Wednesday, April 29, 2020

So I try not to miss anything...


Sheltering in Place Solo, Day #41.

I like to, but don't always, walk around my hill early in the morning before my neighbors are awake and the cars begin to arrive, and the noise starts. Before the reality of the world settles in and upon me.  There are birds for companions ~ their morning song, their flight from branch to branch all I need. The world is too large for me now, I don't fit in. I look instead for the small gifts nature leads me to. My hill, the forest, the birds and other creatures are all around me and not far breathes the sea I have too long ignored because...the world is too large for me now, I don't fit in.  

Silver linings of a world in isolation is my beach returning to me much as it was decades ago: nearly deserted, and contemplative.  It is easy to lose yourself in the big vista  - the immense sea and her roaring waves. But for me the real treasures are nearer, often underfoot.
Stones washed down by the river onto the sea's edge then revealed, all shimmering in the morning light, as the tide recedes. 

Or the seaweed, left by the tide to sunbath on the sand, the same sand that has known my bare, often dancing, feet for these many years. 


I recall this poem by Mary Oliver, so perfect in its simplicity. And I will remember in the years left to me, the fallen feathers and the river stones.




When it’s over, it’s over and we don’t know
any of us, what happens then.
So I try not to miss anything.
I think, in my whole life, I have never missed
the full moon
or the slipper of it’s coming back,
Or, a kiss.
Well, yes, especially a kiss.
~ Mary Oliver