The Field (c) R. Sievers 2008I was startled by the tear in my raw throat. Getting sick yesterday was not on my agenda. After a night of tossing the covers around the bed I woke up calm. I was then startled by the peace in this day. Instead of working hard to improve my little world here I’ve sat. I’ve been wondering how many people actually have the privilege to sit down with a cheap blue pen to record the musings of the sky. Who is that lucky? And there are so many other things to be concerned about, right?
After all, the sky has fallen. There’s depression on Wall Street. Our presidential mirror has burned up the world with light from the past. The cars sliding to the mall are still fueled with the blood of innocents from some sandy environ. Who am I to chide the sure and supple ones with my childlike poems?
All I can say is that all of my life experiences have led me to this very chair, scooting across a pile of wadded poems, oil pastels and graham cracker crumbs. The cell phone is blinking its urgent red light through the scrim of discarded papers. I won’t answer it just yet. I’m dreamy today. Sick with the beauty as much as from the razors in my throat. I just want to listen for the voice of God in the trees. If I’m lucky, to hear Her voice in the rustling of inky wings.
I wonder what sparks this addiction to beauty? Is it the fog or how the sun stirs his holy liquid hands through the morning? Is it the golden field framed with the symphony notes of knotty pine? Perhaps it is the rusty maple standing sentinel with the brick of the old chimney. Maybe it’s the silver barn shimmering signals to the creek dancing around its feet. I also recall the coyotes marching through the forest right to the edge of my fevered dreams last night.
Now I just watch through the steamy windows. The meaning of everything is clear, without words. But I’ll try to translate the wink of the midnight coyote with words anyway.
I think about the ones I love. How hard they are working right now. I remember them like I remember what God has created. The kids at school swinging a tetherball and playing a piccolo in band practice. My mother flying her wood laden pickup truck up highway 75 through the lava plains of Idaho. My silent father sitting on the sand pondering his next money making adventure, while he finishes studying the shape of the waves. My brother asleep so many years beneath the forest. My step father asleep in front of the TV after lunch. My beloved climbing the metal clank of stairs above the churning river. And here I am at my window.
There are so many ways of swallowing up time. And there are so many ways to sing of the succulence of this life. I want to know that I am fine in this world remembering all of you, my beloved friends and family. I want to know that I am free enough to see secrets in the spiral of grasses. Secure enough to dream beneath Orion’s watchful bow. I hear the headlines and I also remember all that is correct in the world. There has to be a place for beauty, even in the sad and struggling times we’ve called into this existence. I think that beauty and remembrance are as necessary as air and water. I think attention is as important as food. Sometimes I even think attention is the essence of love.
I encourage you to loaf for just a moment with me. Be free enough to pause. Remember those that you love and then let them go. See something beautiful you have never recognized before. Maybe the world needs this sort of care as much as any. And a loving pause seems to be such a fine way to begin loving and solid action.
Rick
After all, the sky has fallen. There’s depression on Wall Street. Our presidential mirror has burned up the world with light from the past. The cars sliding to the mall are still fueled with the blood of innocents from some sandy environ. Who am I to chide the sure and supple ones with my childlike poems?
All I can say is that all of my life experiences have led me to this very chair, scooting across a pile of wadded poems, oil pastels and graham cracker crumbs. The cell phone is blinking its urgent red light through the scrim of discarded papers. I won’t answer it just yet. I’m dreamy today. Sick with the beauty as much as from the razors in my throat. I just want to listen for the voice of God in the trees. If I’m lucky, to hear Her voice in the rustling of inky wings.
I wonder what sparks this addiction to beauty? Is it the fog or how the sun stirs his holy liquid hands through the morning? Is it the golden field framed with the symphony notes of knotty pine? Perhaps it is the rusty maple standing sentinel with the brick of the old chimney. Maybe it’s the silver barn shimmering signals to the creek dancing around its feet. I also recall the coyotes marching through the forest right to the edge of my fevered dreams last night.
Now I just watch through the steamy windows. The meaning of everything is clear, without words. But I’ll try to translate the wink of the midnight coyote with words anyway.
I think about the ones I love. How hard they are working right now. I remember them like I remember what God has created. The kids at school swinging a tetherball and playing a piccolo in band practice. My mother flying her wood laden pickup truck up highway 75 through the lava plains of Idaho. My silent father sitting on the sand pondering his next money making adventure, while he finishes studying the shape of the waves. My brother asleep so many years beneath the forest. My step father asleep in front of the TV after lunch. My beloved climbing the metal clank of stairs above the churning river. And here I am at my window.
There are so many ways of swallowing up time. And there are so many ways to sing of the succulence of this life. I want to know that I am fine in this world remembering all of you, my beloved friends and family. I want to know that I am free enough to see secrets in the spiral of grasses. Secure enough to dream beneath Orion’s watchful bow. I hear the headlines and I also remember all that is correct in the world. There has to be a place for beauty, even in the sad and struggling times we’ve called into this existence. I think that beauty and remembrance are as necessary as air and water. I think attention is as important as food. Sometimes I even think attention is the essence of love.
I encourage you to loaf for just a moment with me. Be free enough to pause. Remember those that you love and then let them go. See something beautiful you have never recognized before. Maybe the world needs this sort of care as much as any. And a loving pause seems to be such a fine way to begin loving and solid action.
Rick
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