Tuesday, October 9, 2012

S E A S O N S: being a father.












"Nothing I've ever done has given me more joy and rewards than being a father to my children." -Bill Cosby

As the season has changed from summer to autumn, so has my attention. I look at my children as they grow and become who they were intended to be, and I sigh. They never cease to capture my heart. The chill falls earlier as the sun drops below the redwood tree line. Warmth and laughter billow from the life-energy of my children at home. I welcome the autumn and embrace the time given.

Wednesday, September 5, 2012

Looking For Mike In The Little


There is a place that I know 
                                            Where I need more often to go 
A place of amazing comfort and rest 
Where a smile is never rare 
And Your love is as free as the air 
And I lack for nothing 
When I can see the love in Your eyes 
And know that it's all for me 

I fear nothing at all 
When I'm safe in the arms of my Father 
And if I ever fall I take comfort in knowing 
That You are there

I find myself caught in wonder and sometimes absent of being present to the moment. There are a lot of things that make me think about Mike. The other evening I drove up Highway 9 to a burger joint with family and friends. Mike lived just a mile past. I drove that road weekly in after summer seasons. Winding my way home, listening to Patty Griffin, after hours spent fully accepted by my dear friend. I found no judgments, no cynical talk, no expectations, no arrogance, no doubt, just acceptance and love. I knew when I was with Mike that I was seen truer and more real. When I am in conversations and people are talking about the way something should be and dialoguing about the "what ifs," I pause in thought, and wish I was with Mike. Those kind of yoyo conversations of up and down did not exist. We existed. The presence of friendship for a brief spell was more powerful than any weightless rambling about the who knows and who cares. I acknowledge that I am tired, grieving, and feel the weight of friendlessness as I enter the after summer seasons. Mike was a sailor. I was a cowboy. In another lifetime we would have met in port, and he would have rode out to pasture, and I would have sailed into the horizon. But we had this lifetime, so we sat side by side and shared stories of the wild hills of Africa, and the brilliant sunsets from the Pacific. I look forward to a place "where a smile is never rare." Not today, but someday. Today I am just looking for Mike in the little bits of life.

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

W A T E R fall

“What does it feel like to be alive? Living, you stand under a waterfall. 
You leave the sleeping shore deliberately; you shed your dusty clothes,
pick your barefoot way over the high, slippery rocks, hold your breath, 
choose your footing, and step into the waterfall. 
The hard water pelts your skull, bangs in bits on your shoulders and arms. 
The strong water dashes down beside you and you feel it a
long your 


calves and thighs rising roughly backup, up to the roiling surface, 


full of bubbles that slide up your skin or break on you at full speed. 


Can you breathe here? Here where the force is the greatest and only 


the strength of your neck holds the river out of your face. 


Yes, you can breathe even here. You could learn to live like this.


And you can, if you concentrate, even look out at the peaceful 


far bank where you try to raise your arms."-Annie Dillard

Thursday, May 24, 2012

the presence of still water.

there is nothing i can say or do to predict or prepare what is to come. the stirring in my gut, and the spinning in my head will not stop with answers or rest. i must let myself go. i must choose to lay arms stretched across tender, leaf laden ground. if i inhale, i must exhale. i am alive today to live fully alive. tomorrow there might be pain. yesterdays remind me that it exists, but today the water is still. i am a man. there were no heroes in my pain. i was not anything special in the midst of hardship and tragedy. i was me. i am me. even though my wife has to remind me of who i am, and that one day did not make me this way, i am me. changed, but the same me. i am free.




“When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be, I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds. I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief. I come into the presence of still water. And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.” -Wendell Berry

Saturday, May 5, 2012

H O M E :: the-unforseen-wilderness

"And the world cannot be discovered by a journey of miles, no matter how long, but only by a spiritual journey, a journey of one inch, very arduous and humbling and joyful, by which we arrive at the ground at our own feet, and learn to be at home." -Wendell Berry


I have found the longer I spend being in one place, moving forward and around, discovering the sensational nature I am apart of, I do not wrestle with wonder of where my life is going, but simply smile at where my life is.


The redwood forest is often a place of rescue. People come here holding onto their last thread of hope in something bigger, or better than their circumstances. They seek a shout, a verse, a mere whisper through the trees, telling them they belong to something more. The disillusionment of power players, leaders, and religious pillars have left their hope in God dangling by one last tendon, but their limb is not severed and there is hope. The recovery time begins in the first inhale of pure air from nature. A wonder settles into a sigh of rest. For some the redwood forest transforms them in an instant. For others it takes days, weeks, months, and sometimes years.


I know what it is to be rescued amongst these magnificent trees. The humus holds me as I rest in the knowing of God and the potential of his love known by all. Everyone is not a caretaker. It is a humble position and often forgotten. As I tend to this place where healing happens, I hope the healing is remembered and the maker of the redwoods is taken away in the souls of those who come and go. As the season approaches when many will come and experience this place, I walk gently, whispering the names I know, asking for the forest to be a God reveal, and healer. The bees are buzzing early this year. Poppies blast orange of the sun against the sandstone hillsides. New redwood greens dance in the spring breeze. Deer nuzzle their noses against fields of clover, enjoying their sweet nectar. It is a season of new. Nature is always ready to receive those who come. It was created by God to be his gift to all who come away. This is my home. All are welcome here for a stay.

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

R E N E W E D :: Time to Dance

"By reading scripture I am so renewed that all nature seems renewed around me and with me. The sky seems to be a pure, cooler blue, the trees a deeper green. The whole world is charged with the glory of God and I feel fire and music under my feet." Thomas Merton

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

B E L O N G :: Dancing With Wildflowers

I choose to not dream of "what ifs" but of actual possibilities.

Living with the knowledge and understanding that my life is twined together with others, helps me dream real and completely conscious. As friends develop and change, I desire them to grow. I hope and pray they are brave enough to belong first to their creator. That is where lasting growth and healthy belonging begins. 

When we distort the creators character, we change our perception of pure love. We become similar to a bee trapped under a cup turned upside down. Our attempts to be free are fleeting and abruptly halted, slamming against the ceiling. Only when we choose to exist in the pure love offered at the beginning, will we become a bee, dancing with wildflowers. I dream of being fully free, belonging because I am living how the creator intended me to live.

I believe a lot of people live their whole life under a cup turned upside down. Their desire to belong has become skewed, and distorted. They are looking slightly bent at their surroundings, making their horizontal focus more important than their vertical understanding. The longer they find belonging within their surrounding social meter without a truer, and clearer connection to the creators pure love, they come to settle for a secondary belonging. Their dreams become "what ifs" rather than actual possibilities.

When we belong first and wholly to our creator, the expanse of belonging is uncontainable. Belong to your creator because you were designed to be his. Belonging is not an action or pursuit, it is an acceptance of pure love, intended for you since the beginning.

Dance with the wildflowers in the breeze. Belong.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

New Day.


"With the new day comes 
new strength and new thoughts."
Eleanor Roosevelt

Sunday, April 8, 2012

L I V E :: always in the moment.



"Just as the wave cannot exist for itself, 
but is ever a part of the heaving 
surface of the ocean, 
so must I never live my life for itself, 
but always in the experience 
which is going on around me." 
-Albert Schweitzer


Friday, April 6, 2012

G O O D friday :: Remember the Lions Roar


This is one of my favorite scenes from CS Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia. It is good to remember that on this day there was weeping and silence, but it is even more important to remember the roar.


The rising of the sun had made everything look so different - all colours and shadows were changed that for a moment they didn't see the important thing. Then they did. The Stone Table was broken into two pieces by a great crack that ran down it from end to end; and there was no Aslan...

"Who's done it?" cried Susan. "What does it mean? Is it magic?"

"Yes!" said a great voice behind their backs. "It is more magic." They looked round. There, shining in the sunrise, larger than they had seen him before, shaking his mane (for it had apparently grown again) stood Aslan himself.

"Oh, Aslan!" cried both the children, staring up at him, almost as much frightened as they were glad.

"Aren't you dead then, dear Aslan?" said Lucy.

"Not now," said Aslan...

"But what does it all mean?" asked Susan when they were somewhat calmer.

"It means," said Aslan, "that though the Witch knew the Deep Magic, there is a magic deeper still which she did not know: Her knowledge goes back only to the dawn of time. But if she could have looked a little further back, into the stillness and the darkness before Time dawned, she would have read there a different incantation. She would have known that when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitors stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backwards..."

"And now," said Aslan presently, "to business. I feel I am going to roar. You had better put your fingers in your ears."

And they did. And Aslan stood up and when he opened his mouth to roar his face became so terrible that they did not dare to look at it. And they saw all the trees in front of him bend before the blast of his roaring as grass bends in a meadow before the wind.

Thursday, April 5, 2012

N O R M A L :: what my eyes see.


i see the world through my normal lens. 

the light from the wall of windows glows
through plastic empty grinders.

the new green of spring bounces from limbs.

pale pink bandana hold hair back 
while bangs bounce to the beat.

thrift shirt tees never go out
especially if they are kelly on a kind human.

well cut wood table leaves lines to wonder.

hanging lights add delicate in contrast
to the rugged wood roof accents.

shadows dance against trunks
light bows and joins the wind.

i take in the normal world i see and breathe.


Tuesday, April 3, 2012

hear the music :: L I S T E N

the sun did not shine through the branches with beams of light. it filled the backdrop with a glow of shimmering gold, like the dust left settling in the sifter of some lucky miner.

the green nettles, leaves, and ferns did not pop from the contrasting red trunks of the towering redwoods. they spread a softer hue of dampened growth, like the sea kelp of an ocean basin after a sun full day.

the sound of the forest did not hum with life rhythms from all the energy of nature colliding. it played a softer tone, deaf to the human ear, but music to the listener.

i heard a song while i walked along.

Saturday, March 31, 2012

man is the stone

water glides seamlessly over the rock bottom creek. 
stones standing still create ripples from the passing flow.
light dances off sky reflections as liquid rolls pass.

man watches as energy envelops stillness
motionlessly standing.
questioning what can be taken from the images casted. 
numbness presents chills to limbs
sensation unnoticed.

questions without answers
wonder remains
man is the stone.

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Wishing for Waterfalls and Wondering :: Am I Alive?

“What does it feel like to be alive? 
Living, you stand under a waterfall. You leave the sleeping shore deliberately; you shed your dusty clothes, pick your barefoot way over the high, slippery rocks, hold your breath, choose your footing, and step into the waterfall. The hard water pelts your skull, bangs in bits on your shoulders and arms. The strong water dashes down beside you and you feel it along your calves and thighs rising roughly backup, up to the roiling surface, full of bubbles that slide up your skin or break on you at full speed. Can you breathe here? Here where the force is the greatest and only the strength of your neck holds the river out of your face. Yes, you can breathe even here. You could learn to live like this. And you can, if you concentrate, even look out at the peaceful far bank where you try to raise your arms. What a racket in your ears, what a scattershot pummeling! It is time pounding at you, time. Knowing you are alive is watching on every side your generation's short time falling away as fast as rivers drop through air, and feeling it hit.” -Annie Dillard

Saturday, March 24, 2012

Never meant to be O R D I N A R Y .

"NO child on earth was ever meant to be ordinary, and you can see it in them, and they know it, too, but then times get to them, and they wear out their brains learning what folks expect, and spend their strength trying to rise over those same folks." Annie Dillard

I see so clearly in my girls that they are not meant to be ordinary. They are extraordinary humans! I know so many adults who seem yearning and bewildered by the wonder of who they are. I wish I could have known them as children and invited them to lay beneath the redwoods, and climb within the trunks. I imagine if my children were children when I was a child we would have been close friends. There is something sweet about being free to play in nature without expectation of results or achievements. I wish every child could come and play, and know that they are extraordinary. The redwoods have a way of reminding us that we are all special. You see, I have never been ordinary, and so I see the extraordinary even when others don't see it in themselves. I hope you know you were never meant to be ordinary, so be who you were meant to be. Be EXTRAORDINARILY you!

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

She Played The Guitar :: I Sang A Solo

photo taken by: orion pahl, 18,march,2012
My eyes are dry
My faith is old
My heart is hard
My prayers are cold
And I know how I ought to be
Alive to You and dead to me

But what can be done
For an old heart like mine
Soften it up
With oil and wine
The oil is You, Your Spirit of love
Please wash me anew
With the wine of Your Blood

My eyes are dry
My faith is old
My heart is hard
My prayers are cold
And I know how I ought to be
Alive to You and dead to me

But what can be done
For an old heart like mine
Soften it up
With oil and wine
The oil is You, Your Spirit of love
Please wash me anew
With the wine of Your Blood
My Eyes Are Dry, Keith Green


Tracy was from Quebec, Canada. She would sit in the back of the bus as we made our way down the potholed dirt road to Butterworth. It was the closest town to where we stayed in the Transkei. I was sixteen years old, spending my summer on a missions trip in South Africa. As we bumped along the road, I sang along with Tracy as she played my favorite Keith Green song, My Eyes Are Dry. Abigail Ousteissen, one of our team leaders heard us singing and told us that we would perform the song in church that day. We laughed out loud, and she said, "No, I am serious!" The church service lasted for over six hours. The song only lasted a couple of minutes. We all ate together, laughed, cried, shared stories, and built memories I will never forget. It is still my favorite Keith Green song. She played the guitar, and I sang a solo. The lyrics mean so much more to me twenty two years later.

Monday, March 19, 2012

When Walking With Grief

art by: Eric Swanson-Dexel
Do not hurry as you walk with grief;
it does not help the journey.
Walk slowly, pausing often.
Do not worry as you walk with grief.
Be not disturbed by memories that come unbidden.
Swiftly forgive, and let Christ speak for you unspoken words.
Unfinished conversations will be resolved in him.
Be not disturbed.
Be gentle with the one who walks with grief.
If it is you, be gentle with yourself.
Swiftly forgive; walk slowly, pausing often.
Take time; be gentle as you walk with grief.


When Walking With Grief
Common Prayer; A Liturgy For OrdinaryRadicals

Sunday, March 18, 2012

Sometimes We Just Need Scripture :: Psalms 27

Psalm 27

The LORD is my light and my salvation—
   whom shall I fear?
The LORD is the stronghold of my life—
   of whom shall I be afraid?
When the wicked advance against me
   to devour 
me,
it is my enemies and my foes
   who will stumble and fall. 
Though an army besiege me,
   my heart will not fear;
though war break out against me,
   even then I will be confident.
One thing I ask from the LORD,
   this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the LORD
   all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the LORD
   and to seek him in his temple. 
For in the day of trouble
   he will keep me safe in his dwelling;
he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent
   and set me high upon a rock.
Then my head will be exalted
   above the enemies who surround me;
at his sacred tent I will sacrifice with shouts of joy;
   I will sing and make music to the LORD.
Hear my voice when I call, LORD;
   be merciful to me and answer me. 
My heart says of you, “Seek his face!”
   Your face, LORD, I will seek. 
Do not hide your face from me,
   do not turn your servant away in anger;
   you have been my helper.
Do not reject me or forsake me,
   God my Savior. 
Though my father and mother forsake me,
   the LORD will receive me. 
Teach me your way, LORD;
   lead me in a straight path
   because of my oppressors. 
Do not turn me over to the desire of my foes,
   for false witnesses rise up against me,
   spouting malicious accusations.
I remain confident of this:
   I will see the goodness of the LORD
   in the land of the living. 
Wait for the LORD;
   be strong and take heart
   and wait for the LORD.

A Dream :: horseback and hot air ballon

i do not always speak my dreams out loud or write them for others to read, but these past few weeks have been filled with grief, trials, and long hours of work.

when i was seven years old my grandma stowell died. i remember my aunt lou had a horse sometime around then. when my family would be on road trips, i would stare out the window and imagine my grandma riding on a horse  off in the distance, with her silver hair flowing behind her. even when i flew at age sixteen to africa, i remember imagining i could see my grandma riding a horse off in the distance, galloping over a blanket of clouds. i love horseback riding. i love the power of a horse trotting up jagged hills, taking me effortlessly to new heights. there is a rush of freedom found galloping across an open range, charging forward with momentum. i want to ride horses in new mexico. my mom use to always tear up when we would be driving to farmington, new mexico to visit family. as she saw the red dirt out the window, she would always tell us it was grandma stowell's favorite dirt. i want to ride horses across the red dirt in new mexico.

in sixth grade we drew report topics out of a hat from ideas we had brainstormed as a class to write reports about. i had suggested hot air balloons as a report topic. as classmates took topics from the hat before me, i finger-crossed hoped no one picked hot air balloons. as my turn approached, i reached in the hat and i pulled out abe lincoln. jennifer had suggested abe lincoln to be funny, and clearly the joke was on me. i had seen a hot air balloon one time as a child when we were driving out to new mexico. it was big and bright and it seemed to command the sky. even the beams of sun seemed to dance around it. i want to fly high above the desert dirt of new mexico.

my dream is to slip away for a weekend with my family and some friends to a ranch house in new mexico. we can ride horses for a full day, hot tub and stare into the desert sky at night, have a picnic brunch after taking a morning hot air ballon ride, and shop it up at some of the roadside native american trading posts.

i do not always speak my dreams out loud or write them for others to read, but these past few weeks have been filled with grief, trials, and long hours of work. i turn forty in a couple of years, so who knows, maybe these dream can come true.

Friday, March 9, 2012

Living without Joseph Kony.


I remember the first time I heard about what was happening to children in Northern Uganda. It was 2006 when someone introduced me to Invisible Children. It broke my heart to know that such atrocities were happening and so little was being done about it. My family and I started to get involved in little ways. Many of our local friends and family circles have been uncomfortable with the topic being brought up around their children. Having spent some time in Transkei, South Africa during the ending of Apartheid, it never fazed me that I should not share with my children the reality of other peoples experiences in the world. I guess it is a comfort and privilege raising children in the United States to guard or "protect" them from the reality of pain, and the evil inflicted on others. My wife and I have navigated the conversation about Joseph Kony, child soldiers, abduction, LRA, and the reason we as a family should be involved with honesty, tears, and open dialogue. I am so proud of my children. They wear their Invisible Children shirts more than any other single clothing item. When people ask, they speak with boldness and the sweet innocence of children wanting to bring change. My oldest daughter said it best, "every child should be able to sleep at home, play with their brothers or sisters, every child should be able to be a child." Living without Joseph Kony will be a dream come true. My youngest asked me today if he (Kony) was gone yet. We all hope and pray that he will surrender and that the children can go home. It is true, the story of the LRA child soldiers is disturbing and stomach turning, but they don't have a choice to censor their life. They are the victims. My family lives with hearts and eyes wide open. My daughters live vibrant, activist lives. It is naive to think that the absence of knowledge of pain in the world will protect a child from the results of a broken world. I am the father of three exceptional humans and we call all the children and families effected by Joseph Kony, "friends." We live for a better world where Joseph Kony surrenders. I hope everyone will be motivated and join us for the freedom of our friends.

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Solstice to Solstice (11.13) :: QUIET


"Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved." -Hellen Keller


I have grown in character a lot over the last couple of weeks. Quiet has yet to come, but I am okay. I have grieved the loss of friendships from the living, and now I grieve the loss of a friend through death. My soul finds comfort in knowing God's love for me. I have been running the same route for two weeks now and I am looking forward to increasing my distance, and seeing new trees. I have achieved a new understanding of living by watching my wife pursue a balanced life, and my daughters' daring to live beyond their comforts. I will know the quiet someday and the ease will be there too, but for know I am growing in character.

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

NEVER grow up :: NEVER ever

Sitting on the rocks called Slippery Rock, I watch as my daughters play in an imaginary world that they love to include me in. As the sun settles in the distant trees, I enjoy tours of each of their homes, filled with hallways, and kitchens created in their minds. As if I am Peter Pan at the dinner table with the other Lost Boys, I see the hallways, and I sit in the living room vividly created in my mind. For a moment I am swept away to a world that is just as real as this one. There are challenges and triumphs, parties and bedtime, meals and work to be done. The only difference is that in our imaginary world found on the rocks there is no sadness. We live in harmony with nature and each other. Whenever we are figuring out how the day will end, there is always a ball to end the day, and a feast to share. I know they will continue to grow and change, but if I can model for them one thing, it is to always imagine. There is an amazing world found at a place called Slippery Rock where the only difference is that in our imaginary world found on the rocks there is no sadness. It is good to have a place like this to go, because outside of our imaginations there is sadness and sometimes it is good to get away. Even if it is only for a moment in our minds. I always recommend going into your imagination world with friends. That way sadness cannot go into that world to. I hope we grow as a family in love, but never ever grow up.

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Solstice to Solstice (10.13) :: WHITE

 WHITE 

the moment after you die
the darkness is overpowered
like a blink, WHITE

the lace trim that glides behind
as a bride strides her way down
flowing effortlessly, WHITE

the weight upon new day branches
after the evening snow falls
stacked like sand castles, WHITE

the longing gaze of a baby
eyes turned off to present
in another place, WHITE

500 reels stacked in each slot
warmed by the mechanics 
just an everyday image, WHITE.

pitch black forest night
stars blocked by the umbrellas of nature
stalking predators eyes, WHITE.

Monday, February 27, 2012

winter bloom

winter waited to arrive this year. as a result the magnolias are in full bloom. their sturdy petals and vibrant colors, splash the sky against the knobby limbs they grow from. it is easy to see life full all around. i see it in every flower blooming, and the surprisingly pleasant smiles of glazed humans awaiting the grey. winter lends hand to pensive process and internal growth through hibernation. i love the magnolia flowers in their own time, but i wish for bare limbed days of blank stares and the freedom to be introspective without explanation. as the winter blooms, i wait longingly for spring storms and petals blown across asphalt streets. if seasons have flipped then i look forward for spring, and summer is going to bring a lot of new life to autumn. every season brings new changes. today i choose to deliberately smile with wide-eyes, anticipating the discovery of what i am learning about life.

Saturday, February 25, 2012

blue eyes

i wore a blue shirt today. it was a blue shirt kind of day. full of bright blue sky and water reflecting blue off the distant shore. i rarely wear blue. it isn't that i dislike the color. i think periwinkle is my favorite hue of blue. all the men on my father's side have blue eyes including my brothers and me. there are always silly remarks made about how blue is a dangerous color for us to wear because it makes our eyes show off and that could get us into some trouble. my eyes aren't the same blue as the rest of the men in my family line. my grandma had hazel colored eyes on my mother's side and i have a yellow ring around my eyes that makes the blue more of a grey or periwinkle. my eyes have never gotten me into trouble, but they are blue. i don't wear blue very often, but it was a blue shirt kind of day. the shirt was more of a periwinkle hue of blue. i guess my eyes showed off a little, but it was from gazing into the sky, thinking a lot about sailing, and heaven. it was a good day to be brave, fully live, and let my blue eyes see all the blue of today.

Sunday, February 19, 2012

sleepless indeed.

Sleepless Night

A sleepless night
Spent struggling
Through the meanders of my mind
In endless explorations.

Innumerable considerations
Scattered around
As stars in the sky
None with enough light
Of its own
But adaptable
In their interconnection
To show me the way.

The harmony of the universe
Confined for a moment
in the boundaries of my head
explodes in its beauty.

The thirst for knowledge
Has kneeled
At my need of sensations.

Bittersweet memories
Erase all the powerful thoughts
Leaving a proven soul
Sighing in an exhausted body.

The dread of the night
Has subsided
And a sudden warmth
Has overtaken me.
While the first sunbeam
Sneaks through the window
I remember how to sleep.


it is strange when your thoughts in the early hours of a new day are cluttered by the days past and wonders of days ahead. my mind seems to give way to weariness just in time to greet the sun. i sleep for a spell and the day begins. half full i continue on. i am not discouraged, just tired. i am at peace in sleeplessness. rest will come in the morning.

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Dimly Seeing


"For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known."


i wear glasses more often these days
when i look closely in the mirror i see lines
lines of laughter and mind altering pain
when i focus in i see time and tattered skin
as my eyes move away and look beyond
light splashes across my cheekbone
what is this life that invades time?

straining to focus beyond the thistle and brier
the golden glimmer pulls at my present
longing fills me with aching hope
possibility of time moved beyond moments
longing to see ahead in focus i stare
i intently look for what is missing
what do i do with what i can faintly see?

i live present with longing to fully see.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Solstice to Solstice (8.13) :: LIGHT

"For with you is the fountain of life: in your light do we see light." Psalms 36: 9














"we see light"- i think of heaven and the gloaming. i think of Mike dancing, spinning, sipping with friends. i think of firelight flickering. i think of Mike's red hair sparkling from the lamp light. i think of hours spent sitting together, laughing, talking, honestly sharing. i think of hope. that's where it began. i think of dusk drives home after one hour visits that turned into three hours. as the light lends way to the the dark, i think how sweet light is.

Light
light illuminates so many things
the glistening brow of friend
the sweat smudge from the bridge pad of his glasses
the shine of his white teeth
glistening when he head tilt smiles
his eyes sparkling  with joy when his daughter enters the room
the flop of his hair as he moves his head to see his bride
there is light in his eyeful joy expressed
light illuminates so much
Mike basks in light.
written 02.11.12


Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Solstice to Solstice (7.13) :: SLUMBER


"He would lie in bed and finally, with daylight, he would go to sleep. After all, he said to himself, it is probably only insomnia. Many must have it." -Ernest Hemingway

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Forest Found Freedom :: "barefoot amongst the leaves."


Walk away quietly in any direction and taste the freedom of the mountaineer. Camp out among the grasses and gentians of glacial meadows, in craggy garden nooks full of nature's darlings. Climb the mountains and get their good tidings, Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves. As age comes on, one source of enjoyment after another is closed, but nature's sources never fail.
John Muir - Our National Parks (1901)








My youngest was born of the forest and it is here that she dwells fully alive and present to everything happening around her. Without prompting or permission she removes her shoes and walks barefoot amongst the leaves. The sunlight dances about the branches and cast shadows on the forest floor. Like a game of hopscotch my daughter jumps from one light square to another. As I venture away from the forest, I carry it within me. It is in the forest that I dwell fully alive and present to everything happening around me. I am her father. She holds the forest sacred as I do. It speaks to us in a language only some hear and very few understand. The God whispers, and spirit giggles that carry throughout, are carried within us. Go into the forest and let the good tidings and warmth of sun bathe you in the Glory gifted you in that moment, and remember it when the forest is not near, so that you always return, and invite a friend to discover themselves again. It is in the forest that we are truly found. Truly free.

Monday, January 30, 2012

Solstice to Solstice (6.13) :: COMFORT



Comfort

Do not confuse comfort with settled
Or make assumption that one is stagnant
As a redwood spreads its roots out
Connecting with the surrounding redwoods
There is a comfort found in stability
Not wealth shown in shiny symbols 
Or light reflecting off creating awe
But rather structure of relationships
Defined by common connection
Held together by time and commitment
When comfort is fully established 
It is the warm exhale after a long embrace
Comfort is acknowledging the desire for connection
Without the weaving of others into life
Humans are not functioning wholly
We need each other so that we can 
Find comfort even when the light 
Stops dancing through the forest and 
Darkness deafens the sound of life
Comfort is knowing we are all connected
And choosing to hold tightly to our necessity
We lie to ourselves and others when we act 
Like independence is separate of others
Find comfort in knowing you belong
The redwoods remain because they hold each other
There is comfort found in the arms of another