ON THEIR WAY TO BOSTON

"Highway 70", oil,
by Carmen Beecher

(1/29/15)

Passing cars

on the interstate

seemed like a little miracle,

like letting their lives go

and getting a good gift.

It was a small thing --

she simply stepped

on the accelerator

and then they sped along

like two stars in the sky

sailing along, shining

and passing other stars

with ease, like friends

giving the gift

of peacefulness

as they fly

along the interstate. 

WINTER GIFTS

      

"Snowdrifts", watercolor, by Shanti Marie

     Today’s hard-blowing blizzard has me thinking of the gifts winter gives us. Sure, there are hardships associated with today’s storm, but I’m trying to see Juno’s gifts more than the misfortunes. First, there’s the gift of the fluffy, flying, whirling snow – a sight that still thrills me like it did when I was a boy. Someone who had never seen snow would be astonished at what I see outside my window just now – an endless dance of soft white pieces of enchantment, a gift to make an old guy get young again. Then there are the gifts given by the strong wind -- the flowing, multifarious snowdrifts, as distinctive as sculptures in a gallery. Tomorrow, in the welcome sunshine, I will tour the storm’s museum in our neighborhood, admiring these evanescent, once-in-a-lifetime snow sculptures produced by this artisitic and generous storm. I may feel more fortunate than ever as I look at what powerful but fleeting Juno, now vanishing into the universe, produced for me.     

THRIVING IN THE BLIZZARD

1/27/15, Winter Storm Juno

"Winter Scene", oil,
by Tom Brown

The birds are grateful for our food in this

outburst of blowing snow. They seem to feel bliss

and relaxation as they take their seeds

and fly away. Their simple wants and needs

are met with ease on this tumultuous day.

They live uncomplicated lives, the way

I’d like to live. They’re thankful they’re alive

in snow and wind. They celebrate and thrive.

ON BEING SATISFIED

   Over my 73 years, I’ve been fortunate to know a few people who, no matter what was happening, always seemed satisfied, and I’m continuously envious of their lucky lives. These are people who genuinely seemed at ease with wherever they were, whatever triumphs or troubles were taking place, whatever the present moment was bringing them. Almost always, they somehow seemed contented, and in a sincere way. Even in sorrow, they appeared to be what I might call comfortable, in the literal sense of being able to bring comfort to themselves. They seemed peaceful with their sorrow, calm inside their unhappiness. Whatever was happening was sufficient for them. They seemed to allow themselves to be saturated with each experience, almost as if they were easily swimming in it, feeling the flow of either happiness or heartache. They were – and are

- a fortunate few, these contented ones, and I only hope something like their steady ease with all of life shows up in me sometime soon.

WITHOUT HIS HELP

 When morning comes he once again lets go.

He tells his heart to carry on, and tells

his lungs he trusts them. He lets the show

of life proceed without his help. The bells

of harmony are ringing with no aid

from him, which makes him glad. The sunshine

spreads without his guidance. The parade

of breezes happens by itself, and pine

trees bend without advice from him. He lets

life work its wonders. He steps back and gets

a view of countless marvels all around

him. He’s amazed and doesn’t make a sound.

SOFT WORDS

When he spoke a few soft words,

they always flew away like birds

and he never saw them again.

The words simply waved and then

disappeared. He smiled and said

good luck to these words that led

their own lives now, flying

softly and never, ever dying.  

IN THE BEGINNING

Thursday, 1/22/15

    

"Writing It All Down"
oil by Robin Cheers

I’ve usually been befuddled by the Bible’s assertion that “in the beginning was the Word”, but lately I’ve been seeing some significance in the phrase. Perhaps words are, in a sense, one of the foremost starting points of creation in our lives. Words, after all, are thoughts made into shapes and sounds, and thoughts are a central source of power for us. Our thoughts, moment by moment, mold and manufacture our experience, and our thoughts take form as spoken or written words which stream through our lives like productive winds and sunshine. In all of human history, hasn’t every disagreement, dispute, and all-out war started with contentious words? And hasn’t every single friendship and affair of the heart commenced with the speaking or writing of gracious words? Words work their commanding magic on a moment to moment basis – the magic of malice or the magic of compassion and devotion. In the beginning of both hatred and love there was, and still is, the word – a single word or a series of these irresistible written or spoken forces.

SADNESS AND REGRET

 

"Infinite Sadness",
ink on paper
by Carmel Jenkin

(inspired by a line from a poem written by two 4^th graders at Pine Point School)

“Blue is the color of sadness and regret”

is what they wrote, these children who let

their thoughts and words go free. They read

the line so softly, like following a thread

they had found in their hearts. Perhaps

they’ve known sadness, seen joy collapse

with no warning. Perhaps regret has filled

some hours of their lives, and chilled

the sunshine of their spirits. They wrote

their poem as if they hoped to float

their thoughts across to all their friends

to share the sorrow life sometimes sends. 

 

A GUEST FOR TEA

She brought us yellow tulips as a sign

of friendship, and we shared our special tea

with kindliness. There seemed to be a vine

of thoughtfulness encircling we three

and joining us together as we talked

beside the fire. All the flames seemed light

like gentle flowers, and our words all walked

together and were generous and bright.

"Yellow Tulips", oil,
by Delilah Smith

MY DREAM

(on the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr.)

I have a dream that life will one day be

the marvel that it truly is, that love

will rise triumphant, and a joyous spree

of kindness will begin to dance above

the burial ground of hate. I have a dream

that clouds of sorrow will become the clear

and open skies of comfort, and a gleam

of goodness will be there to shine and cheer

up our disheartened world, and yes, I have

a dream that wisdom will become the salve

to spread on fear, and gentleness will fast

become the force that frees us all at last,

thank God almighty, frees us all at last.  

 

SPLENDOR

"RESTFUL" oil,
by Tom Brown

    I hope these words don’t sound too prideful or self-admiring, but I must say that I see splendor in myself. Of course, it’s the same splendor I see in every person I pass in the grocery store, in every manifestation of sunshine, in every shade of color on quiet winter days, and in every drifting ripple in the Mystic River. This entire universe is an endless and fabulous display of splendor, and since we’re all part of the universe, we, and all things, share in the splendor. Somehow, all over the earth, lungs keep lifting and falling with beautiful evenness, and hearts keep helping billions of us – people and panthers and butterflies – stay strong in splendid ways. Just the fact that I can carry my teacup to my lips is a magnificent accomplishment, given the countless nerves and muscles that must flawlessly function together in the process. When birds wander above the river, they do it, always, with smoothness and splendor, and when the girl greets me at the grocery checkout, her smile is a minor miracle to me. All of us – people, small stones on the shore, flames in a winter fireplace – share in the splendor of this earth that somehow and miraculously became our home.

BEING UNIVERSE-CENTERED

   I guess I’m no more self-centered than most of us, but I’m looking to let something else become the center of my life from now on – and I’ve chosen the entire universe. Strange as it may sound, I want to become more universe-centered. Instead of pondering the problems my little self seems to always have, I’d like to wonder more about what’s happening outside of “me” – what’s happening in the homes of people who are suffering with illness or scarcity, and in the homes of people who feel lucky to be alive; what’s happening in the forests and valleys across the world, where animals and plants prosper while I fret over my paltry problems; what’s happening, even, among the planets and stars as they swirl me along on our endless passage through time without end. I’ve grown weary of worrying about this small segment of the universe called “Ham”. There are majestic miracles surrounding me, for millions of miles on all sides, and I want to stay centered there. I want to set my “self” off to the side and see, almost for the first time, the wondrous universe that’s been waiting for me.      

WISDOM SPEAKING

    Like all of us, I occasionally pick up some new knowledge here and there – even some wisdom now and then – but surprisingly, a very high kind of wisdom speaks to me, and all of us, all day long. Unfortunately, I am often too frazzled with forty different things on my mind to listen to these quiet calls of wisdom (or Wisdom, since it’s everywhere) – these soft voices of understanding that signal me from both far inside and far away. It takes stillness to hear what Wisdom is saying. It takes settling down and setting aside the countless concerns I carry with me, and then absolutely listening to what this wise force in my life is softly saying to me.

OFFSPRINGING

     In our blended family, Delycia and I have five children and four grandchildren – our “offspring”, to use an old-fashioned word – but I’ve been thinking this morning about another kind of offspring we might lay claim to – our thoughts and spoken words. After all, we, in a sense, “give birth” to thoughts and words all day long, sort of sending them out into the world as the creations – the “children” – of our minds. Each day, thousands of newborn thoughts are brought forth in our minds, and, somewhat like children, they instantly start making their presence felt. They mix with other thoughts, making more new thoughts, and then perhaps new spoken words to be newly delivered to the world. Just in the last few days, we have given birth to thousands of these full-of-life thoughts and words, these short-lived offspring that materialize in innocence and wholesomeness and help us share our lives with each other and the world.  

DAYS OF REVERENCE

    The word “reverence” has to do with treating someone or something with respect and honor, and it strikes me that today, and any day, deserves this kind of treatment. As I sit with Delycia during breakfast with bright sunshine slowly spreading across the yard, I almost feel a sense of amazement at the appearance, once again, of so many marvels this morning. This sunshine, for instance, has brought its gifts to us from billions of miles away, and now it’s making our winter grass look almost golden and the side of the house next door shine like a sheet of silver. I see the trees swaying slightly in passing breezes, which makes me wonder how many little and large movements I will see today – the sway of Delyica’s arms as she walks through the house, the easy passing of cars along our street, the sudden rising of birds from a bush.

    Like all days, this is surely a day for reverence, a day to welcome and bow to and give a greeting of esteem and praise.       

BRAND NEW SLEEPINESS

     I was feeling sleepy a few minutes ago, drowsy and heavy-eyed, but it occurred to me, strangely enough, that this sleepiness was brand-new. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the simple fact that each moment of my life is completely new, a totally fresh entrance of new sights and sounds and thoughts, and it made sense, as I thought about my drowsiness, that it, too, was completely new. It was, you might say, a fresh drowsiness, a clean, unspoiled, up-to-the minute tiredness. It was fatigue, but a pristine, mint-condition fatigue. My yawns seemed flawless, just right. My eyelids were closing with freshness and sparkle. It was lethargy of the latest, new-fangled kind.         

TODAY NEEDS ME

        Most of us probably have days when we feel somewhat superfluous, like we’re just an unnecessary speck in an immeasurable universe, but fortunately for me, I usually wake up from that misunderstanding fairly fast, and see again, with a smile, that today needs me. I see again these simple but striking truths – that the universe is endlessly harmonious, that I am an essential part of that harmony,  and that whatever I do today will be a soft but continuously influential force. l am needed today. The oxygen atoms I send out from my lungs will he used again and again in countless ways by the universe. Every step I take will move limitless molecules around, and thus move the universe. My smiles might bring blessings to careworn lives. A word of thanks might throw a streak of light across someone on this day – a day that’s very special, like all of them, and a day that definitely needs me.

SUNS IN DEWDROPS

  I recall seeing, on many summer mornings, the sunlight reflected in small drops of dew in the grass, and, thinking about it on this gray day in winter, it seems as though the sun itself was in those summer dewdrops. When I stand in front of a mirror, I am, in a sense, in the reflection, since it looks exactly like me, and so perhaps it could be said that the sun is, in some way, inside each drop of summer dew. When I walk across a summer lawn, perhaps I walk among millions of sparkling suns. On this winter day, when grayness gives its quiet gifts to us, it’s good to remember being among dewdrops with suns inside them.   

INFINITE POSSIBILITIES

     It sometimes seems awe-inspiring to me how many possibilities exist in my life – how many different thoughts, feelings, and events could maybe happen, even in the next few moments. It’s like I’m a small but essential stream in an endless ocean of possibilities. Who knows what will happen in the next few hours, or even the next few seconds – what current of life will come and carry me along, what thoughts will waft me here and there, what surprises will suddenly show themselves? The verb “to surprise” originally meant “to seize”, and it does sometimes seem like I’m seized, moment by moment, by one startling surprise after another. True, I don’t often think about this startling aspect of life – this tendency of life to be reborn and brand-new each moment – but it’s there, nonetheless. Each second, the shoreless ocean of my life shifts, a little or a lot, and a new and splendid surprise arises. 

TAKING MYSELF LIGHTLY

     I recall hearing someone say that angels can fly because they take themselves lightly, and it always sounds to me like excellent advice. I’m not interested in flying, but I would like to shed some of the seriousness which occasionally weighs me down. I sometimes walk around like I have loads of responsibilities on my shoulders – like I’m some special superman who has serious tasks to perform, tasks that simply must be done by me alone. On those days, I take myself way too seriously. Unlike angels, I’m weighed down by a dreamed-up sense of my own importance. On those days, flying is out; self-absorption and slogging is in.

    On other days, lucky for me, I get loose from this seriousness and see myself for what I am – just a twist and twirl in the everlasting dance of a generous universe. My silly self-importance disappears like a small star in the vastness of dawn. I feel light on those days – light and free and ready to relax with life instead of wrestle with it. 

HEARING THE CALL

In the summer, when I hear birds calling back and forth across the yard, I sometimes make believe they’re calling me. “Hello, Ham,” I hear them saying, “pay attention to what’s happening. Don’t miss this amazing day.” There are other calls that seem to come to me: just now, the call of the flag in front of our house as it waves in the wind and wants me to watch it carefully; the call of the clock in our living room as it ticks and tells me to make the most of all my moments; the call of a clementine on the counter to come and enjoy its juiciness. As a young boy, I was encouraged to listen for the call to the ministry from a God who seemed to reside somewhere in the sky, but since then I’ve found another God. I’ve found the God that lives in all of us, including birds and flags and clocks and clementines, the God that loves to let us know about the beauty of each newborn moment, the God that calls to us to see the sacredness of all things. Those are the calls I'm listening for these days.

MY ANGELS

     For Christians and others, this is the season of angels, but in the last few years I’ve been realizing that angels visit me, and all of us, almost every minute of the day. In the original Greek, the word “angel”, after all, simply meant “messenger”, and what better messengers are there than the thousands of thoughts that land in our lives each day?  As I’m typing these sentences, thoughts are saying what I should  type, as though countless friends are constantly passing by, sharing ideas they’ve brought from somewhere. Of course, someone might say that it’s just my brain that’s making the thoughts, but that answer is far too simplistic. It completely misses the vast mystery of thinking, the fathomless puzzle of why a particular thought occurs to us at a particular moment. I realize more and more that I don’t actually make my thoughts, but that they just sort of descend to me, second by second. I don’t say, “Now I will make this thought.” No, the thoughts – my angels – just suddenly land in my life, say their message, and then move off to make way for the thousands of other thoughts always descending, lucky for me, from who knows where.

THE GREAT GIVER

"Waiting for Santa", oil,
by Roxanne Steed

     There are some colorfully wrapped gifts under our Christmas tree today, but they don’t come close to matching the gifts Delycia and I receive each day – each moment – from “the great Giver”, a name one of my favorite writers gives to the infinitely kind and giving universe. Each moment, the gift of breath is given to our lungs, again and again, perhaps 20,000 brand new breaths each day. Each moment, too, our blood brings the gift of fresh, spotless oxygen to our cells, helped, of course, by the gift given with each pump of  our hard-working hearts, again and again, perhaps 100,000 pumps each day. And then there’s the gift of our thoughts, those always surprising presents that somehow unwrap in our minds in a nonstop way -- maybe 60,000 mint-condition thoughts each day. So I guess each day, each second, is truly Christmas for us as we enjoy this generous universe we’re privileged to be part of.     

THE CITY OF MY LIFE

     Sometimes, sitting in an airplane window seat at night above a brightly lit city, I’ve thought of what almost seems like another shining city -- the city of my own life. Now and then, when I’m able to mentally see my life from a distance, it seems to be lit-up with lights of all kinds. Close up, my days often look blurry and cluttered, but, when I stand way back from them, it looks like there’s serenity and a sort of luster in the minutes and hours. For instance, all the innumerable people who come and go through my life are, in a sense, shining with their own hopes and worries – the shimmering lights of hopefulness as well as the pale blue lights of trouble and sorrow. Also, from a distance, the numerous events in my life seem to be sparkling in countless hues as they pass swiftly along and disappear. Some good, some bad, some just tedious – all the large and small episodes in my days, when I observe them from far off, seem to glisten and shine in their various ways. Somehow they all seem sort of effulgent, much more full of brightness than dullness. I sometimes like to pretend I’m on a mountaintop, looking down at my long life, and then I realize, again, that this life of mine, this grand gift I was given 73 years ago, is indeed a shining city for me, a spectacle of lights like I might see from a night sky over New York.       

AN EVERLASTING LIGHT

"Follow the Star", oil,
by Roxanne Steed

 Whenever I hear the Christmas song about the little town of Bethlehem, I especially notice the phrase “the everlasting light”, and it sometimes starts me thinking about the everlasting lights in my own life. One of these lights would be simple gentleness. What darkness can put out the light of gentleness? What sorrow can kill a person’s gentleness, a person’s ability to be tender toward others? True, in a tragedy it may appear that gentleness has disappeared in the smoke of misfortune, but shortly it always reappears, more durable and undying than before. Gentleness can never be vanquished, because it’s not made of bricks and mortar or bones and muscle or dollars and cents. Gentleness is like light: it looks soft, but it can shine through or around or over any problem. Gentleness is unobtrusive and sometimes unnoticeable, but, like light, it can instantly and easily destroy the deepest darkness. Perhaps what was born in the dark manger many years ago was the inextinguishable light of gentleness. Perhaps that is what I, a non-churchgoer, worship at this special time of year.

PROPER IDENTIFICATION

    I sometimes have to show my driver’s license to prove my identity, and each time, I smile to myself at the ridiculous idea that a laminated card can actually say who I am. Does the card say that the oxygen and hydrogen atoms in my body (which make up most of it) were born with the stars billions of years ago, making me a billion-year-old guy? Does the card say that about 50 million of the cells in my body will be brand new in the next few seconds, turning me into sort of a brand new person? Does the card say that fresh, pristine thoughts somehow spring up inside me by the thousands each day, all of them adding, in mysterious ways, to who I am?  The card shows my name and a photo, but does it show any of the multitudinous feelings that have bubbled up inside me over the years, feelings that would disclose my identity far better than a small plastic card?    

FREE AS A BREEZE

     

"Fresh Breeze", oil,
by Robin Cheers

I sometimes see, with surprising ease, that I am freer, by far, than I ever imagined. Somehow, on those occasions, it becomes clear to me that I am not just a separate, isolated, and time-bound individual, but an essential part of a freely flowing universe. The atoms that make up my mind and body were shaped at the same moment the stars started to shine and the earth to spin, and thus have sailed through thousands of years with freedom, all the way to me. My thoughts, too, have flown to me on the freest wings, sailing into my life in casual, slapdash ways from who knows where, and I can freely flow with those thoughts beyond all boundaries. I confess I usually feel fairly bound up by all kinds of limits, but at certain special times I know I’m as free as a breeze on the loose.   

OUTSIDE AT DAWN

"Morning Star", oil,
by V....Vaughan

So early in the morning it was strange

to see a star still shining just above,

but then again it wasn’t a surprise,

since stars were shining in their lives in all

their moments. Even worry was a star

to show the path to reassurance, and

distress could shine a special, caring light. 

WALKING IN THE GARDEN IN DECEMBER

  "Garden Gate", watercolor,
by Nita Leger Casey

They know the flowers are not dead, but just

transforming under frost. They know that nothing

truly dies but only changes, turns

from loveliness to beauty, smoothly flowing

in the river of undying life. The silver crust

of frost is just a sheet of safety to

protect the garden in its time of change.

They walk and know their lives are streaming

onward with the stars and fish and flowers,

changing as the universe is pleased to change them. 

Today their lives are joined as friends among

the flowers, and years from now they’ll be

among the stars or sweeping through a sea

as waves in this amazing and unending life.