When first snow begins to fall

I stop what I’m doing–

dishes, e-mail, prayers–

And heed its call.

I fall, too.

Contemplation spins open on the hinge of an instant.

And I know in my bones:

the unchanging and the changing are inseparable.

Can this be what mystics experience?

Does it matter?

When the fresh snowflakes carry their own melting and 

evaporation in every molecule, why not notice– and 

celebrate– my own potential for transformation?

Is this not how fate first turns towards destiny?

Heeding the invitation to witness.

Here.

Now.

Falling.    

by Steven Crandell

Opening poem chosen and read by Nancy L.

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I stopped at the sign DO NOT ENTER on the side of the path near the woods.  Only landscape vehicles were invited further.  I listened, watched.  Who claims home beyond this sign? Two fox squirrels with ample frothy tails flew from stump to branch to branch.  Doves cooed; crows squawked; woodpecker knocked; cardinals cheeped; mockingbirds mocked.  Deer and fox who don’t have English as their second language had forged past the sign recently, their tracks in the sand.  Leaves and trees were living, dying, dead there.  And silence held among it all. Wind entered undetected except for what got stirred by its presence,  stilled after it passed through. I was delighted by the array of life that didn’t obey the sign, that I might have missed had I not stood still a while.  As I turned to walk back the way I came, thirty wild turkeys had gathered then parted like the Red Sea as I walked down the path.  They watched me carefully, maybe heard me say quietly, “Hello, no need to fear, good to see you.”  What a gift from paying attention to the sign…

…………………………..

At the Fountain of the Muses, the sun beaming strong, onto and through the spurting arcs of water, I saw a smallish pin oak standing at the edge of the pond.  Up and down its grey mottled trunk moved a strobe-like reflection–the light off the water.  It reminded me of looking at a live blood sample through a microscope, the pulsing of cells, a flowing rhythm mimicking heart beats.  The bark was alive with it, as was the underside of the canopy, the sprays of hanging moss.  I imagined I was seeing the lifeblood of this tree from outside in.  Mesmerizing.  As I walked away from the pond and noticed other trees without the reflection, I envisioned just below the bark of each one a similar pulsing energy, up, down, throughout– the elements nourishing its life.

I see trees differently now, more as kin.

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Up the hill from the Muses, a huge live oak stands, with a plaque indicating it was living at the time the Constitution was signed.  I walked around the tree, touched its bark, did the math. I noticed a healthy seedling growing from an area halfway up the tree where a large limb had been.  I wondered if conditions now would support that new tree’s survival for over 200 years.  What is changing, what is unchanging?

Reflections by Amy W.

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 ” The unchanging and the changing are inseparable.” This line spoke to me throughout my walk…

… The 200+ year old oaks grounded and steady for centuries, yet changing season to season, moment to moment.

… The river that has flowed and nurtured life for millennia, while swirling and twirling and changing each and every moment. 

… The sky, the sun, the earth, the water steady in nourishing us with their bounties since the beginning; yet changing constantly.

… My prayer — that humankind will take good care of these unchanging wonders that change daily in nature’s rhythm and dance. 

 

“When the fresh snowflakes carry their own melting and evaporation in every molecule, why not notice– and celebrate– my own potential for transformation?”

Pink petals give way to brown petals and to rich earth — transformed to bear new life… As we too must fall to heed the call for transformation.  

Photos and reflections by Nancy L.