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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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!

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.