Which Otherwise

If twenty million years ago
the butterfly flew in a different
direction do you think
we would have met, maybe
we wouldn’t have even been
people, maybe we wouldn’t
have even been us, you know,
maybe you would have
been a tortoise and I would
be a raspberry,
maybe we would both be plants
on opposite sides of the same
coral reef, so that we could
have been connected without
ever having met,
maybe I would be an oak cut
down to be the home that held
you, maybe I would have never
been, maybe the butterfly’s wings
would have blown the seed
into the river
and away from the soil
which otherwise would have
become a bush of blueberries
which otherwise would have
been eaten by a squirrel or
some other prehistoric rodent
which otherwise would have died
in a field of milkweeds
which otherwise would have
been carried by the wind
to another place
which otherwise might have
gotten caught in the feathers
of the bird which otherwise
might have flown to the other
side of the sea I could go on
but what I mean to say
is that it would have been
such a tragedy
if something happened
that would have prevented me
from meeting you
like a butterfly
who didn’t realize it was flying
in the wrong direction.
~Clint Smith “Chaos Theory” from Counting Descent

Divinity is not playful.
The universe was not made in jest
but in solemn incomprehensible earnest.
By a power that is unfathomably secret,
and holy,
and fleet.
There is nothing to be done about it,
but ignore it,
or see.

~Annie Dillard from Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

We weren’t conceived by random happenstance,
we are here because we were earnestly needed and wanted,
by a power and divinity beyond comprehension
with a capacity for love and compassion
beyond anything in our earthly experience.

He knows his intention and plan for us. He brought us together for a reason.

We aren’t a cosmic joke controlled by the random events.
We aren’t pawns in the universe’s chess game.
We may think what we say or do ultimately doesn’t matter a hill of beans
in the scheme of things, but we are created to clearly see God for who He is,
and in whose image He made us.

It is tragedy to ignore our Creator;
we have no excuses.
It is time to open our eyes, fixing them on the mystery we share,
and see it as sacred.

One-Time
Monthly
Yearly

Make a one-time or recurring donation to support daily Barnstorming posts

Make a monthly donation

Make a yearly donation

Choose an amount

¤10.00
¤20.00
¤50.00
¤5.00
¤15.00
¤100.00
¤5.00
¤15.00
¤100.00

Or enter a custom amount

¤

Your contribution is deeply appreciated.

Your contribution is appreciated.

Your contribution is appreciated.

DonateDonate monthlyDonate yearly

Unseen, Unknown

Happy the man, whose wish and care
   A few paternal acres bound,
Content to breathe his native air,
                          In his own ground.


Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread,
   Whose flocks supply him with attire,
Whose trees in summer yield him shade,
                          In winter fire.


Blest, who can unconcernedly find
   Hours, days, and years slide soft away,
In health of body, peace of mind,
                         Quiet by day,


Sound sleep by night; study and ease,
   Together mixed; sweet recreation;
And innocence, which most does please,
                         With meditation.


Thus let me live, unseen, unknown;
   Thus unlamented let me die;
Steal from the world, and not a stone
                          Tell where I lie.

~Alexander Pope, “Ode to Solitude” from Pope: Poems

450 year old gravestone in Glencairn Parish Cemetery in Scotland which reads:
Here Lyeth The Corps Of John Mcubin in Meruhirn (Marwhin) Who Departed This Life The Year 1663 Age 100

other side of the same stone

But the effect of her being on those around her
was incalculably diffusive:
for the growing good of the world
is partly dependent on unhistoric acts,
and that things are not so ill
with you and me as they might have been,
is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life,
and rest in unvisited tombs.
~George Eliot’s final sentence in Middlemarch

We have no idea who came before us,
unseen, unknown, unheralded, unvisited,
yet they, by living and dying, made our lives better today.

They lie, forgotten, now dust in the ground.

Yet they lived fully and lovingly, stewards of the earth and its creatures, parents to the next generation and the next and the next, placed here as images of their Creator.

May we, someday, having also lived faithfully in the fullness of time, leave behind a legacy of good and unhistoric acts that leave this world a better place for those who walk behind us in our footsteps.

It’s the least we can do, to honor those whose footprints we now follow.

A new book from Barnstorming available for order here

Between Midnight and Dawn: The Unseen Seen

sunrise410143

sunrise10915

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
2 Corinthinians 4: 18

 

I believe I will never quite know.
Though I play at the edges of knowing,
truly I know
our part is not knowing,
but looking, and touching, and loving,
which is the way I walked on,
softly,
through the pale-pink morning light.
~Mary Oliver from Bone

 

It is in the early morning hour that the unseen is seen,
and that the far-off beauty and glory,
vanquishing all their vagueness,
move down upon us till they stand
clear as crystal close over against the soul.

~Sarah Smiley

***************************

 

In the moments before dawn
when glow gently pink-tints
the inside of horizon’s eyelids,
the black of midnight
waxes to mere shadow:

that old faded midnight
That frightened but an hour. (from Emily Dickinson)

Gloaming dusk
fades into gleaming dawn,
a backlit silhouette stark
as the darkening earth
slowly opens her eyes
to greet in rebirth
a new and glorious morn.

 

sunrise222151

sunrise222153

During this Lenten season, I will be drawing inspiration from the new devotional collection edited by Sarah Arthur —Between Midnight and Dawn