The Invitation
Sunrise on the porch first with just hummingbirds then joined by Tarah soon after. We read some Love Poems From God— all of those mystics found such radical love and presence in the world around them. It is inspiring to learn about their life paths and read their words and yet nothing compares to the sunrise and they knew that! Mary Oliver too. There’s nothing any of us could write that would be more beautiful or soul-stilling as the sunrise itself. Or the stars or the birds’ call or the snuff of the seal surfacing.
Sometimes I wonder if words are really for the desolate human. The one imprisoned within slums and buildings or merely in their own minds. I am sure there is enlightenment and wonder to be found in those places, if not in the surroundings, at least in the people. However I am certain it can be much harder to be swept into ecstatic love for the universe in a prison cell or in a state of depression then when seated on an East facing porch watching the sun rise up over the ocean with the entire landscape on the edge of its seat singing for the start of the day. No, this morning I just sat and listened as the sun rose. Words – writing or reading them seemed unneeded and almost unholy.
Words save us when the page is all we can see – and for that I am grateful. It is for those moments that I write, for those future selves and loved ones who become lost and must be reminded of the love around and in them that I write.
Mary Oliver often wrote of starting her morning writing but soon being swept away by the birds or light or call the fields. It is a blessing to be called to put down the pen and step out into the world. A blessing to be called into flow.
Right now the sun is warming half my body. The invitation to swim is growing louder and more enchanting. The water joins in the sun song calling for contact. For bare toes over grass and rock. For the faith and weightlessness of the leap. For the sweeping and enlivening of the cold clear water. For the breath that flows in and the heart that pounds. Then the sun that warms once again as I bask, learning from seal and lizard, once again on the dock. Oh what a delicious invitation.
