The Ache to Experience More, or Less

Sunrise at Starry Meadows  ~ Photo by Linda Witmer

Something new is percolating. 

I'm beginning a Facebook page called Starry Meadows - the name of our farm here in Singer's Glen, Va. I probably will not be blogging as much for awhile as I launch this page and our unfolding endeavor at Starry Meadows. If you are one to 'like' pages on Facebook, check out the page:  https://www.facebook.com/rest.restore.walk.wonder/

~~  

 Last guests here at Starry Meadows noticed the quiet. It was 4 in the afternoon with no traffic sounds, no cicadas. Oddly, there were no deer coming out to graze either. Having just shared deeply from our art and writing journals, we resonated with the deep, contented calm. Contentment and calm with a hint of disappointment. Other than birds and flowers, there were no wildlife sightings for the guests. Isn't there often an ache to experience something more: a doe stepping cautiously into the meadow, the whinny of a Barred Owl in the distance? Or something less: less chaos in the White House, less internal drama, less suffering in the world?

As our guests said goodbye and drove out our long lane, the neighbor’s family arrived and our affectionately named ‘no pond hollow’ echoed with happy sounds of playing children. Suddenly, the deer herds moved, bringing does with fawns out at dawn in our back hill’s big meadow, herds of young bucks in the neighboring quarry meadow their velvet antlers silhouetted in the sunrise, and mixed herds in the afternoon down at the creek meadows. When the deer moved, the tree frogs began singing their soothing night choruses. The rhythms of nature baffle and entice.

Last night as I prepared for sleep, anxiety crept around my edges. Like the sudden moving of the deer, my life feels stirred up. Our daughters are moving in 2 weeks, staying at Starry Meadows for a season. We’re currently renaming our studio/shop – the building where daughters will be living in while here. (This will be our future AirBnB, or retreat space, so we’re playing with appropriate names. How about Constellation House? Meadow Lark Lodge? Will our buildings be named after constellations, like Pegasus Place and Lyra Log Cabin? Naming is a sacred, joyful ritual!)  We prepare to welcome them to Virginia even as we are still transitioning ourselves. There is much to do before they come: cleaning our stuff out of the studio/shop, checking on their boarded horses, preparing for our son’s family vacationing here this week, anticipating seeing our newest grand baby again.  Then there is the North Korea threat, the unpredictable and vindictive US president, the state of our country and politics, climate change threatening this beloved earth, plus my body fighting a cold/sinus infection. Along with wanting wellness so not to infect my grand baby, I ache for smooth adjustments for my daughters, energy to enjoy my grandchildren, reassurance from our government and from God. Anxiety wants to morph into fear, like hesitant deer stepping from the security of the woods ready to bolt at the first tiny threat. I can’t control the rhythms of nature, what wildflowers or wildlife guests of Starry Meadows will see, or what experiences our daughters will encounter. Nor can I completely control my health.  

I want my grandchildren to hear the tree frogs. I want there to be children and tree frogs long into the future. I want to sleep deeply tonight. I don’t want the horses to get sick on my watch. I don’t want war or more chaos in the US. I notice all the ‘wants’ arising in me and switch my attention to the song of tree frogs. The sheets are soft below me, blanket warm above me, healing aromas of peppermint, lemon and lavender from my essential oil diffuser soothe my sinuses allowing deep, relaxed breathing. I sense my own aliveness. Outside the earth is alive, vibrant, rooted and grounded in all that is holy. Like a wild turkey hen enfolding a chick under her wing, I feel the pull of Spirit, of deep holding, of gentle Mystery. Nestled and warm, no problems exist.

As I drift into sleep, I am peace.

May you walk and sleep in aliveness and peace,

Sharon

Jesus rebuked the storm. He said, “Peace! Be still!”

Eckhart Tolle writes: “If you create no pain for yourself, then you create no more pain for others. You also no longer contaminate this beautiful Earth, your inner space, or the collective human psyche with the negativity of problem-making.”

Sunset on Big Hill Meadow at Starry Meadow - photo by Sharon 

"Soar"   The skies Starry Meadow -  Photo by Linda Witmer

When Life Gets Non-Wordy, You'll Find Me Out Back Feeding the Goats

Words fail me these days. The world around me is unfamiliar, both interiorly, and exteriorly: in physical location, family and church transitions, in political, spiritual and global changes. For the first time in my life, I’m not voraciously reading books or writing.

Let me clarify -I’m not reading and writing words on pages, I’m reading and writing words in my soul. Every sunrise brings new images and experiences, every day I sense the sudden or slow shifts in my depths. Many paragraphs of the past have been deleted, are still being erased, words written the day before, years before, while new words take shape in the pages of my heart.  I’m writing, but not sharing; I own my writing, but my writing doesn’t own me. I feel no prompting or compulsion to share, no obsession to write because of the label of ‘writer.’  

Old roles, like those disappearing words, have gone. New ones are forming. I’m aware that my identity is not in what I do, offer, say or write; I love living this truth, at the same time such dying is painful even as birthing the new is exhilarating. Plus, I’m half a hermit now, a beautiful fulfillment of a lifetime desire! Every coin as two sides and the flip side of this pretty penny is loneliness. Writing, contemplating, and seclusion are both lonely. Yet, I’d so rather be here than there, be where I am interiorly than where I was.

Though it all, something Gently Mysterious moves with me, inviting me to hold, welcome, observe life, struggle to name what is going on, struggle in the letting go, sing, and walk the dogs. 

This Mystery is very different than what I’ve felt or noticed before. I thought I lost Presence, lost my sensing of Being. But that too has simply dried up, died and is being reborn. It's not comfortable being in between, but it's freeing. 

I remember my hunger as a first year student at Kairos School of Spiritual Formation. There weren't enough days to learn everything about spiritual traditions that I had never known before. Now, as religious groups dispute-excommunicate-harden, I’m just as eager to not know anything. In the deepest deep, I abide with Spirit and Spirit abides with me, deeper than human rules and folly, deeper than theology even. In this place I am safely enfolded in Love, in Mystery, in the cloud of unknowing.

When life gets non-wordy, when my response to life is too full or too deep to sort out, I find balance noticing simple things. You'll find me out back, feeding the goats….

If video doesn't load, try this link   https://www.facebook.com/sharonjl/videos/10159060976445301/

Feeding the Goats

Like a leaf shredder

those mouths, with lips more

delicate than machine,

steadily devouring offered boughs. Maple and oak    
                        

disappear into both kinds of hungry jaws;

molars grind the same, but metal wheels

and whir of mechanical leaf shredders

miss the tickle of leafy edges

in the nostril. Nibble, munch, crunch,

mince. Is there a sound more mesmerizing

than the grind of goat molars on twigs?

More satiating than caprine mouths engulfing 

branches of leaves in sheer eating ecstasy?  With

quick upward flicks

of their heads, veined greens of chestnut, walnut

are snapped free, consumed. Twig-poked eyes,

ears, nose are of no concern. Nipping, stripping,

pulling, masticating receives full attention.

After feeding the goats, I wander down

the farm lane. Stop to tend my darling

young redbud tree. Aghast, I find

only trunk and empty stems jutting skyward, like

the spines of an umbrella stripped of fabric, holding                     

up nothing but air. This favored one, now

naked of all green-with-a-touch-of-burgundy

heart-shaped leaves.  How dare a deer snack on

 THIS tree, with an abundance of browse                                          

 everywhere? Never mind the fawn sleeping

 behind the swing so breath-takingly innocent. Or          

 does bounding fences in the dewy morning mist,

 all grace and beauty.  Indignation wants my full

 attention. Flashback. Minutes ago, goats flicking

their heads, snapping off leaves, eating their bliss,

long lashes framing  round doe eyes. Ah, the memory!

Floods my soul with pleasure.  A breeze rises, a sigh escapes

as a smile settles in my belly.  Nibble,

munch, crunch, mince. How the deer must

   have enjoyed this delicious redbud!  

How to Walk in a Messy World

How to Walk in a Messy World

Illness. Fear. Bombs. Wounds.  

Each life has a cross to bear. 

And, dead bulbs raise tulips!

Storms. Drear. Anxious thought.

We journey in empathy, 

and, dread resurrects hope!

Why does one live and

this one die?  Life makes no sense.

“Why” isn’t important.

Love is. How do I

love?  Receive love? Divine Love

always flows. Accept!

Walk with open heart.

Walk with compassion. Be a

non-anxious presence.

Walk in the woods with

fear; imagine bear, snake, wolf!

Without, see violets.  

Life is anger. Life

is joy.  Welcome both, but do

no harm.  Love revives!                       

“God” is signpost,

pointing to eternal Mystery.

LOVE resurrects all!

Resurrection in Haiku

View from Blue Ridge Parkway- near Dripping Rock parking area

Daffodils -our driveway in Singer's Glen

Like Wind Rustles

The love you need is everywhere. 

Love comes in the sound of the wind swirling leaves around your feet. There is love blowing about your dwelling place, intensely banging on windows and rattling doors. 

Wake up!  Experience the Mystery. Receive the love you need; share in the exchange.

Love comes in breezes and whistles.  Love tickles ears and teases hair, rustles foliage and stirs up wildness.....

              .... invites all to dance! 

               Or hunker down. 

Love whips around pant legs. 

            Love comes like the wind, pushing us into   

     

                     new challenges, encouraging us to lean in.  

   Croaugh Patrick, Ireland 2011 

Ireland 2011

blanket of snow on our cobblestone walk

The love you need is everywhere this day – in blizzards, gusts and sea gale, in tropical breezes 

inviting you to move 

      and change 

                        and wrap up in comfort. 

Allow the wind to rustle your soul. Allow the wind to soothe your edges. 

Nana and grand daughter - April 2012

Be one with the wind. Move with Love's Energy; blow love into the world, like bubbles, like gale force shake ups, like gentle kisses on sweet baby cheeks.  

 Be love that binds. 

Hoya "rope" plant from my friend, Lenoir

I live my life in Widening Circles

I live my life in widening circles

that reach out across the world.

I may not complete this last one

but I give myself to it.

I circle around God, around the primordial tower.

I've been circling for thousands of years

and I still don't know: am I a falcon,

a storm, or a great song?

~ Ranier Maria Rilke ~

Go Deep, Go with the Flow

Deer once again roam our hills and turkeys gather in bunches outside our windows, offering hope in imagined fawns and egg clutches. 

As I mentioned before in this blog, the farmer and I are meditatively working our way  through the book: On The Journey. 

Today's entry invites us to let go of the struggle and sink into Mystery. We hold so much, in our bodies, souls, minds. We, like most in western culture, pay more attention to our minds and thoughts. Wisdom and mystery exists deeper than the mind. 

During our discussion, I asked him about meditation and centering prayer. He answered, "It's not my thing." I asked if nature is his thing. He said yes. I laughed, saying, "Yeah, even there we are different. I like to observe or contemplate nature - you like to crash through it." So we do bird watching and trail maintenance on our property in an attempt to come together. He mentioned mindfully working in his shop; I get his description - it's similar to the way I write.

It's not easy blending our different ways of sinking deeper than our frenzied, anxious, or so-important thoughts. Opening the heart and engaging from there in our relationship to each other, to the earth, to the Divine takes effort. Like the effort it takes for him to sit with me, read, open, share as we go through this book. It's not easy for me to be patient with his non-meditating ways, or to keep up with his trail blazing. 

Imagine churches then, societies, different cultures trying to relate. Or go deeper. Ah, how easy to just live in one's head - to compare, silence, shame, accuse, blame, judge and criticize. To ignore the body's wisdom whether that body is your own, or a small part of a whole group. 

A friend and I recently discussed our similar default modes when highly stressed. We catch ourselves praying to an old white, male God and feel judged, driven, pinched rather than deeply loved. At those times we are not living in relationship and co-creating with an earthy, relational, embodied, colorful, mysterious, loving energy that we 'call' God, Christ, Divine or Spirit. When we live in our heads we ignore our bodies. We think, overthink, problem-solve, fret, get trapped in self aggrandizing, self righteousness, addictive thoughts, boredom or anguish, live totally out of our heads, rather than sinking deeper into hearts and bodies to dwell in the flow of the Beloved and our belovedness. We fail to find deeper wisdom and intuition, or meet what is holy. 

As Parker Palmer says, we have much work to do in healing the heart of our democracy. Perhaps we start with learning how to listen to our own bodies and hearts. Love what we find there, especially our belovedness. Then hold the hand of one right beside us, literally or figuratively, marvel in their belovedness and listen deeply to their experiences. Perhaps even hold the hand of a stranger. 

Like the movie we watched last week -  

Before We Go

2015 PG-13 Rated PG-131hr 35m

rated 4.4 stars

4.4

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Not Interested

Our best guess for you: 4.4 stars

Average of 406813 ratings: 3.9 stars

When Brooke Dalton is mugged and misses the last train back to Boston, she's by herself in the predatory darkness of New York City. After busker Nick Vaughan comes to her aid, the two forge a connection -- which brings complications in the morning.

a surprising, gentle example of how two people can drop below their head space, and truly open, listen to each other. The movie begins slowly and takes some effort to stay with it. So very much like the reality of worthwhile human relating. 

Playing with Haikus

It’s been a long, dark winter.  The farmer and I are walking mindfully, yet with sustained effort through our transitions: the uprooting move, the death of his brother, his heart surgery with all the reflecting and recovering that comes with such experiences, the medical bills and sorting out of insurance claims. 

My psyche and soul are still navigating the past election cycle with all the division, fear and negativity, especially the unleashing of hate and disrespect towards women, Jews, Muslims and people of color. Add the uncertainty of climate change to the holding of my own whiteness, femaleness, while knowing I can never understand completely what women of color are experiencing.  

Unsettling. 

Perhaps it’s been a long dark winter for you too.

If I were writing a book, this chapter would be called The Dark Night of the Soul. So much has become obscure for me, not hopeless or joyless, rather complicated and unclear. I hold this too, and mostly trust the process. Sometimes begrudgingly, yet I find comfort trusting the Mystery when redbirds and deer sightings bring no consolation. 

If I were painting, I’d paint my soul a sapphire blue pot being stirred by Divine Fire. As Bruce, from the Virginia Department of Forestry said while gesturing toward the straw-like patches of dried Japanese Stiltgrass in our back meadow, “What this place needs is a controlled burn. You’d be surprised at all the new growth.” I instantly thought of my soul. Sure, fire burns chaff and hallelujah for new growth, but the burning feels hot and wild. 

Like erasure and emptiness.    

That said, I play with haikus and feel my barrenness easing slightly. At the end of winter, after the burn, the soul opens like warm earth receiving and releasing hardened seeds. 

Orchid

Light a candle.

Kneel. Pray for union, peace, love.

Trust the blossoming.   

Farmer's Valentine Day gift to me,
bird bath/fountain made from our old farmhouse
pump and trough

             Thirst

     Build a pump.

     Invite all thirsty souls come.

     Huddle. Drink. Quench!

Deepest Joy

CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=174698
flowers of Ailanthus altissima

Trees of Heaven, Ailanthus,  

not a glory, invasive.

Another hostile takeover,

needing removal.

Like the undesirables

rooting in my depths.

Yet, stands a grandchild, 

arms stretched, “Here, I feel so free!”

My soul holds space for joy.

Photo by son, Ryan Landis, taken the same weekend our grand daughter so grandly
expressed her freedom when ever she's at our  place.



Since I'm taking a break from Facebook for awhile, I appreciate comments here as well as Facebook

  

Snow Moon

Snow Moon     (Feb 2017)

SNOW MOON

Again, I’m drawn by curves of wonder, round and full,

illuminating the night with mystery. My yard is a cloth spread- 

a picnic of beauty for all who stand with craned neck and thirsty 

eyes, who drink hope while surrounded by darkness. Since 

childhood, the moon showed the way, going before yet following, always

   

inviting paradoxes: grace, fullness, diminishment.

From the window of an old brown station wagon

packed with siblings, purses, Bibles, suitcases depending

the destination, despite tussling, complaining or

singing, the moon winked at me. While lost in wonder

the world collapsed into one glowing ball, my soul, my

closest friend, followed our every turn, sailing

through trees, hiding behind buildings only to leap out on

the other side, coaxing a smile from deep melancholy

slowing on turns, silently waiting at red lights, traveling fast

down highways, keeping up. Keeping up. I caught love from 

this darling of the night. Intuited the wisdom of seasons, joy,

and sorrow, how it feels to shine or be reduced to a sliver.

She taught me more than holy verses committed to memory, 

more than hymns or fickle human affection.  Even now 

she is Mother, teaching love, endurance, persistence. Hope

in darkness.Trustworthiness. When mom couldn’t shine,

the moon did. And when mom billowed a blanket upon the grass,

inviting her little ones down on the ground to look up, gaze

at stars, watch the moon, I knew God as full and radiant.

“I see the moon, the moon sees me.”