Tag: Beauty

In Celebration of Autumn

Here in Alberta, September is often our most consistently glorious month. Albeit, days grow shorter and the sun shines lower in the sky, but the colours. Oh, the colours! The golds against that brilliant blue sky. Amur maples glowing scarlet and orange, reminiscent of hardwoods in my hometown of Niagara. Ruby-like crab apples waiting to be plucked.

So today, in honour of the northern hemisphere’s autumnal equinox, here’s a lovely one from Mary Oliver.

SONG FOR AUTUMN

Don’t you imagine the leaves dream now
how comfortable it will be to touch
the earth instead of the
nothingness of the air and the endless
freshets of wind? And don’t you think
the trees, especially those with
mossy hollows, are beginning to look for

the fires that will come—six, a dozen—to sleep
inside their bodies? And don’t you hear
the goldenrod whispering goodbye,
the everlasting being crowned with the first
tuffets of snow? The pond
stiffens and the white field over which
the fox runs so quickly brings out
its long blue shadows. The wind wags
its many tails. And in the evening
the piled firewood shifts a little,
longing to be on its way.


Praise Song for the Pandemic

Season's End, Perspectives with Panache, 2019

PRAISE SONG FOR THE PANDEMIC

Praise be the nurses and doctors, every medical staff bent over flesh to offer care, for lives saved and lives lost, for showing up either way,

Praise for the farmers, tilling soil, planting seeds so food can grow, an act of hope if ever there was,

Praise be the janitors and garbage collectors, the grocery store clerks, and the truck drivers barreling through long quiet nights,

Give thanks for bus drivers, delivery persons, postal workers, and all those keeping an eye on water, gas, and electricity,

Blessings on our leaders, making hard choices for the common good, offering words of assurance,

Celebrate the scientists, working away to understand the thing that plagues us, to find an antidote, all the medicine makers, praise be the journalists keeping us informed,

Praise be the teachers, finding new ways to educate children from afar, and blessings on parents holding it together for them,

Blessed are the elderly and those with weakened immune systems, all those who worry for their health, praise for those who stay at home to protect them,

Blessed are the domestic violence victims, on lock down with abusers, the homeless and refugees,

Praise for the poets and artists, the singers and storytellers, all those who nourish with words and sound and color,

Blessed are the ministers and therapists of every kind, bringing words of comfort,

Blessed are the ones whose jobs are lost, who have no savings, who feel fear of the unknown gnawing,

Blessed are those in grief, especially who mourn alone, blessed are those who have passed into the Great Night,

Praise for police and firefighters, paramedics, and all who work to keep us safe, praise for all the workers and caregivers of every kind,

Praise for the sound of notifications, messages from friends reaching across the distance, give thanks for laughter and kindness,

Praise be our four-footed companions, with no forethought or anxiety, responding only in love,

Praise for the seas and rivers, forests and stones who teach us to endure,

Give thanks for your ancestors, for the wars and plagues they endured and survived, their resilience is in your bones, your blood,

Blessed is the water that flows over our hands and the soap that helps keep them clean, each time a baptism,

Praise every moment of stillness and silence, so new voices can be heard, praise the chance at slowness,

Praise be the birds who continue to sing the sky awake each day, praise for the primrose poking yellow petals from dark earth, blessed is the air clearing overhead so one day we can breathe deeply again,

And when this has passed may we say that love spread more quickly than any virus ever could, may we say this was not just an ending but also a place to begin.

– Christine Valters Paintner –
Abbey of the Arts
2020

As we head into our 7th month of living in the pandemic, I wanted to share this poem, now making special mention of all the teachers around the world, who as another lovely poet wrote this week: “To All the Teachers, we see you turning your hearts into classrooms where not even masks can block out your love.” bentlily by Samantha Reynolds

Praise be the teachers.

With love and kindest regards, dear friends.

A Couple of Covid Summer Days

Driving along a prairie east west highway, see
tawny hawks sit still and solemn on weathered wooden fence posts
gazing out over the sun yellow canola fields
bordered by green grass and blue sky.
While crows hop on the edges of pot-hole ponds,
and others soar on invisible cloudless slipstreams.

The linden tree we planted to replace the “sacred” grove of aspens,
(those four slender white trunks and limbs finally reached their natural end)
is now in full golden blossom, gives off that
subtle, yet distinguishable sweet fragrance
attracting big-bottomed bumblebees by the dozen.

This day I sit on the café patio of a favourite garden store.
The masked hostess initially said there’d be an hour wait,
then quickly waived it and me to the perfect table.
Such kindness these days so easily
brings me,
touches me,
moves me
to tears. Thankful for sunglasses. I can see out. She can’t see in.

Creamy globes of hydrangea, some in pots, others topiary trees.
Their petals flutter in a balmy breeze I’ve longed for ages to feel.

Piano muzak and signature water fountains, my aural companions.
Another day of cloudless blue soothing warmth.
Background melodies blur nearby conversations,
but accentuate my silent solitude.
Those familiar invite a slippery slope of remembering when

I was last here…lunch with friends,
Winter cold.
Swaddled in sweaters and down, toques, gloves and coats.
Warm in the glow of time shared.

Floating down the river as a teenager with my girlfriends, or
lounging on the air mattress in the cold quarry waters.
Music blasting from the boom box above.
Carefully passing the joint,
we be jammin’.

My spoon glides through
the layers of light whipped cream,
denser coconut cream,
then break though oven crisp pastry.
My raison d’etre this favourite dessert.

Pachelbel’s canon whispers, evokes
body memory to breathe slower, deeper.
And then, like that golden dragonfly I watch
my thoughts
lift and land lightly

a friend who lost her husband to suicide
another her brother
won’t linger too long here,
just enough for a steady pause and heartfelt prayer.

Finally a long awaited week of summer
where the yellow circle weather icons make it possible to plan

a picnic,
a patio visit,
an alfresco dinner with friends,
another day long road trip.

Slugs shrivel. Flowers flourish.
Farmers’ crops and home gardens ripen,
promising a bounty this week.Perspectives with Panache, 2020Hallelujah! Cohen’s chords now proclaim.
Bill received and paid.
Thanks be given.

My Necessary Counterpoint

Today, like every other day, we wake up empty
and frightened. Don’t open the door to the study
and begin reading. Take down a musical instrument.

Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.

– Rumi –
translated by Coleman Barks in The Essential Rumi, 1995

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