Future Attraction

I wonder if my reliance on my GPS has spoiled me. Sometimes the path plays tricks on our eyes when we try so hard to see. We seek clarity, a road map, points of interests and warnings of construction ahead, a voice saying our exit is 300 feet ahead. Though I admit, I have no idea what 300 feet looks like when driving.

Sometimes what you see just doesn't make sense, or perhaps it is only a peak of what is. The photo is untouched, it is what I saw. And like the path, I have to laugh and trust what I saw is a future attraction waiting to reveal.

Neither Up Nor Down-Simply There

Sometimes I do smile at Life's sense of gentle humor. How often to think a change of perspective is needed. Yesterday, as the plane flew so many thousands of feet in the air, I looked out and there were my precious mountains waving above the clouds. So many days, looking up, I stood in awe at how they pierced the clouds. That moment, looking down, not up, the vision was the same. 

Sometimes we try to over analyze, sometimes to think a change is needed, sometimes to ask "Oh please life grant more clarity!" And there stood the mountains, the same whether looking up or looking down. A gifted smile, to know strength, awe, beauty, and courage are so constant. No digging, no clinging or discarding, no effort required. To trust the instinct within the heart.... it is there my child, right now, where and as you are.

True Art

I did not know what to say when her tears fell and then my own to see the pain. I only knew each tear was a thread uniting all in the tapestry of Life. The fear was but Love's palette spilled of its richness upon the canvas of the heart. And both were framed in silence sung.

Union's Garden

Doubt is but the resistance of the soil to the seed. Life is their union.

The Certainty of a Limp

When osteoporosis fractured both knees I was confined to a wheel chair for three months. Me, a hobbit who walks and walks like a sandpiper scurrying along the beach. But I knew I would walk and accepted the distraction of walking with my hands and wheels. I walk with a limp, the mountain rocks, inclines, and descent make the knees quiver trying to hold, but they have learned to laugh. Belief is something you were told. Faith, ahhhhh faith, is something you just know.

Blessing Placed

A dusting of snow upon the drought hardened earth. The sweet earth, her creatures, plants, trees, and thin lakes and rivers will be given a drink. I pray for more, the thirst and hunger is great. Trusting nature and Life I listen for the rhythm.

With a giggle I place the shell upon the snow. That which knew life as nothing but water rests upon that which  craves each drop. And then the whisper that when I too may feel out of place, perhaps my experience is simply Life's own blessing placed, saying "I too believe in you."

Opening Christmas #1 - The Gift of Tilt

As one with no family or nearby friends to celebrate Christmas, a whisper to begin a reflection series and opening of gifts. To begin to reflect upon this season, the last before the calendar notes that I have now reached 60.
        The image is the moon dancing with clouds and the morning. Oh her illumination so grand in the night, a portal of light beaming through the darkness. And yet here she is, dancing in the day. Her presenceis  always there,. She is now seen simply because of the tilt of the earth and nature's season.
        In this time of bargain deals, frantic mailings, crowds, lines, and lists, I open the gift of tilting. Tis one thing to have a faith that shines a light in the darkest of hours. Tis another to behold and see the light that shines and dances during the day. To pause and feel the buffeting winds of preparations as but a reminder to look, see, breathe, and yes, tilt.

Smallness Transformed

I sat on my cushion releasing my heart's prayers. For a six year old boy undergoing brain surgery. A mother whose adult child simply did not wake up and no reason is known. For others facing grief, sadness, uncertainty, and lacking the basic water, food and shelter of life. I am but one and sometimes feel so old, frail, and inadequate. My simple little prayers but they are so so earnest and felt. Then to open my eyes and see such a gift. The sun and morning had gathered my little simple prayers and were streaming them into the universe. Never doubt. Never stop praying. Life truly hears and responds.

Final Sacrifice

On this day of remembrance, in the U.S. and Canada, for those who have served in war, I bow in gratitude for all who have and currently sacrifice so much. And then to bow again in compassion and faith, that one day soon, we will all be veterans celebrating. Warriors of Love and heart. Warriors whose only required sacrifice was to lay down the swords.

Simply Rise Simply Try

To practice acceptance of all circumstances, feelings, people, and events with compassion and without judgment, not forgetting it applies to the self. My heart sighed to read such words. And then the gentle whisper, “Are they but a bumper sticker placed on your car? Or have you experienced them as both the car and fuel that carry you upon the path? Are the words but your hiking boots worn in the house?” Oh I may get lost in my car. I may get stuck in traffic jams. I have to wash, fuel, and maintain the car. I have to clean off the winter snow and ice so I can see. And I can put on my boots and perfectly lace each eyelet, tie the perfect knot and sit on the couch. The word is to practice, to experience, and to try. No mention of perfection or attainment. To slip inside the car or my boots and travel the path. Nike says “Just Do It.” The path, knowing I am human, says, “Get up and try.” The moon and sun never check the weather to see if conditions are favorable. They simply rise.

Imprisoned Not

He made a terrible mistake. Oh no, not a saint.  He is paying the price, a young adult in prison. Surrounded by windowless cement, bars, electric fences, watchful guards with guns, and others filled with rage and despair, he found his heart, forgiveness, and chose to be free.  Years without a mark, unthinkable in such surroundings. He devoured every course offered and desires only to complete the price and then to be a good man, a good father and son. Because of his record he was moved to a less guarded prison. For the first time in years he stepped outside and felt grass beneath his feet. A tree on the grounds gifted her touch. And he stood outside in the night and saw yes, sweet mercy, there is a moon and stars. I am thirty years older and judged by society as the better citizen and person; he is my teacher and guiding North Star. Sometimes I am overwhelmed with responsibilities and mistakes I've made. I see only the walls that keep me from being who I know I could be.  At such times, with grace, I touch the door handle and think of him. I can step outside the prisons I create. 

Unbarred Fierceness

So many have felt the power of nature. Her wind, water, earth, and fire. Today may my heart unleash an even greater force. To give honor to the devastation with the inviolable unbarred fierceness of hope. 

To Touch

The haze of drifting smoke from wild fires have created a dance of colors with the sun. How can such destruction create such beauty? Perhaps, as Mary Oliver said "When the thumb of fear lifts, we become alive." To open my eyes and heart and see. Not to just see  but to look. To see. To look. To know. And then to touch....

Saint Francis and the Sow

BY GALWAY KINNELL

The bud

stands for all things,

even for those things that don’t flower,

for everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing;   

though sometimes it is necessary

to reteach a thing its loveliness,

to put a hand on its brow

of the flower

and retell it in words and in touch

it is lovely…..

Wisdom's Eyes and Hands

She has grown up. She doesn't think herself small. She can walk now. She is starting to talk. She is letting the world know what she wants and does not want. She laughs. She runs for hugs. She stands in front of strangers until they smile. She loves without fear. She never doubts that life will, with tender love, fill in the holes. She still looks out the window. She takes time to see.  

On the first day of 2011, I prayed to be so wise.

A year later, even more grown up and has found her voice, she looks with wonder into the Light determined to hold the Candle in her own hands.

On this day, may I too be as strong.

This Day Christmas Eve

I believe in the grace of the baby lying in a manger. I believe in the power of the menorah to quench the darkness and radiate hope. I believe in the vision of a man named Buddha. I believe in the jolly red suited Santa. I believe in the Grinch whose heart grew three sizes. I believe in scrooge who kept Christmas in his heart every day. I believe in this sacred holiday we’ve carved into time. I believe in the hope, love and gathering of this time. I believe in the weariness this time casts as our hearts and energy disperse to loved ones, friends and strangers in need. I believe in those who work this holiday to service, protect and care for our needs.

 I believe that belief is seeing. I believe that belief is faith unseen. I believe that belief is a sense of knowing. I believe that belief is the voice in my head that says “On this day” and goes no further for I have but now. I believe that belief is the voice in my heart that says “On this day a child” and goes no further. For a child I will be, full of wonder and innocence and arms outstretched. I will have no prejudices, no judgments and no past. I will trust all who reach out, especially those in need. On this day. On this day a child. I believe in my soul it will remain, forever, Christmas Eve.

Unedited Peace

Readmitted to the hospital, a flurry of doctors and orders attend to her.  They cannot stop the pain or nausea, venting the tube that feeds chemical food no longer helps.  It was her greatest fear, that the end would be ugly, the two year fight spent devoted to laughter and joy of the moment. Her partner writes, “They have to stop the pain and nausea. She must let go in peace.”

Writers, poets, artists and sculptors spend hours, days even months perfecting their craft, each sentence, word, stroke and pause.  I would not think the birth of the heart’s pouring ever made it untouched, perfected and edited to those who would behold.  I giggle to think of the Christian creation story where God created the world and humanity, and pronounced, “It is good.”  God did not say perfect.  From birth, like the birth of the heart’s creativity, we feel perfection is the standard and edit, retouch, throw away, scrap, rewrite our lives to conform to that anonymous standard of perfection.  We forget that precious moment of birth when with the first cry, the newborn is recognized by heart, body, soul and mind as ‘simply perfect.’  We lose that moment and parents, child, society and institutions begin to edit.

With ports, shunts and god knows what else, she swam with the dolphins, dove into the sky from a plane with her brother holding her hand, she flew in a side car to sit by the waterfalls, friends four-wheeled her wheel chair to Lake Superior’s shore with a handmade grabber so she could gather agates, she planted perennials and trees that will not sprout til next year.  She did not edit neither has she allowed the cancer to edit.  Each moment, each pause, word and painted stroke perfect in itself.

“Hiiiii, thiiiis iiis my stuttre hadn taht yiiii do not see. Thiiiis iiis teh way my eys see adn my hadns wriiiet befoer Iiiii work throuuiiihg teh iiiniiital scriiihces of my heart to leaaev hre for any taht may seee.”

An unedited offering to the Sweet Hands of Life, naked and unshielded, that Annie may have her peace and that her courage to live unedited will continue in the lives she has touched. I take my stutter hand from its closeted pocket where it is hidden, and take yours in mine, Annie.  As you said, ‘We all have our cancers.’  “Lettiiiinng go iiiin peaec…….unedddiiiiide.”