Tag: sun

Daisies Follow the Sun

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The daisy follows soft the sun,
And when his golden walk is done,
Sits shyly at his feet.
He, waking, finds the flower near.
“Wherefore, marauder, art thou here?”
“Because, sir, love is sweet!”

We are the flower, Thou the sun!
Forgive us, if as days decline,
We nearer steal to Thee, —
Enamoured of the parting west,
The peace, the flight, the amethyst,
Night’s possibility!
~Emily Dickinson

So has a Daisy vanished
From the fields today—
So tiptoed many a slipper
To Paradise away—

Oozed so in crimson bubbles
Day’s departing tide—
Blooming—tripping—flowing
Are ye then with God?
~Emily Dickinson

In the shadow of a metaphor
give me a daisy
because I could hold the daisy
in my hand.
~Patrizia Cavalli

We may be as ephemeral
as the daisies of the field,
but we are not lost to God.

Our hearts swirl and spiral
into the vortex of infinity
that contains only Him.

Growing well, growing strong
The surest signs that you belong
Waited so long
But the time is now
First a bud
Then two blooms
The world will need your presence soon
Wait a while it will be clear how

So be a daisy, daisy
Be like a daisy
Strong yet still innocent and pure
And maybe, just maybe
It’ll be ok
See, there are new beginnings I’m sure
Just stop
But don’t smell the daisies

Spreading joy
Bringing cheer
When there’s so much to be feared
Every petal offering new life
What is faith if not a seed
That’s how you started and it seems
You’ve come so far with nothing to hide

So be a daisy, daisy
Be like a daisy
Strong yet still innocent and pure
And maybe, just maybe
It’ll be ok
See, there are new beginnings I’m sure
Just stop
But don’t smell the daisies

Butterflies, a sign of love
From the heavens up above
It’s no wonder that to you they flock
Others still, you draw near
Most would say they appear
As a sign of endings beauty stops

And some are pushing daisies
While other journeys start
But turning flies to flowers
Takes a special heart

So be a daisy, daisy
Be like a daisy
Strong yet still innocent and pure
And maybe, just maybe
It’ll be ok
See, there are new beginnings I’m sure
Just stop
And maybe smell the daisies

Maybe it’s time that we all smell the daisies
~Bethany Sorenson

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Clouds Gathering Around My Feet

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Like animals moving daily
through the same open field,
it should be easier to distinguish
light from dark, fabrications

from memory, rain on a sliver
of grass from dew appearing
overnight. In these moments
of desperation, a sentence

serves as a halo, the moon
hidden so the stars eclipse
our daily becoming. You think
it should be easier to define

one’s path, but with the clouds
gathering around our feet,
there’s no sense in retracing
where we’ve been or where

your tired body will carry you.
Eventually the birds become
confused and inevitable. Even our
infinite knowledge of the forecast

might make us more vulnerable
than we would be in drawn-out
ignorance. To the sun
all weeds eventually rise up.
~Adam Clay “Our Daily Becoming”

I stroll among clouds surrounding my feet,
tiny puff balls that shatter and fall.

Watching the seeds scatter is a reminder
of the inevitable march of time,
for what will be no more, for what is sure to come

I’m given another day to get it right before I too blow away:
to be fruitful by rising up, my face to the sun, even in my weediness.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ip-fgsXCWd4
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Dawn on Our Darkness: There’s Nothing Like the Sun

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There’s nothing like the sun as the year dies,
Kind as can be, this world being made so,
To stones and men and birds and beasts and flies,
To all things that it touches except snow,
Whether on mountainside or street of town.
The south wall warms me: November has begun,
Yet never shone the sun as fair as now
While the sweet last-left damsons from the bough
With spangles of the morning’s storm drop down
Because the starling shakes it, whistling what
Once swallows sang. But I have not forgot
That there is nothing, too, like March’s sun,
Like April’s, or July’s, or June’s, or May’s,
Or January’s, or February’s, great days:
August, September, October, and December
Have equal days, all different from November.
No day of any month but I have said—
Or, if I could live long enough, should say—
“There’s nothing like the sun that shines today.”
There’s nothing like the sun till we are dead.
~Edward Thomas “There’s nothing like the sun”

Each day throughout the year, I search the sky for a hint of how the sunlight might appear through the clouds. Like a gallery of landscapes in a museum, the artistry of Light penetrating darkness changes moment to moment. Some days the sun is completely missing in action and we’re covered under a gray flannel blanket. Other days, there are no clouds whatsoever for the light to flow over and play with.

November can be particularly poignant because of the dying light at the end of the year. At times I feel desperate for the dawn, almost worried it won’t come. During these recent chill late autumn mornings, any light is welcome, along with the potential warmth it brings.

I keep taking pictures of what I see during this transition from night to light and light to night. I keep trying to find words to describe what these brief moments feel like, as it is always a visceral experience, often exhilarating, watching the sun navigate the horizon yet again.

I know if I could only live long enough, there will be a day when I say “nothing can equal the light I see today.” That would indeed be the day when the ultimate Light has called me home. What I see here is merely the preview. Indeed, God Himself came down to see how things look from our perspective.

There’s nothing like the Son to light the way home.

This year’s Advent theme “Dawn on our Darkness” is taken from this 19th century Christmas hymn.

Brightest and best of the sons of the morning,
dawn on our darkness and lend us your aid.
Star of the east, the horizon adorning,
guide where our infant Redeemer is laid.
~Reginald Heber -from “Brightest and Best”

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Where the Sun Never Sets

barnstormingblog2 Comments

In this kingdom 
the sun never sets; 
under the pale oval 
of the sky 
there seems no way in 
or out, 
and though there is a sea here 
there is no tide.
For the egg itself 
is a moon 
glowing faintly 
in the galaxy of the barn, 
safe but for the spoon’s 
ominous thunder, 
the first delicate crack 
of lightning.
~Linda Pastan, “Egg”

It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird:
it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly
while remaining an egg. 
We are like eggs at present. 
And you cannot go on indefinitely
being just an ordinary, decent egg. 
We must be hatched or go bad.
C. S. Lewis from Mere Christianity

I try hard to be the good egg-
smooth on the surface,
gooey inside, often a bit scrambled,
yet ordinary and decent,
indistinguishable from others,
blending in,
not making waves.

It’s not been bad staying just as I am.
Except I can no longer remain like this.

A dent or two have appeared in my outer shell
from bumps along the way,
and a crack up one side
extends daily.

It has come time to change or face inevitable rot.

Nothing can be the same again:
the fragments of shell left behind
must be abandoned as
useless confinement.

Newly hatched
and transformed:
now there is the wind beneath my wings.
I’ll soar toward an endless horizon
where the sun never sets.
and stretches beyond eternity.

I will no longer be merely ordinary.

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Sun Drunk

barnstormingblog3 Comments

The happiest field in all the harvest
is the field of sunflowers at their peak.
Drinking the rays and dancing in the breeze.
The saddest field is the same field, six weeks later.
Drunk on the sun and burnt with shame,
they drop their heads to hide their mane.
― R.S. Barrington

Three months of no appreciable rain is unprecedented here in the Pacific northwest.  We have been dryer than the plains states; tractors raise vast dust clouds as they harvest the fields around our farm.  No precipitation is mentioned in the forecast over the next ten days.

It has been simply too much for web foot natives like myself.  We are so inebriated from this interrupted run of perpetually sunny days, we are unable to take in any more, now bloated with Vitamin D, sickened with shame at soaking in more than our allotted share of rays. 

We are at serious risk of solar withdrawal when the rain starts.  I’m already shaky at the thought of gray clouds.  Shorter days and foggy mornings might bring on the dry heaves.  Hallucinations could include parades of multicolored bumbershoots multiplying like Mickey’s brooms in Fantasia’s The Sorcerer’s Apprentice.   Someone will need to detox us with a full spectrum seasonal affective disorder light to taper us down slowly.

Okay, enough is enough.  We’ve had our run, we’ve had our fun drunk on the sun but we’ve had enough.  We are exhausted and in need of reprieve.

Let the rains begin. Please!

And all the people said, “Amen!”

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The Heart in Exile

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Down near the bottom
of the crossed-out list
of things you have to do today,

between “green thread”
and “broccoli,” you find
that you have penciled “sunlight.”

Resting on the page, the word
is beautiful. It touches you
as if you had a friend

and sunlight were a present
he had sent from someplace distant
as this morning—to cheer you up,

and to remind you that,
among your duties, pleasure
is a thing

that also needs accomplishing.
Do you remember?
that time and light are kinds

of love, and love
is no less practical
than a coffee grinder

or a safe spare tire?
Tomorrow you may be utterly
without a clue,

but today you get a telegram
from the heart in exile,
proclaiming that the kingdom

still exists,
the king and queen alive,
still speaking to their children,

—to any one among them
who can find the time
to sit out in the sun and listen.
~Tony Hoagland “The Word” from Sweet Ruin

When I moved from Washington state to California for college, daily sunshine was a new experience for me, having grown up in the cloudy Pacific Northwest. At first I was nearly giddy with the new reality of not having to wear jackets with hoods or (horrors!) carry an umbrella. It was like being let out of gray prison into the land of puppies and rainbows – like the old Wizard of Oz B&W film becoming technicolor when Dorothy’s house lands in Oz and she opens the door to her new home.

But then I realized strings of sunny days were doing something to my head. Previously, I was dependent on rainy days to stay inside and hit the books, curled up in a quiet corner, content to be cerebral rather than exercising the rest of my muscles. If there was a sunny day in Washington, then I was compelled outside to enjoy what few hours were offered up by the skies. Real gray life happened the rest of the time when I could buckle down and get some work done.

So college days started out euphoric and ended up depressing – I tried studying in dark carrels in the library but I still knew there was sunshine going to waste. I tried studying outside on the college lawn but the distraction of all the activity around me was too great. I finally learned to apportion my “out-in-the-sun” hours from my study hours so I wasn’t feeling robbed of either. I decided to take a sun bath like I take a water bath – just enough to feel transformed and cleansed.

I owned a rainy heart in exile so moving back to the northwest after college was easy; I longed for strings of cloudy days so I could be productive guilt-free again. To this day, I only dose myself with sunbeams in moderation as if I was still worried there won’t be enough sun to last another day.

But there is, there always is.

You’ll never know, dear, how much I love you. Please don’t take my sunshine away.

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Left to Her Own Abandon

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Sometimes when you’re in a dark place
you think you’ve been buried,
but actually you’ve been planted.
~Christine Caine

I love a wild daffodil,
the one that grows
where she’s planted—
along a wooded highway
left to her own abandon,
but not abandoned.
Her big yellow head   
leaning toward or away
from the sun. Not excluded
but exclusive, her trumpet
heralds no one, not even
the Canada geese—
their long-necked honks
announcing their journey. 
She’ll be here less
than a season, grace us
with green slender stems,
strong enough to withstand
rain and spring’s early chill.
And when she goes,
what remains she’ll bury
deep inside the bulb of her,
take a part of me with her
until she returns.
~January Gill O’Neil, “For Ella” from Rewilding

Our farm was homesteaded by the Lawrence family over one hundred years ago — soon afterward, someone decided to bury daffodil bulbs scattered around the yard. All these decades later, dozens of faithful heralds of spring still come up as the sun and extra hours of light call them forth. Some years they bloom in February, but most typically they wait for a more predictable welcome from the weather in March.

They are very tender, easily injured by a strong wind or late snowfall – mostly an old antique variety of fluffy double blooms, but some traditional trumpet blossoms still come up called forth by the trumpeting of the geese and swans passing over far above them.

For me, their blooming with abandon is inspiration in faithfulness and persistence, especially because of the 44 weeks per year they remain silent and buried out of sight. I have a general sense where they will appear each February, but am still surprised and impressed when they do push up through the ground. I walk around them carefully, knowing I could crush them with one firm inadvertent boot step if I am not cautious.

Once the daffodils are blooming, they encourage my hope and a promise of the spring just ahead. When the blooms wither and fade, the green spiky stems must gather the strength the bulb needs for another cycle of dormancy, so I mow around them to allow as much time as needed to replenish before disappearing underground again.

I still don’t understand how these gentle blooms somehow manage to pull me down with them into the bulb, waiting my turn alongside them while buried deep in the dark. Perhaps it is because God plants each one of us here in His holy ground, to await the ultimate wakening that calls us forth to bloom everlasting.

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The Sun Spoke

barnstormingblog1 Comment

All afternoon by the window, sunlight—
that great soft hand on my head. I could hardly
move. And the sun spoke. It said, There now. 
Maybe your heart is wiser than you think.

Afternoon slowly rolled into evening.
I will listen for that voice all the days of my life.
~Annie Lighthart, “The Blessing” from  Pax

I seek His hand on my head when I need reassurance – that glowing warm sensation as sunbeams soak through my scalp and calm my overwrought neurons. I can’t help but close my eyelids and bathe in the feeling that all things are made new, myself included, and everything is going to be okay.

Even as the sun fades with the passage of hours in the day, the warmth within me remains. I remember the touch, I remember the wisdom, I remember the encouragement, I promise I won’t forget.

I’ll keep listening for His voice and know His hand rests on my head.

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I Am Partly Tuber

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Some of us . . . are darkness-lovers.
We do not dislike the early and late daylight of June,
but we cherish the gradually increasing dark of November,
which we wrap around ourselves in the prosperous warmth
of woodstove, oil, electric blanket, storm window, and insulation.

We are partly tuber, partly bear.
Inside our warmth we fold ourselves
in the dark and its cold –
around us, outside us,
safely away from us;
we tuck ourselves up
in the long sleep
and comfort of cold’s opposite,
warming ourselves
by thought of the cold,
lighting ourselves by darkness’s idea.
~Donald Hall from “Seasons at Eagle Pond”

I confess to a love of the dark of January winter mornings
as much as the pervasive light of mid-summer.

Drawn away from our warm bed
without need for an alarm,
I awake before sunrise
in inky blackness
to this yet uncharted day.

I am raw with underground ripening,
belonging to earth and dust
until the Light comes
to force me forth to seek out sun.

Only from darkness could I
sprout so boldly to find out
what comes next.

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A Day for Grumbling

barnstormingblog4 Comments

I like these cold, gray winter days.
Days like these let you savor a bad mood. 
~Bill Watterson (Creator of Calvin and Hobbes)

Sometimes the mist overhangs my path,
And blackening clouds about me cling;
But, oh, I have a magic way
To turn the gloom to cheerful day—
      I softly sing.

And if the way grows darker still,
Shadowed by Sorrow’s somber wing,
With glad defiance in my throat,
I pierce the darkness with a note,
       And sing, and sing.

I brood not over the broken past,
Nor dread whatever time may bring;
No nights are dark, no days are long,
While in my heart there swells a song,
       And I can sing.
~James Weldon Johnson “The Gift to Sing”

I can grumble and complain with the best of them. There is camaraderie in shared grumbling, as well as an exponential increase in dissatisfaction as everyone around me shares their own particular misery. Some relationships are based on just such collaborative complaining.

But I know better. I’ve seen where grousing leads and I feel the ache in my bones when I’m steeped in it. The sky gets grayer, the clouds become thicker, the night is darker–on and on to its overwhelming suffocating conclusion.

I have the privilege to turn away from being bleak and gloomy and choose joy. I can find the single ray of sun and stand steadfastly within it, to sing out that first note and pierce the darkness.

This is not me putting on a “happy face” — instead joy adopts and inhabits me, holds me close in the tough times and won’t abandon me. Though at times it may hide temporarily behind a cloud, I know it is there even when I can’t see it.

So I gently sing my way out of the gloom and clouds, for when I choose joy over grumbling, I find joy has chosen me.

So breaks the sun earth’s rugged chains,
      Wherein rude winter bound her veins;
So grows both stream and source of price,
      That lately fettered were with ice.
So naked trees get crisped heads,
      And colored coats the roughest meads,
And all get vigor, youth, and spright,
      That are but looked on by his light.
~Ben Jonson “So Breaks the Sun”

May we sing together, always.
May our voice be soft.
May our singing be music for others
and may it keep others aloft.
Sing gently, always.
Sing gently as one.
May we stand together, always.
May our voice be strong.
May we hear the singing and
May we always sing along.
Sing gently, always.
Sing gently as one.
~Eric Whitacre

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