Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted, and by degrees the forms and colours of things are restored to them, and we watch the dawn remaking the world in its antique pattern.
~Oscar Wilde from The Picture of Dorian Gray
Tag: mist
Steaming Like a Horse
Why do we bother with the rest of the day,
the swale of the afternoon,
the sudden dip into evening,
then night with his notorious perfumes,
his many-pointed stars?
This is the best—
throwing off the light covers,
feet on the cold floor,
and buzzing around the house on espresso—
and, if necessary, the windows—
trees fifty, a hundred years old
out there,
heavy clouds on the way
and the lawn steaming like a horse
in the early morning.
~Billy Collins from “Morning”
~Billy Collins from “Morning”
A Mere Mist
Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.
James 4:14
…Noticing
a spider’s web under the olive trees
splendidly hung with early drops, already
vanishing up the vortex of the air
…a heaven-sent refreshment? or a curtain
cutting out the light?
And I must ask it now
(small moisture that I am)under the sun of God’s great grace on me:
Which am I–dew, or fog?
~Luci Shaw from “…for you are a mist“
To be mist that clarifies
rather than opacifies,
that reflects
rather than absorbs,
that replenishes
rather than depletes~
to evaporate within His warmth,
glistening with descended grace.
Another Voyage Starts
new year’s eve-
in the echo of fog horns
another voyage starts
– Keiko Izawa
I grew up on a small farm located about two miles from a bay in Puget Sound. When I awoke, I knew it was a foggy morning outside even before looking out my bedroom window. The fog horns located on coastal buildings and bobbing buoys scattered throughout the inlet would echo mournful moans and groans to warn freighter ships away from the rocky or muddy shallows. The resonant lowing of the horns carried miles over the surrounding landscape due to countless water particles in the fog transmitting sound waves so effectively. The louder the foghorn moan heard on our farm, the thicker the mist in the air. The horn voices would make me unspeakably sad for reasons I could never articulate.
Embarking on a voyage in blinding foggy conditions, just like starting a new year, portends both adventure and risk. Of course I’d prefer to see exactly where I am headed, carefully navigating with precise knowledge, eventually winding up exactly at my intended destination. The reality is that the future can be a murky mess. We cannot see what lies ahead: we navigate by our wits, by our best guess, but particularly by listening for the low-throated warnings coming from the rocky shores and shallows of those who have gone ahead of us.
I am still too easily lost in the fog of my fears–disconnected, afloat and circling aimlessly, searching for a touch point of purpose and direction. The isolation I sometimes feel may simply be my own self-absorbed state of mind, sucking me in deep until I’m soaked, dripping and shivering from the smothering gray. If only I might trust the fog horn voices, I could charge into the future undaunted, knowing there are others out there in the pea soup prepared to come alongside me as together we await the sun’s dissipation of the fog.
Now I know, almost sixty years into the voyage, fog does eventually clear so the journey continues on.
Even so, I will keep listening for the resonant voices of wisdom from shore, and now raise my voice to join in.
Instead of echoing the moans and groans of my childhood mornings, I will sing an anthem of hope and promise.
- photo by Nate Gibson
BriarCroft in Autumn
“November always seemed to me the Norway of the year.”
– Emily Dickinson
“Lo! sweeten’d with the summer light,
The full-juiced apple, waxing over-mellow,
Drops in a silent autumn night.”
Alfred Lord Tennyson
“Bare are the places where the sweet flowers dwelt.
What joy sufficient hath November felt?
What profit from the violet’s day of pain?
– Helen Hunt Jackson, Autumn Sonnet 
“O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn’s being.
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead,
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing.”
– Percy Bysshe Shelley
“How silently they tumble down
And come to rest upon the ground
To lay a carpet, rich and rare,
Beneath the trees without a care,
Content to sleep, their work well done,
Colors gleaming in the sun.
And come to rest upon the ground
To lay a carpet, rich and rare,
Beneath the trees without a care,
Content to sleep, their work well done,
Colors gleaming in the sun.
At other times, they wildly fly
Until they nearly reach the sky.
Until they nearly reach the sky.
Till all the trees stand stark and bare.
Exhausted, drop to earth below
To wait, like children, for the snow.”
– Elsie N. Brady, Leaves
“I saw the lovely arch
Of rainbow span the sky,
The gold sun burning
As the rain swept by.”
– Elizabeth Coatsworth, November
“Pleasures lie thickest where no pleasures seem:
There’s not a leaf that falls upon the ground
But holds some joy of silence or of sound
Some spirits begotten of a summer dream.”
– Laman Blanchard
“The mountain air is fresh at the dusk of day;
The flying birds in flocks return.
In these things there lies a deep meaning;
I want to tell it, but have forgotten the words.”
– Tao Yuan Ming
“A fine rain was falling, and the landscape was that of autumn. The sky was hung with various shades of gray, and mists hovered about the distant mountains – a melancholy nature. The leaves were falling on all sides like the last illusions of youth under the tears of irremediable grief. Every landscape is, as it were, a state of the soul, and whoever penetrates into both is astonished to find how much likeness there is in each detail.”
– Henri Frederic Amiel
“Even if something is left undone, everyone must take time to sit still and watch the leaves turn.”
– Elizabeth Lawrence
Filling Up the Tank
This was one of those early September mornings with fog close to the ground yet clear skies and sun above so all appeared shrouded in golden mist. It was only a matter of minutes until the moist air dried and the mist evaporated but I marvelled in the surrounding gilded fog bath in the meantime.
Every morning and every evening I have water barrel filling duty as one of my farm chores. As this is a portable barrel, which goes into whichever field the horses go, we simply fill it using a hose that stretches from the barn, rather than investing in automatic watering systems. It doesn’t sound very efficient but standing with a hose filling a 50 gallon barrel 10 minutes twice a day has its upsides. It is a good time to reflect on the day that is dawning and the day that is wrapping up. It is a good time to scan the fields and trees, survey the fences, and deeply suck in fresh air. In short, it’s a time to fill up my own tank when I’m feeling “dry”. Some weeks bring more to contemplate than others.
Four years ago this week hundreds of thousands of Americans were left homeless, bruised and battered physically and emotionally, and many dead in the Gulf Coast region after a hurricane proved it was far mightier than any disaster planning table top exercise or exhaustive textbook scenario. In the horrific irony of post-storm flooding, people died of dehydration surrounded by water. Their homes and neighborhoods overflowed while they themselves were parched. It was an agony that was impossible for the rest of us to fathom, comfortable as we were in our corner of the world. By simply turning on a faucet, I can watch gallons and gallons of clean fresh water pour out of my barn hose for my horses to drink, and I think about how many people this water barrel could have saved from certain death that fateful week. If only I could have magically transported my deep well, my hose, and my barrel where it was needed, I would have filled it over and over as they quenched their thirst. So many “if onlys” in such a week.
It was also a week where a split second decision that I made while moving horses on my farm, in an effort to save time, resulted in significant injuries to two of my horses. Saving a moment resulted in untold future hours of wrapping wounds, a pile in vet bills, and my own guilty shame in making a poorly planned out decision in haste. So I force myself to stand as I fill up the water barrels and realize that a few saved minutes, a misplaced sense of control over things that are uncontrollable and just plain lack of common sense is never worth the cost to be paid. It is fool’s gold, as transient and blinding as the fog this morning and just as ephemeral.
The “what if’s”, “if onlys”, and “shouldas” in my flawed life can be dehydrating all on their own, causing more long term suffering and untold misery. So I dive into the tank that is filling up in front of me and drink deeply, bathed, saturated, and washed clean in “what is” and “what will be”, not “what should have been”. The tank will always be full, the invitation is genuine and unlike ever rising gas prices, it is given freely.
Barnstorming 