My Dad taking pictures on Freswick Beach
I woke in the wee hours of the morning (or had I actually slept at all?) with lots on my mind. After much tossing and turning, I got up to make some herbal tea and noticed a shaft of white light shining onto the wall in the darkness. I went to the window and holding the curtain aside, I was struck by the luminescence of the night sky and landscape. There was a radiance that came from the super Blue Moon hanging high in the sparkling night sky. What a sight to behold! It made me want to immerse myself in it. So I did by stepping outside the front door, and basked in the silence and exhilarating glow for a while, enjoying the tranquility - such a poignant gift at that moment in time. My senses were leveled and my nerves calmed, my busy thoughts stilled and my sore heart revived.
Immediately the poem by Wendell Berry was brought to my mind....
The Peace of Wild Things
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
(from The Peace of Wild Things And Other Poems (Penguin, 2018))
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I’ve been out of touch with myself lately, lacking the sense of grounding and freedom mentioned in this poem. I’m a little off kilter and must make attempts to shift the balance and ‘come home’; to show up for myself and others from a right and proper place, with the kind of humility and honesty that is revealed in wild things. I am not perfect, but I can certainly try to improve without striving.
Soaking in that glorious moonlight in the middle of the night was a healing balm to my soul, quieting my thoughts and erasing any regrets. I felt held in a way, and was reminded that all is right with the world, a place of innate goodness. As I stood there, I thought to myself that here there is no complexity or stress. Just the gentle 'unforced rhythms of grace', ebbing and flowing like the waves lapping on the distant shore. It brought new perspective.
I gulped in a long breath of the night air, went inside and drank my tea. And with a gentle patience that had come over my whole being I eventually drifted off to sleep.
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