Simple Gifts

Simple Gifts (the song) runs through my head today.  I am not at church, being on another driving hiatus.  I will go to church tonight for the Ash Wednesday liturgy to mark the beginning of Lent. Already I feel the changes, the turning and returning, the bowing and bending unlike anything I remember from before.  I think my Lenten journey has been marked out for me.  All that matters is placing one foot in front of the other.  A simple dance.  A simple gift.

I am home bowing and bending

I watch the way life

Has turned

And turned again.

Tonight I will be reminded

I am dust,

To dust I will return.

This is the gift

For today.

A simple gift.

It is one gift

Of oh so many.

Focus

Part of the reason to try acupuncture was to get more of a handle on the blurry vision thing.  It is more than noting when I would feel safe to drive, and when not.  Some of the pieces are more obvious than others.  Heat and bright light bring it on.  Of course, like everything else, good sleep and hydration help.  And of course, less stress.  This morning, watching the birds along with the cat, I am focused and clear.  I am also grateful I never got the pot planted in front.  It makes the perfect dust bath.

On mornings like this,

Slightly cool,

I open

Every open-able door,

Listen to what speaks

At 10:03.

The cat slowly moves

To the door.

He listens to the sparrows

In the front,

Barely moves,

Slight twitch

To his tail.

It occurs to me

I can see

Perfectly well

At 10:05

As I watch the cat.

The sparrows take turns.

They use the planter

As a dust bath.

Now the cat notices.

He is focused

At 10:11

Ready to leap.

He can see

Perfectly well.

The sparrows bathe in dust

Only for him.

Costume changes

Ash Wednesday.  First a client (no collar), then speaking dust in English and Spanish in the library (collar), and  now a job interview (no collar, and on third thought, no ashes).  Costume changes, but still the same underneath.  Dust, even shining gold dust.  Like everyone.

This has been a day

Of costume changes.

I feel like the child

Who goes through the dress-up closet

To find the right fairy princess

Costume.

No tiara but still a day

Of costume changes.

I wash my face

Change out of the clerical collar

For the job interview.

I do not know what I will wear

For dinner.

It remains to be seen

Or in this case

Worn.

Each of us takes life at her own speed

As I sit with people, the truism that people do things when they*re ready to do them comes home again and again.  I have the privilege of talking about parables this Sunday.  One of the beauties of  a parable is that there is no one interpretation of them.  They have layers of interpretation.  Jesus* parables turn the world upside down and inside out.  They beg a nuanced understanding.  No matter where one is in life, whether one is going breakneck speed or slogging, there is room in a parable to enter and sift and reach an understanding, then do the same tomorrow, and find new understanding.  Each of us takes life at her own speed, his own speed.  The tortoise and the hare.  Sometimes we are blessed to see it.

Each of us takes life

At her own speed.

Such a simple thing to learn.

I had to slow

To see it.

Even now I sit sidelined

For numbers of slow days

Watch the sun*s slow illumination

Of the trees

The yard

The ducks

Even the mountain ash filled with cedar waxwings

This morning.

Sidelined

I watch things move

At their own speed:

The tortoise plods

The hare races

Until they are finally nothing

But dust

Yet more;

Each to his own speed

Her own speed

Both finally dust

And more.

The tortoise takes a slower time

To get there.

The hare thinks it is a race.

Both get there

Anyway.

Such a simple thing to learn.

In the end we are dust

Yet so much more than dust.

Loved and lovely dust

And really so much more,

No matter how long it takes

To get there.