William Carlos Williams’ famous poem “The Red Wheelbarrow” is short, fragmented, and incomplete. Yet in this imperfect prose this poem finds its full power, its perfection as a poem.
This evocative poem made out of broken, ordinary prose has no beginning and no ending. It is a slice in time, caught out of the corner of one’s eye. Yet the world is different after the sighting.
In my hurried, fragmented, imperfect day, The Red Wheelbarrow calls out. It reminds me that my messy to-do list might be hiding a glimpse of the sublime. Maybe it’s a sign of the Divine presence keeping me company during the day.
Today, instead of the wheelbarrow, God’s presence will show in a resident’s grateful smile. Today, instead of chickens, it will be a fleeting moment spent with my hand resting on someone else’s.
Every moment of my day contains the possibility of poetry, usually when I least expect it.
The first time I watched The Wizard of Oz I was a young girl glued to the television. I was amazed at that moment when Dorothy’s world turned from black and white to full color. I realize I could have been afraid of the witch, or amused by the munchkins, or perplexed by the flying monkeys, but for me the magic was in the color.
I’m just realizing now, after almost fifty years that the theme of color runs throughout that story. There were ruby red slippers, a yellow brick road, and the Emerald city. The song, “Somewhere over the Rainbow”, stirs nostalgia in our hearts and once again underscores this theme of color.
Color and rainbows symbolize hope for so many and for so many reasons. We see them after storms of all kinds, when things have settled, and we need assurance that we are ok and that we will continue to be ok. They are the embodiment of hope.
Rainbows can come in unexpected packages at unexpected times. I drove to a pond yesterday. On it were kids and adults swooshing around on skates and hitting pucks with sticks. I walked up to the edge. My hands were in my pockets, my favorite purple hat was on my head, my eyes were closed and I just listened. I became aware of the sun on back, a car pulling away, and a dad tossing a hat to his daughter. But I kept turning my attention to the sound coming off of the ice.
It’s a sound you don’t often hear, the swooshing and the smacking out in the open air. For me it felt like hope, it felt normal. I needed normal yesterday. So, yesterday my rainbow came in the form of blue skies and yellow sun and silver blades on white ice. It was beautiful.
Sometimes rainbows come as gorgeous bands of color; sometimes they come in unexpected packages. Today I am thankful for rainbows, in whatever way they choose to come.
Does your family have a favorite go-to tv show, something that everyone can agree on? In my house, we’ve gone through phases of “The West Wing,” “The X-Files”, and “The Office.” We’re on a “Criminal Minds” kick now. If you’re not familiar with the show, it’s a classic crime drama, following the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit. It’s actually pretty fun to watch with others, as we share our suspicions and piece together the evidence throughout each episode. One unique feature of the show is that it begins and ends with a quote, as if each episode offers a profound life lesson.
I certainly enjoy good thought-provoking or inspiring quotes, but I find myself feeling like the story of each episode, the twists and turns along the way to solving the crime, is enough. In life we can’t always summarize our day in one line or find some profound meaning in each moment. I don’t mean to say that we shouldn’t be learning lessons every day or finding meaning in our lives. We should. But sometimes it’s enough to get through the day. Sometimes it’s enough to have a pretty crummy day and simply feel sad or upset or frustrated. Sometimes it’s enough to just feel what we feel for no particular reason.
I’m reminded of the Lord’s Prayer and the words “Give us this day our daily bread.” When we pray this, we’re asking for just enough for today, without worry of tomorrow or thoughts of yesterday. This day, this moment, is enough. All we need is just enough to get us through. It’s OK to pray for something to be just enough.
I invite you to pray for what might be just enough for you today. It might be something like, “God, please help me to just get through this next hour.” Whatever it is, whatever you’re feeling, whatever’s in front of you today, just know that it’s enough.
It finally happened this week; I saw the first signs of Spring! Outside my window, I saw my first Robin with its magnificent red breast foraging around in the earth looking for tasty worms and other insects to eat.
That same afternoon, I went to the local Trader Joe’s and was greeted by an explosion of Spring flowers – daffodils, tulips, hyacinths, and azalea plants. I nearly wept with joy right there in the middle of the store to see their gloriousness blooming in every color of the rainbow. I heard the tulip plants calling out. “Take me home and let me brighten your day with radiance!” I heeded their call and selected a plant with tulips the color of a spectacular sunset. This jewel of a plant is nestled by a window and flourishing in the sunshine.
These signs of spring are small, yet I find myself savoring their presence and promise of new life after a long, dark winter.
A Serious Frivolity
Bernadette Miller
Savoring the substance of existence is a serious frivolity. Someone must do it.
Someone must love luminous hours when leaves marry light and refuse to stop shining.
Someone must speak the sweetness of lilacs before it is lost beneath smog.
Someone must bask in the beauty of blessing because the news knows only brokenness.
When you give yourself to a particular place the power and peace of that place give themselves through you.
So savoring the substance of existence is a serious frivolity. Someone must do it.
Will that someone be you?
May you savor the delights of spring and the blossoming of new life that is coming into being.
February is National Black History Month. This speech by Martin Luther King, Jr., always inspires me. It is good to read it, but it is even better to hear the live recording. Imagine this speech being given on a hot sultry day on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC, on August 28, 1963, with a crowd of 250,000 on the National Mall. This was 58 years ago. Savor these words, and realize there is still work to be done.
“Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must ever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you today, my friends, that even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow. I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed. We hold these truths to be self-evident that all (men) are created equal.
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that that one day right down in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and every mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plane and the crooked places will be made straight and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together. This is our hope. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope.With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to climb up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
This will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with new meaning “My country ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my father’s died, land of the Pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring!” And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.
So let freedom ring from the hilltops of New Hampshire.
Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.
Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.
But not only that, let freedom, ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi and every mountainside.
And when this happens, when we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every tenement and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old spiritual, “Free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.”
My husband is a great cook (I’m a proud “microwaver.”) He enjoys creating dishes and no two ever taste exactly the same, always delicious, but each in their own way. At the beginning of the pandemic we decided to start an herb garden. (I should also confess that I have a very brown thumb.) We live in a 4th floor condo so our garden sits on the window sill.
The cilantro grew in bold and strong. You could smell its sweet aroma when you gently rustled the leaves. Late in the season, we noticed the leaves entangled in webs from the tiniest mites. Where did these critters come from? The soil? Our home? Hmmmm. Unfortunately, the cilantro was overcome and to keep the other herbs safe we decided to cut it back.
A couple days later we noticed new growth a pattern I know plays out in gardens regularly. As I thought about the cilantro, I was reminded how much renewal and regrowth will bloom through our experiences in this pandemic. That who we are and how we live will change in ways that produce growth. I was also reminded that renewal and new beginnings are central to the Lenten journey which begins today – Ash Wednesday. New beginnings invariably come from old false things that are allowed to die (Richard Rohr). May you experience trimming back and beginning anew with curiosity. Open to renewal with wonder at what may be.
I love how an artist or poet can shift my perspective on the world with even the simplest of strokes.
An artist friend of mine, Laurie McGugan, was out hiking when she came across a gravel pit, well
hidden from the pretty countryside by berms and trees. Gravel pits are not pretty places, but Laurie suddenly saw it as a big sandbox, with big boys playing in it with their heavy machinery. She snapped some pictures and continued on her way.
At home, Laurie printed the pictures out on a large color ink-jet printer. She then painted sandbox toys onto the gravel-scape. My favorite of the series features a big, red bucket, yellow shovel and the members of the Village People.
Life in the New England midwinter during a pandemic is not always pretty. But I’m setting out today to ‘reframe’ one thing in my day, just like Laurie did after her hike.
Where can I place the red pail and the yellow shovel in my landscape?
Or maybe I’ll just sing “YMCA”:
Young man, there’s no need to feel down I said, young man, pick yourself off the ground I said, young man, ’cause you’re in a new town There’s no need to be unhappy….
I listened to a podcast today about love. The speaker talked about the textures, nuances, complexities of love. It seems that the thing that is so necessary for a human soul to survive should come simpler and with cleaner lines.
True love that can rattle the bones and break a heart wide open can make us feel too tender, too vulnerable. Like somehow if we see it, offer it fully, step right into it and embrace it we will turn to jelly and disappear. Maybe we unknowingly close our eyes, resist love, and then cry because we do not see those who love us. And maybe we cry because the love we offer isn’t seen either. . .because our missteps and mistakes make the love we offer the world harder to see so it sits in its lonely office.
This poem, about love, is like love. It has texture and nuance and complexity. I hope it speaks to you today in some meaningful way.
In honor of Black History month, Robert Hayden was the first African American to fill the role of poetry consultant to the Library of Congress which he was appointed to in 1976, a role now known as poet laureate.
Those Winter Sundays
Sundays too my father got up early and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold, then with cracked hands that ached from labor in the weekday weather made banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.
I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking. When the rooms were warm, he’d call, and slowly I would rise and dress, fearing the chronic angers of that house,
Speaking indifferently to him, who had driven out the cold and polished my good shoes as well. What did I know, what did I know of love’s austere and lonely offices?
Today is Valentine’s day…I hope you are showered with real love and care today.
As I was coming in today, I was listening to a podcast “On Being” with Krista Tippett. She had previously interviewed Omid Safi who talks and writes about marriage and love. Omid talked so realistically about love and how we are all tremendously broken people trying to be relationship with other broken people. And we are trying to build relationships amidst all the fluffy “falling-in-love” fantasies of TV and movies. I so appreciated Omid’s take on love and the fact that primary relationships ARE HARD and messy and often misses the mark of the fantasy.
They also talked about how many dimensions of love there are and that we can practice a service kind of love or a friendship kind of love or a familial kind of love that is probably more important than romantic love. I so appreciated the breaking open of the myth that couplehood is heaven or even the ideal. No. For those of us who live in a couple… we know that it is hard hard work to come to terms with our own brokenness and that of the one we love. Just trying to bring up kids with another person is incredibly challenging and probably the hardest thing in the world!
Anyway, I work hard at it, (love) at home and I could do better at leaning on alternative love relationships like in service, friendship or family. How about for this valentine’s day we celebrate all kinds of love… like the service love we have for our residents? How about we bring a bit of humility and non-judgment to our beloved even if there are no flowers or chocolates waiting for us?
We are all hard at work at love in all our brokenness. Spread some kindness and appreciation today.
Jewish tradition is rich with prayers and blessings for virtually every occasion and every moment of the day. For instance, upon waking up from sleep, one should say the Modeh Ani, “I am thankful before You, living and enduring King, for you have mercifully restored my soul within me. Great is Your faithfulness.” Then, after getting out of bed and washing your hands, another blessing is recited. Step by step throughout the day, Jewish tradition honors the moments by acknowledging the Divine’s presence in our lives and expressing gratitude for creation. Even after using the bathroom, a blessing is said, the Asher Yatzar, thanking God for creating us so completely and wondrously that our bodies are in good working order. I love this feeling of continual reminders that our days and our lives, even the small moments we usually take for granted, are holy.
The last time I was on the Havenwood campus was Thanksgiving Day, when I offered a blessing to Lodge residents before their meal in the dining room. I ended my prayer for that day with the Sheheecheyanu, translated from Hewbrew as “Who has given us life.” This blessing is traditionally offered to mark a special occasion, when something is happening that occurs infrequently or is quite momentous. It felt appropriate for that day, as I looked into the dining room and saw all the Lodge residents gathered together for the first time in months, though separated by plexiglass barriers.
As the HHH community is completing its vaccination process and our nation is embarking on an astounding endeavor to vaccinate the public, this blessing feels appropriate once again. No doubt we still have hurdles ahead of us, and these new COVID variants present some uncertainty. Still, we’re approaching an historic moment. And so I invite you to join me in reciting the Sheheecheyanu:
“Blessed are You, Lord, our God, King of the Universe, who has granted us life, sustained us, and allowed us to arrive at this Time.”
