The Pond

Black Holes

The grand starry sky is lovely to behold from this warm corner of the universe. It twinkles and touches us with a tender awe. But when I consider the vast reaches of empty space and blazing extremes, the lovely vistas brought down from Huble's scope seem trifles compared to the fierce silence and gargantuan forces that push galaxies out, out, ever out.

I admire astronomers. Astro-physicists stare at the impersonal beasts that roam the sky, crunching and crashing, blowing up and radiating, and with the patience of love pick through signals that started on their way billions of years ago, all to find a single blip that yields a clearer understanding of this monster that cares about them not at all.

They have come upon the boogie man in my closet. They gleefully study it, a phenomenon that scares the socks off me. Out there, occasionally, a star crunches down, burned out. But it's mass is so great it cannot rest and finally it becomes a well of gravity that pulls everything, even light into its maw, insatiable. They call it a singularity. They call it a black hole.

I believe in light. It is not a phenomenon for me. It is a philosophy. It is my ground of being. Darkness will one day learn light, as hate will one day learn love. Ah, but there's the rub. What of apathy? What of that maw that swallows feeling, all feeling, that doesn't even waste the time of day or night with concern, because after all, what does it matter?

When I face the idea of these grand vacuum cleaners of space, I shiver. And I wonder, is there something beyond them, down inside or through them? Or do they just suck everything down, down, down?

Daffodils are my cure, this week, daffodils and my love's smile. Einstein said that it was not fair. Astronomers and physicists labor mightly to climb the icy crags of theory to carry human understanding up the pinnacles of knowledge. Blasted and exhausted they triumphantly plant their banner of discovery, and looking up find a group of theologians having tea. They'd been there for a while.

I'm a theologian. I have to chew on this one. Perhaps it's my job to look into the darkness and consider, what's in there, and what's beyond. Looking at it that way it's not so creepy. But I still like the daffodils and Chris.

April 2009

I looked through one window to another

The sky shone clear there, deep blue graced

With clouds come down to float across the pane

All because of dark and light, within and beyond.

I am full of darkness, fear and prejudice shadow

Day's brightness, dim mornings and afternoons

Of life. We all are. Well defended, isolated, documented,

Over-extended. The day of life is lost in our shadows.

But now and then we gaze out and see. Now and then

Day's light touches us, reminds us, opens us to a world

Of light and life. Windows' gifts, these moments blessed

Show us brilliance, and possibility, and freedom wide.

And on this day the sky, high above brought down,

Reflected on the pane, showing me the source of

Light's wide grace. Perhaps our dimness can be more

Than curse and blight. Perhaps a blessing of the light.

The tomb is so, source of fear and darkness.

Brutal loss that dims the day and leaves us lost.

But look again. See there reflected by the light of love

God's brightness in the life of one. He is risen!

A blessed Easter. Hallelujah.

David

Letting Go

I don't know about you, but change ain't easy for this humble servant. I have spent my life doing the church thing. This isn't a hobby or a membership in a pool club. This has been the focus of the most important events and moments in my life. My parents, music, art, love, coming of age, marriage, death, the presence of the almighty, friendship, learning, literature, fighting injustice, family, loss, sacrifice, capability, mysticism, and the list goes on. All of these have come into focus and been part of the solar system that has been defined by this locus of community and devinity. I got into this business partly because it's a congenital disorder. It runs in my blood. Then there's the very real sense that this focus of power and love put me up to this. I have a call. All of that I'm sure will be the focus of future installments. But resting there, right there with these others is the most human and simple reason: I love the joint.

In spite and because of its warts and idiocies, it is my home. And I think it's a grand place. I like its style and grace. I like its geekiness and innocense. I like its grandure and power. I like what it stands for and how it goes about grappeling with the beasts that beset us. And now I'm watching it struggle to survive. It's far from dead, but it's having a hard time holding together.

I get defensive when charges of irrelevance, hypocracy, judgemental, and all the other stones that have hit it come lobbing in from 'out there.' I get angry when some from 'in here' say and do things that make me want to weep. And I fume at the apathy of most about the life or demise of this glorious entity that means so much to me. After all, soccer practice is so important.

Last night we had a meeting. It was a good meeting. It dealt with the issues of hunger and justice and the blessed earth and the safety of our children. We talked about how to more effectively work through conflict. I'd say that is a pretty relevant and honest agenda. And I realized that we are swimming upstream and we are exhausted.

God doesn't depend on the church. It's a gift to us. God will be fine. And who knows what the shape and style of the next incarnation of the Body of Christ will take? It has morphed and will continue to do so. But it's really hard to let go of something that has nurtured and prodded me toward the grand horizons of life.

I think I'm going to have a hard time giving up my driver's liscense.

cold snap

Spring's here. I know it is. The light comes earlier and stays later. Proof positive that the sacrifices offered on the Equinox were not in vain. But why then is it cold? Isn't spring supposed to be warm? Now that we've been given the gift, why aren't warm fuzzies there to embrace us on a consistant basis?

But then again, life doesn't allow a presumptive comfort. Bases are rare. Sanctuary is an unusual comfort and perhaps not even a real one. Such an assumption that we don't have to deal with that which comes to us, on its own, without filter or padding is rather arrogant. The world is given to us, a gift as it is. People come to us as they are. The best of them are honest polite enough not to abuse us. Their honesty helps create the edges and bumps in the topography of our living.

I like bumps. They've been tough enough to live through the erosions of peer pressure and exhaustion. They stick out and say, "Hey, wait a minute." And when they come from people I love they are interesting enough to appreciate. Sometimes moss grows on them and they become outcropings of new ways of looking and considering. Or they become reminders of my own limitation. Or they become foundations for new structures. I guess that's called learning, perhaps that's called living.

Anyway, the cold makes my face hurt. But the daffodils are still blooming. Appreciate the gift, even when you're shivering.

Daffodils

I cut three daffodils for Chris today. I always feel a little guilty cutting flowers. But I reconcile it by considering the joy they bring when I give them to her. These were some of the first to open. They trumpeted the Vernal Equinox better than any headline. And when she saw them I knew they felt appreciated. They are.

St Patrick's Day
I never really paid any attention to the day of the saint. Protestants are so boring sometimes. I guess with a name that comes out of the mists of the Hebrides my family had better things to do that to drink green beer. We’re snobs. Besides, this guy was responsible for kicking the Celtic kings out of the western annex of Scotland that is Ireland. The kings carried dragons, tattooed up their arms and legs. Patrick was a tough guy and he knew that unless he could get rid of these pesky Celts, Christianity would be wrestling with the Druids. Time for a coup. It got translated into pushing the snakes out of Ireland. That’s the legendary version.

Anyway, my first church was in Irvington, that bastion of Irish tradition. Well, in 1975 the Irish mob still ran a lot of the area. There was a parade to celebrate the wearing of the green. It went by my house. Late on the 16th, some of the faithful would follow the parade route and put a stripe down the middle of the street, a bright green stripe. I guess it helped the paradees not make any wrong turns.

After watching this whole production an adolescent dragon, a wee beastie whispered in my ear “Mee boy, therr be a way to scatter dismay and consternation among these upstarts. This Patrrick be celebrated by all an’ none stand for the serpents. Justice! (that’s the way Celtic dragons talk). “

So late on the next March 16th, after the semi drunk crew had left green proof behind them down the middle of my street, I ventured forth in the wee hours of the morning, armed with two cans of orange spray paint. I confess I was not wearing a kilt. But my spirit was. The orange stripe began a block beyond Donovan’s Pub, the place where the parade began and where the faithful got tanked up before staggering forth. It ran parallel to the green, coexisting for fifty yards, and then with glee, as much glee as an orange stripe can exhibit, tangled and superimposed itself upon the green. The paint ran out a bit beyond my house. No sense leaving too much proof from whom the blessing of the orange had come.

The next day I sat on my stoop, early. I heard the first whoops of consternation an hour before the parade. Ahh, it was better than the pipes upon the moors. Being the day to party, they were not ready to repel such an assault. Besides, the time for the parade’s beginning came upon them, leaving them no choice but to go on with the show.

On that day the sons of Erin followed and orange stripe for half their jaunt. They scowled. It was beautiful. I could hear the beastie chuckling at them.

They posted guards the next year. Dragons must be reckoned with.

New Endeavors

This is a brand new topography for me. The worn paths and road signs that seem so mundane and familiar to so many are exotic and largely meaningless to me. I have guides. They are patient. They have to be. I'm dumb. But I think they get a kick seeing me going "Wow!" over simple and basic operations. "Look at the bunny!"

This is somewhere I will return and go beyond, soon. Then I will be less amazed. But it will be no less a miracle and the guides will be no less reasons for thanksgiving.

Here we go.

March 2009

There's an angel in the cemetery that I hang around with on a regular basis. She's delicate, graceful, though worn from spending so much time out in the weather. Sometime before I got to know her, she had a mishap, so one of her wings is stubby. You'd think it would mar the angelic effect, but somehow it fits. She doesn't move when I'm around, so to face her I have to look east. As a result. I've seen the glory of her halo. It shines around her at sunrise. The circle above the head thing doesn't express the halo of dawn.

Sometimes when I look at her, I realize that all our concepts and ideas of that which is above and beyond are almost useless. It is enough to say that there, as I face east, the eternal shines in her so clearly, stubby wing and all.

The other day we woke up to a white world. The snow had fallen soft on every branch, with no breeze to dislodge it. So the bare trees were bare no more. In the moment before dawn the coming sun whispered around the corner of the horizon in hints of lavender and rose. The master of our sky often does this, teasing us with hints of the glory to come. Glory's great, but whispers draw us in, like children awed by candles' glow. And on this dressed up morning, the sky king's colors reflected from each and every surface. Shadows became color pots. There was no black and white.

She stood there, as she always does when I come to call. A bit of ice had coated her hair before the snow offered her ermine for evening-wear. And now her gown graced the morning. A bit gaudy for walking the dog, but that kind of beauty cannot be limited by the small categories of appropriate or fashionable. It sets its own style, claiming the moment as its own.

I wish there were more to see her, just then in her radiance. I wish that vision could grace the eyes of every person who stands in awe of the coming sun, and all who don't notice it at all. We all need it, that momentary reminder that the order of our living can wait for such a sight. And she deserves oooh's and ahhh's from more than just one.

But that's the way eternity is. It sneaks up on us without an appointment or a warning. If only we could plan for it. We could fit it into our busy lives. But that's the rub. We can't fit something that amazing "in." We accept it on its own terms and share the magic when it comes, or miss it in our rush to somewhere else.

I don't spend much time with her, but I treasure our moments together. And I think I'll shave before I walk the dog. A lovely lady deserves a bit of respect.

David