down, not to pick but merely to touch –
the suitability of the field for the daisies, and the
daisies for the field.
~Mary Oliver from “Daisies”
I am content realizing I won’t understand what this world means, (and why any of us matter when we are all made up of the same atoms as everything else in existence);
No, I will remain in the dark until I cross from this field to the next. I have to wait for heaven itself to see how the Sun illuminates what matters.
It is all mystery in the meantime, and sometimes a mean and joyless mystery – with pain and heartbreak and suffering, but just enough loving sacrifice to make it worthwhile.
How are our atoms different from that stone, or that tree or that daisy?
We are breathed on. As God’s breath surges within us, we laugh out loud, weep mightily and sing out His Words – struggling to be suitable for this field, so often trampled and broken, but with plans to flourish plentiful in the Sun of heaven.
I wonder what it would be like to live in a world
where it was always June.
~L. M. Montgomery from Anne of the Island
Each month is special in its own way: I tend to favor April and October for how the light plays on the landscape during transitional times — a residual of what has been, with a hint of what lies ahead.
Then there is June. Dear, gentle, abundant and overwhelming June. Nothing is dried up, there is such a rich feeling of ascension into lushness of summer with an “out of school” attitude, even if one has graduated long ago.
And the light, and the birdsong and the dew and the greens — such vivid verdant greens.
As lovely as June is, 30 days is more than plenty or I would become completely saturated. Then I can be released from my sated stupor to wistfully hunger for June for 335 more.
We do not want merely to see beauty…
we want something else which can hardly be put into words-
to be united with the beauty we see,
to pass into it,
to receive it into ourselves,
to bathe in it,
to become part of it.
We discern the freshness and purity of morning,
but they do not make us fresh and pure.
We cannot mingle with the splendours we see.
But all the leaves of the New Testament
are rustling with the rumour
that it will not always be so.
Someday, God willing, we shall get in.
~C.S. Lewis from The Weight of Glory
We are wounded by the grime of this world, no question about it. Just one look at the headlines shows how tainted and sullied we’ve become, so long separated from the beauty and perfection for which we were created.
The wounds we bear are from beauty banished when we desperately wish to bathe in it. We’re offered just such a cleansing when we offer up our soiled selves.
Come on in, the water is fine.
Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers today;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.
Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts at night;
And make us happy in the happy bees,
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees.
And make us happy in the darting bird
That suddenly above the bees is heard,
The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,
And off a blossom in mid-air stands still.
For this is love and nothing else is love,
The which it is reserved for God above
To sanctify to what far ends He will,
But which it only needs that we fulfil.
~Robert Frost “A Prayer in Spring”
We are wisely warned what may happen in the next few months: a second or third wave of virus, more disruption, more closures, more deaths. There seems no end in sight on this long COVID road. Or perhaps the end is prematurely near for too many.
Thinking so far away to uncertain times ahead, we need to remember the future has always been uncertain; we just aren’t reminded so starkly. Instead we are reminded to dwell in the present here and now, appreciating these quiet moments at home for what they may bestow.
The earth is springing even while our hearts are weary of distancing and isolation. Each breath is filled with new fragrance, the greens startlingly verdant, each blossom heavy with promise.
There is reassurance in this renewal we witness yet again.
This, now, is love springing.
This is His love, reminding us He has not abandoned us.
This is love and nothing else can be as certain as that.
