Tag: Grace

Good Things in Abundance

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There was an entire aspect to my life that I had been blind to — the small, good things that came in abundance.
~Mary Karr from The Art of Memoir

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.
~Thornton Wilder, quotes from “Our Town”

The smell of baking bread, smooth floured hands,
butter waiting to be spread with blackberry jam,
and I realize, this is no small thing.
These days spent confined,
I am drawn to life’s ordinary details,
the largeness of all we can do
alongside what we cannot.
The list of allowances far outweighs my complaints.
I am fortunate to have flour and yeast, a source of heat,
not to mention soft butter, the tartness of blackberries
harvested on a cold back road.
A kitchen, a home, two working
hands to stir and knead,
a clear enough head to gather it all.
Even the big toothy knife feels miraculous
as it grabs hold and cracks the crust.
~Ellen Rowland “No Small Thing”

The words from “Our Town” written over 80 years ago still ring true:
our country a Great Depression of the economy then –
now we stagger under a Great Depression of the spirit.

Despite being more connected electronically, we are actually more divisive than ever, many feeling estranged from family, friends, faith.

Some less economically secure,
yet many emotionally bankrupt.

May we be more conscious of our abundance –
our small daily treasures.

God knows we need Him.
He cares for us, even when
we turn our faces away from Him.

I search the soil of this life,
this farm, this faith
to find what still yearns
to grow, to bloom, to fruit,
to be harvested to share with others.

My deep gratitude goes to you
who visit here once in awhile, or daily.
Thank you to those who let me know
the small and the good I share with you
makes a difference.

I’m right here,
alongside you in joint Thanksgiving
to our Creator and Preserver.

Many blessings today and always,
Emily

Let it go my love my truest
Let it sail on silver wings
Life’s a twinkling and that’s for certain
But it’s such a fine thing

CHORUS:There’s a gathering of spirits
There’s a festival of friends
And we’ll take up where we left off
When we all meet again

I can’t explain it
I couldn’t if I tried
How the only things we carry
Are the things we hold inside

Like a day in the open
Like the love we won’t forget
Like the laughter that we started
And it hasn’t died down yet

Oh let it go my love my truest
Let it sail on silver wings
Life’s a twinkling and that’s for certain
But it’s such a fine thing

Oh yeah now didn’t we
And don’t we make it shine
Aren’t we standing in the center of
Something rare and fine

Some glow like embers
Like a light through colored glass
Some give it all in one great flame

Throwing kisses as they pass

So let it go my love my truest
Let it sail on silver wings
Life’s a twinkling and that’s for certain
But it’s such a fine thing

East of eden
But there’s heaven in our midst
And we’re never really all that far
From those we love and miss
Wade out in the water
There’s a glory all around
And the wisest say there’s a thousand ways
To kneel and kiss the ground

Oh let it go my love my truest
Let it sail on silver wings
Life’s a twinkling and that’s for certain
But it’s such a fine thing

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The Rustling Maize

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A dim veil hangs over the landscape and flood,
And the hills are all mellowed in haze,
While Fall, creeping on like a monk ‘neath his hood,
Plucks the thick-rustling wealth of the maize.

And long for this manna that springs from the sod
Shall we gratefully give Him the praise,
The source of all bounty, our Father and God,
Who sent us from heaven the maize!
~William Fosdick “The Maize”

Come, boys, sing!—
                               Sing of the yellow corn,
                           Sing, boys, sing,
                               Sing of the yellow corn!
He springeth up from the fallow soil,
With the blade so green and tall,
And he payeth well the reaper’s toil,
When the husks in the autumn fall.
              The pointed leaves,
                  And the golden ear,
              The rustling sheaves,
                  In the ripened year—
                            Sing, boys, sing!
                               Sing of the yellow corn,
                            Sing, boys, sing,
                               Sing of the yellow corn.

He drinks the rain in the summer long,
And he loves the streams that run,
And he sends the stalk so stout and strong,
To bask in the summer sun.
              The pointed leaves,
                   And the golden ear,
              The rustling sheaves,
                   In the ripened year—
                              Sing, boys, sing!
                                  Sing of the yellow corn,
                              Sing, boys, sing,
                                  Sing of the yellow corn.

He loves the dews of the starry night,
And the breathing wind that plays
With his tassels green, when the mellow light
Of the moon on the meadow stays.
              The pointed leaves,
                   And the golden ear,
              The rustling sheaves,
                   In the ripened year—
                              Sing, boys, sing!
                                  Sing of the yellow corn,
                              Sing, boys, sing,
                                  Sing of the yellow corn.

A glorious thing is the yellow corn,
With the blade so green and tall,
A blessed thing is the yellow corn,
When the husks in the autumn fall.
              Then, sing, boys, sing!
                  Sing of the yellow corn,
              Sing, boys, sing,
                  Sing of the yellow corn!
                     The pointed leaves,
                          And the golden ear,
                     The rustling sheaves,
                          In the ripened year—
                              Come, sing, boys, sing!
                                   Sing of the yellow corn,
                               Sing, boys, sing,
                                   Sing of the yellow corn.
~Charles Eastman “The Yellow Corn”

The dying autumn garden can feel like a treasure hunt as we pull out and sort through the dead and dying vines and stalks: a giant zucchini growing undetected under leaves, a rotting pumpkin collapsing into itself, fat hollowed beans ready to burst with seed.

Everything is dry and rustling in the north winds.

The greatest Easter Egg of all hidden away in husk and cornsilk is glass gem corn. It grew on stunted stalks with few apparent ears, so pitiful next to our robust sweet corn crop.

It fooled us; this corn is pure gold in a kaleidoscope Thanksgiving display – purely ornamental since it doesn’t grow prolific like a sweet yellow corn. Yet these meager ears glow like stained glass, colorful quilt swatches on a stalk.

God has a palette of heaven-sent color and imagination. People come in all colors too, thanks to His artistry, but not nearly so varied as these kernels of colored glass.

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An Increasing Enigma

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A turkey is more occult and awful than all the angels and archangels. In so far as God has partly revealed to us an angelic world, he has partly told us what an angel means. But God has never told us what a turkey means. And if you go and stare at a live turkey for an hour or two, you will find by the end of it that the enigma has rather increased than diminished.
~ Gilbert K. Chesterton from All Things Considered

There is something about looking into a turkey’s eye that makes you think twice about them being the focus of millions of dinners later this week. We’re raised chickens, ducks and geese on our farm over the years, but we never did raise our own turkey for Thanksgiving. Perhaps they look much wiser and dignified than they actually are, but I’m told they too, can become quite bonded with their farmer caretakers.

I am grateful for many things this week, including professionals who have skill in working on rural wells and well pumps and filtration systems, as well as plumbers working on plugged pipes and drainage issues, and the fact our entire family is arriving this week when our water supply and drainage are on the fritz.

But most of all, I’m grateful I’m not a turkey.

I’m glad God keeps turkeys more of an enigma than the angels who assist us when we need it most, even during a holiday week.

I think God’s angelic world will be the primary focus for us this week.

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Emptied Out in the Wind

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What we were taught was nothing—
our history like a husk,
the desiccated wasp nest
my daughter found at the park
but disguised. Where is the life?
Where was the life in that?

History as it was taught
is nothing like that wasp nest
which has its particular grooves,
its exits and passageways
written in wasp spit and wood.

Looking at this nest I see
how everything was used.
Our history of a wasp
is its stings, but in this nest,
even dead, I see the ornate
stingless habitat, envision
nests with stingers subdued,
their larvae fattening
sleek bodies of use and grace.

History as it was taught
has been emptied and emptied out,
its intricate well-laid cells
disguised. They always teemed
with sickness, utility,
and violence. And each person
who happened only once.

Who happened only once.
~Lisa Williams “No Wasp Nest”

…And I think
They know my strength,
Can gauge
The danger of their work:
One blow could crush them
And their nest; and I am not their friend.

And yet they seem
Too deeply and too fiercely occupied
To bother to attend.
Perhaps they sense
I’ll never deal the blow,
For, though I am not in nor of them,
Still I think I know
What it is like to live
In an alien and gigantic universe, a stranger,
Building the fragile citadels of love
On the edge of danger.
~James Rosenberg from “The Wasps’ Nest”

Over the years, we have had basketball-sized paper bald-faced hornet nests appear in various places on the farm. They hang from eaves or branches undisturbed as their busy citizens visit our picnics, greedily buzz our compost pile, shoot bullet-like out of the garbage can when I lift the lid. In short, their threat of using their weaponry control our moves during the summer.

Two years ago, a nest was built to include some Golden Delicious apples in an apple tree. This year, a nest hung suspended from the top branch of our tall big leaf maple tree in our front yard. It dangled there through the summer, growing week by week, with maple keys and leaves incorporated into it. Over the last month, it has been hanging alone on the bare tree.

During a northeast wind blast yesterday, I was returning home from a shopping trip when out of the corner of my eye, I saw this huge thing flying across our yard. I thought it was a large raptor, but then realized that our paper basketball had finally been jarred loose and was airborne.

I followed it until it landed in our field and gathered up the broken pieces into a grocery bag. My wise husband wouldn’t allow me to bring it in the house (“who knows what’s ready to wake up inside??”}, so I inspected it outside.

It was a magnificent feat of community cooperation and construction.

The nest had been abandoned, its workers dead and gone and its queen safely tucked into a winter hiding spot inside a tree trunk. Each nest happens only once, a fragile fortress for only a season.

The approach of winter had dealt a devastating blow and the nest disabled, now gone with the wind. It was torn free from its tight hold on a branch, flying aloft in its lightness of being, then fallen, crushed and torn open. Its secret heart is revealed and all the danger emptied out.

As I am not in or of them, I did not cast the stone that brought it down. Instead, it let go of its own accord and followed the wind.

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A World of Hurt

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The pain I feel now is the happiness I had before. That’s the deal.
~C.S. Lewis from A Grief Observed

I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain. 
~James A. Baldwin

We pay for hate with our lives, and that’s too big a price to pay.
~Brené Brown from Braving the Wilderness

We live in a world of hurt. We are consumed with hatred for all that is unjust and unfair because we are people who are in fear and in pain.

We get angry at what we don’t like or don’t understand and that includes the mystery of the ways of God.

We are a people struggling with profound irritability of the spirit.
We give no one the benefit of the doubt any more,
and that includes God.

We ask God why He doesn’t do something about the suffering we see everywhere, or the terrible hurt we feel ourselves. We want answers, and that includes answers from God.

Instead He asks us the same question right back:
What are we doing about the suffering of others?
What are we doing to understand our own misery?
Where are we seeking answers if not from His own Words?

God knows suffering and hurt.
He knows fear.
He knows what it is to be hated, far more than we do.
He took it all on Himself,
loving us so much because His pain was
part of the deal He made with us to rescue us.

With that realization,
we trade our pain for hope in Him,
our fear for trust in His promises,
and our hatred gives way to His sacrificial love.

Only then are we ready to respond to His call,
wrap ourselves within and around Him,
cling to His Word,
and feel His comfort for His people.

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear..
1 John 4:18a

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Spoonful By Spoonful

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Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons…
~T.S. Eliot from The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

Tokyo Starbucks
photo of Edinburgh street, taken from Starbucks

I read recently that Starbucks’ business has suffered a loss of customers because of longer waits for service, and price increases for custom-ordered drinks that take more barista time to create.

I have been a pretty loyal coffee customer since Starbucks opened their first shop at Pike Street Market in Seattle over 50 years ago. I have visited countless Starbucks, including one in the bustling Narita Airport in Tokyo and an upstairs shop on a drizzly corner in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Over that time, I’ve graduated from brewed coffee from dark roast beans to dark roast decaf beans. There is a difference between 20 year old me and 70 year old me; caffeine is no longer my friend.

Over a decade ago, I was buying my usual twice a month supply of decaf coffee beans from my local Starbucks shop. The barista looked at me apologetically and said “have you heard?”. She said my favorite blend was being phased out and soon would no longer be available. 

This completely disturbed my decaffeinated equilibrium.

I immediately wrote to the “Starbucks Customer Care” website to see if they really do care about their customers.

How could it be that I became so attached to a particular brand, a specific taste, a daily routine that something so insignificant in the scheme of things should become so significant to me? 

I was upset at myself for being perturbed by this.

So what if I’m in a minority of coffee drinkers who can only handle decaf because caffeine now makes my pulse race and my hands jittery.

So what if I’m part of an aging cohort who may not be all that important to the corporate world bent on marketing the newest taste trend to the young and fashionable. 

So what if I’m ridiculously dependent on that 5:30 AM home brewed cup of coffee, not because of needing a drug to wake me up, but because it is something I have done happily for years,
measuring out my days spoonful by spoonful.

I am indeed grateful for routine, and in my own grudging way, I can learn to be grateful for change. I suppose I’ll could get used to another blend if I have to (please, not too “herbal” or “flowery”). 

But life will not be the same – the evenings, mornings, afternoons I know so well.

It’s just tough to adapt when each morning has been defined by “Decaffinated, yet rich and well-balanced with a dark cocoa texture and a roasty sweetness, like the flavor of a fire-roasted marshmallow after you pull off the darkened cap. To be enjoyed with chocolate truffles and dinner guests who stay late.”  

Wow, they pay people to write stuff like that.  

I guess it isn’t as appealing to say “to be cherished with morning oatmeal by farmer physician poets who can’t handle caffeine.”

Too bad. We’re actually a pretty nice bunch. 
All one of us.

Postscript: My favorite decaf blend was phased out but later reintroduced and became one of their best sellers. I guess we’re all getting older…

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A Fragile Light

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Dark mornings staying dark
longer, another autumn

come, and the body one
day poorer yet,

from restless sleep I wake
early now to note

how the pale disk of moon
caves to its own defeat,

cold as yesterday’s fish
left over in the pan,

or miserly as a sliver
of dried soap in a dish.

Oh for a sparkling froth
of cloud, a little heat

from the sun! I shiver
at the window where I plant

one perfect moon-round breath,
as I liked to do as a girl

against the filthy glass
of the yellow school bus

laboring up the hill,
not thinking what I meant

but passionate, as if
I were kissing my own life.
~Mary Jo Salter “Moon-Breath” from The Surveyors

And who has seen the moon, who has not seen
Her rise from out the chamber of the deep,
Flushed and grand and naked, as from the chamber
Of finished bridegroom, seen her rise and throw
Confession of delight upon the wave,
Littering the waves with her own superscription
Of bliss, till all her lambent beauty shakes towards us
Spread out and known at last, and we are sure
That beauty is a thing beyond the grave,
That perfect, bright experience never falls
To nothingness, and time will dim the moon
Sooner than our full consummation here
In this odd life will tarnish or pass away.
~D.H. Lawrence “Moonrise”

the moon looked into my window
it touched me with its small hands
and with curling infantile
fingers it understood my eyes cheeks mouth
its hands(slipping)felt of my necktie wandered
against my shirt and into my body the
sharp things fingered tinily my heart life

the little hands withdrew, jerkily, themselves
quietly they began playing with a button
the moon smiled she
let go my vest and crept
through the window
she did not fall
she went creeping along the air
                        over houses
                                roofs

And out of the east toward
her a fragile light bent gatheringly
~e.e. cummings “the moon looked into my window”

At times, I’m amazed at the heat of my own breath.
Forming a cloudy mist on a cold day,
a round fog on the mirror or window,
a warming of my ungloved fingers.

This breath that I was given at my beginning
is a gift I rarely think about,
a fragile gift I take for granted.

Nightly, as the moon honors the sun,
reflecting its glory like a faint echo
gathering in its light and warmth,
I treasure the heat and heart
of that first gift of breath so long ago.

Soli deo Gloria.

photo of supermoon by Harry Rodenberger
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For a Little While…

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Flee for a while from your tasks;
hide yourself for a little space from the turmoil of your thoughts.
Come, cast aside your burdensome cares,
and put aside your laborious pursuits.
For a little while give your time to God,
and rest in him for a little while.
Enter into the inner chamber of your mind,
shut out all things save God
and whatever may aid you in seeking God;
and having barred the door of your chamber, seek him.
~Anselm of Canterbury from Major Works

There were clinic days when I needed to leave early:
near tears, physically spent, too fried
to keep listening, problem solving, comforting.

These were times I needed to feel anything
other than being needed.
I was the picture of neediness myself — 
a sorry place to be.

Feeling overwhelmed had happened before:
middle of the night mothering a feverish vomiting child,
middle of the night mothering my frail dying mother,
middle of the night mothering a troubled world.

Yet morning still comes, after a little while,
shining and wondrous because God never left.

In my need, if I gently close the door to all worries
that are not God,
I find Him looking for me
and waiting to hear what I have to say.

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Emptying Like a Cloud

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God empties himself
into the earth like a cloud.
God takes the substance, contours
of a man, and keeps them,
dying, rising, walking,
and still walking
wherever there is motion.
Annie Dillard from “Feast Days” in Tickets for a Prayer Wheel

Soon we will enter the season of Advent, an opportunity to reflect on a God who “takes the substance, contours of a man”, as He “empties himself into the earth like a cloud.” 

Like drought-stricken parched ground, we prepare to respond to the drenching of the Spirit through the Son, and be ready to spring up with renewed growth.

He walked among us before His dying and subsequent rising up.
He walked among us again, appearing where least expected,
sharing a meal, causing our hearts to burn within us,
inviting us to touch and know Him.

His invitation remains open-ended,
His heart preparing us for our eternal home.

I think of that every time the clouds gather, open up, and empty.  
He freely falls to earth, soaking us completely,
through and through and through.

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The Inner Tree Revealed

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I am out with lanterns looking for myself…
~Emily Dickinson from “Letters”

And is it not enough that every year
A richly laden autumn should unfold
And shimmer into being leaf by leaf,
Its scattered ochres mirrored everywhere
In hints and glints of hidden red and gold
Threaded like memory through loss and grief,

When dusk descends, when branches are unveiled,
When roots reach deeper than our minds can feel
And ready us for winter with strange calm,
That I should see the inner tree revealed
And know its beauty as the bright leaves fall
And feel its truth within me as I am?

And is it not enough that I should walk
Through low November mist along the bank,
When scents of woodsmoke summon, in some long
And melancholy undertone, the talk
Of those old poets from whose works I drank
The heady wine of an autumnal song?

It is not yet enough. So I must try,
In my poor turn, to help you see it too,
As though these leaves could be as rich as those,
That red and gold might glimmer in your eye,
That autumn might unfold again in you,
Feeling with me what falling leaves disclose.
~Malcolm Guite “And Is It Not Enough?”

For over 15 years now, I have bared my soul here at Barnstorming, looking for others’ words to help me sort through the events of my life. I particularly look for words that resonate: I can say “I’ve felt like that as well,” with the hope that others reading along with me will recognize that familiar “yes, that is the way it is for me.”

Every day, I am out looking for myself with the help of Light provided by our Creator God. I carry lanterns hither and yon, exploring paths and hidden spaces and wondering what is around the next corner.

So I want to help you see where this journey is going.

Maybe it is finding your own “inner tree” as the leaves fall,
revealing the strength of bare bones.
Maybe it is noticing beauty in the ordinary.
Maybe it is the warmth of knowing someone else feels as you do.
Maybe it is discovering a connection, mysterious and wondrous.

Often I hear from you that the Light you carry helped lead you here.
Welcome, my friend — let’s walk together…

photo by Josh Scholten
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