wings – Barnstorming

A Horse with Wings

July 2, 2019 briarcroft4 Comments

O! for a horse with wings!
~William Shakespeare from Cymbeline

One reason why birds and horses are happy is because they are not trying to impress other birds and horses.
~Dale Carnegie

When I bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk:
he trots the air; the earth sings when he touches it;
~William Shakespeare from Henry V

We all should have a buddy who will simply hang out with us, helping to keep the biting flies away by gobbling them up before they draw blood.

It is symbiosis at its best: a relationship built on mutual trust and helpfulness. In exchange for relief from annoying insects that a tail can’t flick off, a Haflinger serves up bugs on a smorgasbord landing platform located safely above farm cats and marauding coyotes.

Thanks to their perpetual full meal deals, these birds do leave “deposits” behind that need to be brushed off at the end of the day. Like any good friendship, having to clean up the little messes left behind is a small price to pay for the bliss of companionable comradeship.

We’re buds after all – best forever friends.

And this is exactly what friends are for: one provides the feast and the other provides the wings. We’re fully fed and we’re free.

May we ever be so blessed.

Our Wings Ruffled

February 12, 2019 briarcroft2 Comments

Birds afloat in air’s current,
sacred breath? No, not breath of God,
it seems, but God
the air enveloping the whole
globe of being.
It’s we who breathe, in, out, in, in the sacred,
leaves astir, our wings
rising, ruffled — but only the saints
take flight. We cower
in cliff-crevice or edge out gingerly
on branches close to the nest. The wind
marks the passage of holy ones riding
that ocean of air. Slowly their wake
reaches us, rocks us.
But storms or still,
numb or poised in attention,
we inhale, exhale, inhale,
encompassed, encompassed.
~Denise Levertov “In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being“

God reminds us when we are at our most anxious and needy:
He cares for the birds and feeds them, lifts their wings in the wind and their feathered down keeps them warm. He gives them air to ride upon and air to breathe.

If them, then He cherishes us as well.

We too breathe in, breathe out, ruffled and fluffed, surrounded by the air we need and the air that lifts us. Lacking down, it is His breath keeping us warm.

Encompassed.

Hope Beats with Strong Wings

November 18, 2018 briarcroft3 Comments

morningswans

oaklane1116182

cloudmountain6

barecloud

Now we must look about us. Near at hand
cloud like a fist has closed on all the hills
and by this meager daylight on our land
we see just this, and this, and not beyond.

The sodden trees emerge and stand revealed;
we must acknowledge each one as it is,
stripped and stark, its basic structure clear,
the last leaves fallen, summer’s season dead.

And day on day the soft mist softly falls
as the long rain drives across the field
and all the while what we had seen beyond
is lost and shut as if it never were.

And we look closely at each other now,
the bleak roots, black grass, and the muddy road,
the litter that we never cleared away,
the broken flowers from a summer’s day –

Oh, stark and clearly we must look within
to weigh at last our purity and sin.

Oh, lovely hills in sunlight far away,
Oh, curving valley where the river sings!
Remembering, we live this discipline,
and hope still beats about us with strong wings.
~Jane Tyson Clement “November Rain” from No One Can Stem The Tide.

geese1117182

roserain1112

Stripped and stark — if fall and winter were the ending of all things, there would be no hope.
There would be no sun shining on the hills far beyond me to reflect back what is coming, and what has been.

When I am down to the bare and broken essentials — so bleak and muddy and the too-early dark — I seek the strength of the wings whooshing through air above me, alive, vibrant, purposeful.
I know this resting pause is not the end. Never has been. Never will be.

morningrain12

witheredtree

An Ordinary Decent Egg

June 3, 2018 briarcroft3 Comments

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 reveled in being the good egg.
Smooth on the surface,
gooey inside, often a bit scrambled,
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 appeared in my outer shell
from bumps along the way,
and a crack up one side
extending daily.

It has come time to change or face rot.

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

Newly hatched:
my home becomes
the wind beneath my wings
soaring an endless horizon
that stretches beyond eternity.

Hope is Borne on Wings

April 23, 2018 briarcroft3 Comments

Hope is borne on wings. Look at the trees. They turn to gold
for a brief while, then lose it all each November.
Through the cold months, they stand, take the worst
weather has to offer. And still, they put out shy green leaves
come April, come May.
~Barbara Crooker from “Sometimes I am Startled Out of Myself”

Trees have wings too — and not only the feathered kind that rest briefly in their branches before taking flight again, to wheel and glide on the breeze.

The wings on trees don’t fly until fall. They bud and blossom and fledge and wave in the wind and turn golden and then, like birds they are released to the sky.

So hope is born when borne on wings.

“Hope” is the thing with feathers –

That perches in the soul –

And sings the tune without the words –

And never stops – at all –
~Emily Dickinson

Quiet as a Feather

August 19, 2017August 19, 2017 briarcroft6 Comments

Today I’m flying low and I’m
not saying a word.
I’m letting all the voodoos of ambition sleep.

The world goes on as it must,
the bees in the garden rumbling a little,
the fish leaping, the gnats getting eaten.
And so forth.

But I’m taking the day off.
Quiet as a feather.
I hardly move though really I’m traveling
a terrific distance.

Stillness. One of the doors
into the temple.
~Mary Oliver “Today” from A Thousand Mornings

Some days warrant stillness.

This week echoed loud with ruckus and noise — much too overwhelming and nearly deafening.
Today we should seek to be quiet as a feather, silently in place, not saying a word.

We might actually begin to listen again. We might hear each other again.

A funny thing about feathers: alone, each one is mere fluff.
Together — feathers create lift and power, the strength and will to soar beyond the tether of gravity and the pull of our flawed mortality.

Joined and united, we can rise above and fly as far as our life and breath can take us.

May peace be still.

fairfeather5

fairfeather20172

feather9

thank you to the poultry of the Northwest Washington Fair in Lynden for holding still long enough to capture their brilliant plumage.

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Spread Your Wings and Fly

August 13, 2017 briarcroft6 Comments

You can kiss your family and friends good-bye and put miles between you, but at the same time you carry them with you in your heart, your mind, your stomach, because you do not just live in a world but a world lives in you.
~ Frederick Buechner

We have now said good-bye to our children who came together for a time back on the farm this summer and have all returned to their lives elsewhere. It was bliss to raise our voices together in harmony before our meals, as we always have done, and now our table is set for two as we entrust them yet again to God’s care and keeping.

Their wings are strong and sure, carrying them miles away from this place of origin.

I began writing regularly 16 years ago to consider more deeply my time left on this earth and what my family meant to me, here and now, and for eternity. Family is carried inside the words I write without my often writing about them directly. They inspire and challenge me, they love and stretch me, and as our children have now gone out into the world, two returning with beloved wives, and one with their first child, I am assured they are sustained by what they have carried away from this home.

Life is not just about living in the world but what world you carry deep inside, blessed by faith and obedience to God. We can never really be lonely; our hearts will never be empty when our voices are always raised in praise together.

We have each other forever, even miles and miles and lifetimes apart.
For you’re always near to me, in my joy and sorrow
For you ever care for me, lifting my spirits to the sky (see song below by Libera)

I sustain myself with the love of family.
― Maya Angelou

all family photos by Karen Mullen Photography (thanks once again, Karen!)

Angel take your wings and fly, watching over me
See me through my night time and be my leading light
Angel you have found the way, never fear to tread
You’ll be a friend to me, angel spread your wings and fly.

Voces angelorum gloria! Dona eis pacem!
(O voices of angels (give) glory! Grant them peace!)

For you’re always near to me, in my joy and my sorrow
For you ever care for me, lifting my spirits to the sky.
Where a million angels sing, in amazing harmony
And the words of love they bring
To the never ending story
A million voices sing
To the wonder of the light
So I hide beneath your wing
You are my guardian, angel of mine.

Cantate caeli chorus angelorum!
Venite adoramus in aeternum!
Psallite saecula et saeculorum!
Laudate Deo in gloria!
(Sing, Heaven’s choir of angels!
Come, let us evermore adore!
Sing forever and ever!
Praise God in glory!)

Can you be my angel now watching over me
Comfort and inspire me to see our journey through
Can I be your friend indeed, from all cares set free,
The clouds would pass away, then I’d be an angel too

Voces angelorum gloria, dona eis pacem!
(O voices of angels (give) glory! Grant them peace!)

For you’re always near to me, in my joy and my sorrow
For you ever care for me, lifting my spirits to the sky.
Where a million angels sing, in amazing harmony
And the words of love they bring
To the never ending story
A million voices sing
To the wonder of the light
So I hide beneath your wing
You are my guardian, angel of mine
Angel of mine

I come from Pacific Northwest farmers going back three generations, the daughter of teachers, married to a son of farmers; we have raised three children who are making a difference in the world as teachers and people of faith.
While keeping my eyes and heart open to the extraordinary things around me, I work as a full time primary care physician in a University setting, as well as a steward of the small farm we call home.
What I can harvest in words or pictures finds its way here.
Contact email: emilypgibson@gmail.com

...whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. ... And the God of peace will be with you. Philippians 4: 8 -9

What is my only comfort in life and in death? That I am not my own, but belong—body and soul, in life and in death—to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ.
~Heidelberg Catechism

Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
~Mary Oliver

I must consume the abundance of moments now. Days I am overwhelmed, wanting to write the music of my life in a slower tempo … yet this is the glorious dance of now.
So I shall dance in bare feet. For I am on holy ground.
~Ann Voskamp "A Holy Experience"

To do the useful thing, to say the courageous thing, to contemplate the beautiful thing: that is enough for one man's life.
~ T.S. Eliot

A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul.
~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

To live is so startling, it leaves little room for other occupations.
~Emily Dickinson

I believe in God as I believe that the Sun has risen, not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.
~ C. S. Lewis

Remember this. When people choose to withdraw far from a fire, the fire continues to give warmth, but they grow cold. When people choose to withdraw far from light, the light continues to be bright in itself but they are in darkness. This is also the case when people withdraw from God.
~ Augustine

Hello, sun in my face. Hello you who made the morning and spread it over the fields...Watch, now, how I start the day in happiness, in kindness.
~ Mary Oliver

The seed is in the ground. Now may we rest in hope while darkness does its work.
~ Wendell Berry

Nothing will sustain you more potently than the power to recognize in your humdrum routine the true poetry of life.~ Sir William Osler

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

If the world were merely seductive, that would be easy. If it were merely challenging, that would be no problem. But I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. This makes it hard to plan the day.
~ E.B. White

Geese appear high over us, pass, and the sky closes. Abandon, as in love or sleep, holds them to their way, clear, in the ancient faith: what we need is here. And we pray, not for new earth or heaven, but to be quiet in heart, and in eye clear. What we need is here.~~ "The Wild Geese" Wendell Berry

Let it come, as it will, and don’t be afraid. God does not leave us comfortless, so let evening come.
~ Jane Kenyon from "Let Evening Come"

You can only come to the morning through the shadows.~ J.R.R. Tolkien

If you want to identify me, ask me not where I live, or what I like to eat, or how I comb my hair, but ask me what I am living for, in detail, ask me what I think is keeping me from living fully for the thing I want to live for. ~ Thomas Merton

This life therefore is not righteousness,
but growth in righteousness,
not health but healing,
not being but becoming,
not rest but exercise.
We are not yet
what we shall be,
but we are growing toward it.
The process is not finished
but it is going on.
This is not the end
but it is the road.
~Martin Luther

Ten times a day something happens to me like this - some strengthening throb of amazement - some good sweet empathic ping and swell. This is the first, the wildest and the wisest thing I know: that the soul exists and is built entirely out of attentiveness.
~ Mary Oliver

Love isn’t a function of communication so much as Love is a function of communion.
~ Ann Voskamp

It is not your love that sustains the marriage —
but from now on, the marriage that sustains your love.
~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer

She has done what she could...
~Mark 14:8

What do you mean? Do you wish me a good morning, or mean that it is a good morning whether I want it or not; or that you feel good on this morning; or that it is a morning to be good on?~ J. R. R. Tolkien from The Hobbit

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