Monday, July 25, 2011

Ripening

All was busyness in my mind today. It's the beginning of a new work week, friends are due to arrive on Wednesday for an overnight visit, and another friend will be in the area over the weekend.

My mind leapt and jumped like a frog in a pond during T'ai Chi Chih practice. Repeatedly I reminded myself to slow down, soften my knees, and simply allow my weight to flow softly forward and back. Many times I found that advisory easier (nonverbally) said than done. As soon as my mind accelerated my body followed in its wake.

Now, though, as I sit at the computer writing this blog I can feel that my body is more at ease, my shoulders more relaxed. Hopefully, my mental/emotional state is in a more neutral state as well which, I know, will facilitate my helpfulness with patrons at work this afternoon.

After a few days of sweatshirt weather we're back to summer. Summer squash, green beans, and tomatoes are lengthening, widening, and becoming. Frances mentioned that she saw her first grasshopper several days ago and so, a poem:
Grasshopper, your tiny song
And my poem alike belong
To the dark and silent earth,
From which all poetry has birth,
All we say and all we sing
Is but as the murmuring
Of that drowsy heart of hers
When from her deep dream she stirs
If we sorrow, or rejoice
You and I are but her voice....

If you would know what earth is, scan
The intricate, proud heart of man,
Which is the earth articulate,
And learn how holy and how great,
How limitless, and how profound,
Is the nature of the ground--
How, without question or demur,
We may entrust ourselves to her
When we are wearied out and lay
Our bodies in the common clay....
          --John Hall Wheelock
            From: Earth Prayers, pp. 396-99

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