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I let the cat out this morning. She never bolts out the door. She ponders the risk. Twitches her tail, once, twice, and again. Moves one foot forward. Then another. And finally scurries out and settles quickly under the bird feeder hanging from a low branch.
The birds above fall silent, ponder her presence. She crouches, ready to fly up the tree. The birds calculate the risk and restart their song. They have wings even though they don’t know it.
In other trees the birds are merrily chirping. The grass is greening and soon will need mowing. Cut down but not for long. Each blade will rise again, stretching toward the sun.
The soil is warming. Worms are squirming. No one has to tell them the early bird is out to catch them. Still, they can’t sleep in. No one told them that’s an option. They can’t shelter in place. They have things to do and places to go.
The cat’s out.
The birds chirp.
The worms squirm.
The sun rises.
It will shine on the righteous and the wicked today. It can’t discriminate. Doesn’t know how. Never has. I know this but seldom acknowledge it. Today I press my hands together in front of my heart and bow.
Namaste.
The ash trees in my woods are dying. They don’t know what’s eating them. They don’t know a pest has doomed them. They don’t know a chainsaw is coming.
Their branches are bare. Leaf buds show their faces. They don’t know their predecessors lie dead on the ground beneath them. They don’t know the past; can’t dwell on it. All they know is this moment, this chance to be alive. To be here now, even as they become something else.
The birds gather on those sickly branches and chant. Birds can’t see the future. Dread is unknown. They sing in this moment, in this place. It’s all they know, if they know even that. Birds are born Buddhists.
A friend told me you can see God under a leaf. I don’t know about that. I don’t know that God is even God like that.
But I know the sacred. It’s in all things. There’s no one name for it. It asks for nothing but reverence. And gratitude.
I told my friend, if you can’t see the sacred in a leaf, there’s no use looking under it.
As humans have evolved, we have lost one of the senses given to us. Intuition. That “gut” feeling. The birds have it. So do all the others creatures on Mother Earth. How do the Whales know it’s time to head south to birth their young in the lagoon off Cabo? The birds travel north when the warmer months change into spring. The Animals know. Pay closer attention to them. We humans can learn a thing or two from their “gut” behavior. In his book Animal Liberation, Peter Singer states, “Animals are a Nation within themselves.” I couldn’t agree more. Namaste.
Moved to tears by the beauty of your words, your thots, this creation & the wonder of it all…Namaste
I so enjoy your thoughts! They are very comforting and offer solace in a troubled world.
Funny you should write such an amazing poem when you claim to disdain poetry. That is a wonderful poem. It betrays the vision of a poet. So, today is the birthday of Jack Kerouac, the king of prose poetry. Read a page of On the Road…and dig it.
beautiful thoughts and words today
namaste
Just finished watching the first of three Sunday webinars with a favorite poet, David Whyte. He mentioned a Zen master who spoke of the “full vulnerability of the body exposed to the Golden Wind”, the wind that bares all the branches. The Golden Wind will bare our branches of all leaves (the robust blossoming awa the disease and suffering) just as it has slowly laid bare the Ash trees in their dying by the pest habitation. The question then becomes “Will you still be present when all your leaves are gone?” The Ash tree’s buds and its singing “bird sitters” answer with a fully alive, in the moment, “Yes!” And seeing the sacred in all things is also a resounding “Yes!” Beautiful. Thank you.