Star gazing
The summer sky is
languid and light,
Meteors and fireworks
tour the night like paramecium in a warm pond,
Or flash in sudden
sparks as from a stoked campfire,
Marshmallows exploding
in an indigo sky.
December nights are
different; the sun cold and cloaked by five.
Winter stars reach
long fingers like narrow spears from there to here,
December stars hold hard
history and an arctic earth mirrors back their lore--
Written in frost and
ice and shimmering rain dropping like icicles,
Sending nano-sized
units of dazzling light-arrows into slow pupils.
December days are
flagrant with earth-bound stars, too.
Bare branches crossed
and twisted reveal organic carvings of the five-pointed stars we drew as
children.
Flocks sweep overhead,
murmurs of evolving shapes: round and robust, sudden star shapes flickering and
sliding between the tops of trees.
Rocks, rain-clean,
gleam stellar fissures, while mica and quartz wink back the winter sun.
Stars are all around
and we follow them, drawn to their shape and shine.
We reach for stars as
children, tracing their shape with our finger—hands high in the air or eyes
bent, following a cracked line in a stone, a row of tracks crossing the good
earth, a bedewed spider web, a frost-edged stand of dying thistle.
This is our child-voice
rising from that deeper place where wise men watched for signs and recognized heavenly
messages.
Those wise men
following the Bethlehem star, held tight the wonder within like a touch stone,
saw the nature-sign sketched on high and journeyed …
Reaching for the earth-edge
of those silver-gold light threads tumbling from the night sky, weaving a
carpet of light before them,
The language of earth
and heaven understood by each clay-heart breathed into Image dei,
Moving in synchronic rhythm
with star fire, earth-sign, well-deep joy, and Spirit-wind …
Crossing the earth keel-deep
on camel-ships,
Sailing under desert
wind through silent night, child heart calling to Child Heart.
Is it any wonder that
the animals knew first? Why they are so deeply woven into the Nativity?
There is for them no self-conscious
social persona, no conflict with earth-heart and soul-core, no theological
wrestling with words at least a stone’s throw away from this Present Moment.
Blessed are those who
live in the Present Moment, for there the Eternal is.
So be now … body-hearing, soul-listening;
feel this through your bones, this
star-stirring Wind-swept night, holy laughter bubbling and rushing like joyful
angels;
Reach for light
threads curling all around you, luminous in the night;
These ladders between
heaven and earth begin at the gateway of your own heart;
Now, journey,
heart-eyes wide and strong, tread deeply to the Manger,
Dove-wings like Stars
all around.
Merry Christmas,
Faith
No comments:
Post a Comment