Thursday Poem - Sometimes I am Startled Out of Myself,

like this morning, when the wild geese came squawking,
flapping their rusty hinges, and something about their trek
across the sky made me think about my life, the places
of brokenness, the places of sorrow, the places where grief
has strung me out to dry. And then the geese come calling,
the leader falling back when tired, another taking her place.
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. The geese glide over the cornfields,
land on the pond with its sedges and reeds.
You do not have to be wise. Even a goose knows how to find
shelter, where the corn still lies in the stubble and dried stalks.
All we do is pass through here, the best way we can.
They stitch up the sky, and it is whole again.

Barbara Crooker, from Radiance

Wordless Wednesday - Held

Shining Through

Before the first snowfall of the season, I always wonder how I am going to survive another winter without the vibrant colours of other seasons, and I feel a vague anxiety (sometimes sheer panic) thinking about the long, dark months to come. Shame on me for harboring such morose and mutinous thoughts. I should know better.

There are turnings and transformations everywhere: feathery ice archipelagos in highland rivers as they freeze over, icicles dangling from trees along the shore, field grasses poking their silvery heads out of drifts, melt water falling from the roof and freezing again in midair, fallen leaves with frosty grasses shining through them.

Everything my cronish eye lights on is food for notebook and lens, a fine thing since I am unable to wander as far as I once did. There are so many years of memories of winter rambles to revisit... I remember the hollow sound of the north wind moving down the gorge above the frozen lake, snow crunching pleasingly under my feet on the trail, the sussurus of flurries falling in the woods on a quiet day. I remember the sprucey fragrance given off by the snowbound evergreens in my favorite grove, how snowflakes tasted when I caught them on my tongue.

And winter's breathtaking nights, velvety black and filled with stars from here to there...  How can one not be dazzled and uplifted by lambent winter moons and the countless constellations dancing over one's head on clear nights. Sometimes, the stars seem almost close enough to reach up and touch. The season is a fabulous treat for backyard astronomers and stargazey types like this old hen. 

Absent the vibrant colors dancing on the earth's palette at other times, winter's gifts are paler hues, swirling shapes and glittering patterns. Each and every one is exquisite. Outdoors, the blues and golds on offer are sumptuous. Indoors, old window panes, heaps of books, bowls of fruit and cups of tea beckon. So does the sunlight coming through the window in a friend's farmhouse. I can do this, yes, I can.

Sequestered, Week 318 (CCCXVIII)

Sunday, Saying Yes to the World

Do you see how an act is not, as young men think, like a rock that one picks up and throws, and it hits or misses, and that's the end of it. When that rock is lifted, the earth is lighter; the hand that bears it heavier. When it is thrown, the circuits of the stars respond, and where it strikes or falls, the universe is changed. On every act the balance of the whole depends. The winds and seas, the powers of water and earth and light, all that these do, and all that the beasts and green things do, is well done, and rightly done. All these act within the Equilibrium. From the hurricane and the great whale's sounding to the fall of a dry leaf and the gnat's flight, all they do is done within the balance of the whole.

But we, insofar as we have power over the world and over one another, we must learn to do what the leaf and the whale and the wind do of their own nature. We must learn to keep the balance. Having intelligence, we must not act in ignorance. Having choice, we must not act without responsibility.

Ursula K. Le Guin, The Farthest Shore

Merry Samhain/Hallowmas

Merry Samhain/Hallowmas

Happy November!