Tag: nature

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Seeking Trust at Dawn

18 May 2024

Walking in the backyard predawn silence of this suburb, I hear the cooing of a mourning dove before any other sound. This year, after several others of seasonal instabilities, the purple clematis bursts grand with a determined hue of strength – this, despite the cool spring temperatures, clouds, rain…

The flowers’ brilliance widens across its trellis, faithful blooms this May in an overshadowed portion of an otherwise unremarkable periphery garden bed.

This moment of color and sound helps me find hope and gratitude in the extensions of a life of questioning, facing this void alone, always seeking to trust. And I’m deeply grateful for the wisdom, kindness, light, and friendship that may pass to me each day, keenly aware of all it means as my arms and heart remain open.

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Everywhere

14 April 2024

For some reason, last night was rough – the cold wind, spring trying to break through, daughter’s birthday, questions of where life will be going with this crumbling all around, at home, abroad..Lives in the Balance.

Then I turn on TV in the evening and feel the news that Iran strikes Israel at 4am their time. Escalation? Some retaliation? Thoughts of children and their images imprint on what’s left of my imprisoned mind bring me to supplication and prayers of tears for what’s left of this humanity lost.   

Still grateful for a night of almost sleep and quasi rest, I remember 2003 and the public ridicule for warning against war..this…by colleagues and self-defined ‘friends’.

Choosing Nonviolence is a lonely, parched road on forsaken grounds, those of a humanity refusing to see beyond its own reflection. Difficult, oftentimes excruciating, yet, one that assures the spiritual Highground from which we all rise and recede.

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An Evening of Contemplation

17 March 2024

Taking a walk on the evening of St. Patrick’s Day, I absorb the quiet in my neighborhood. Beautiful weather likely facilitates crowds at parades and people probably gather locally and in Manhattan for loud celebrations. Here, all is overbuilt, but serene.

Mockingbirds caw, laugh, mimick, upsetting the calm that seeks to be – much like the chaos that has been unleashed lately by humanity’s disregard for their own outlined path of stewardship.

Know Thy Place. Walk humbly. But instead so many impose, struggle to keep balance and tend to overrun, dominate, with little regard for others. Build bigger, taller, charge more, regardless of the overload on the system. Signs are visible in the neighborhood. Borders and boundaries stretched to limits, just because…paid in cash

The land will swell, rise, and fall. Sink holes will open to engulf and swallow neighborhoods because laws have been transformed for pieces of silver, as Earth is betrayed.

And the leaders in their neatly pressed business suits, dry-cleaned with toxicity, will feign ignorance and invent excuses. While many who have heard, listened, countered, and remembered for years will recognize and continue to proclaim their truth as laws change to bend for bankrolls.

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Cosmic Color Palette

30 September 2023

As the rains and floods in the metro NY and Long Island areas came to a three-day close, the Heavens spoke silently to those who raised their eyes and hearts to feel, perceive and see.

Believe in Truth, and you shall still rise. Practice Love, and you shall still rise.

Trust in The Word, and you shall still rise. Become the Power of Goodness, and you shall still rise.

Then, The Unseen Hand began to swirl tones of French and English lavender, pinks and coneflowers onto the azure canvas that stretched from the sole horizon from East to West and from South to North into Eternity …and October began in brilliant sunshine.

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Healing Rain

24 Sept 2023

Before Ophelia brought three days of beneficial rain to a yearly regeneration of this backyard dotted with deep, destructive grasses and newly-seeded patches of microclover, I managed to remove some withered spots of crabgrass and weakening roots–a yearly chore that has continued over summers.

As the brilliant sunset of this International Day of Peace 2023 promises, we are part of cycles, tides, breezes, just as the Earth lives. And yes, it is difficult to remove the clinging damage of crabgrass that has been free to seed and spread. But, the brilliant green of microclover delights and extends by stolons–horizontal connections between organisms. They expand and reduce weeds, pests..with awareness, labor, and time…bringing beauty and healing.

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Genuine Labor

4 September 2023

Sometimes allowing silent actions to prompt observation, thought and experience succeed more than engaging in conversation.

Ripened grape tomatoes on the vine, small but particularly sweet this year made a smooth sauce for lunch on a cauliflower pizza crust. Tiny green zucchini, sliced thin and pan-roasted made the circular design. Finally, fresh mozzarella, leftover from yesterday’s weekly stop at the local Italian deli dotted the decorative, enhanced Margherita with a touch of basil.

All remains quiet as people recede from today’s heat & humidity. The earth and grass are parched in places, despite watering every other day. Many messages rise up for those who seek them, with accompanying thoughts.

Labor Day 2023 recipe: crushed garlic, evoo, blended garden tomatoes however small, drop in a few fresh basil leaves shredded and simmer your pizza sauce – dotting with fresh (leftover) mozzarella, garden baby zucchini slices on cauliflower crust. Bake at 400 for 10-12 minutes.

Incomparable, unprocessed taste gives simplicity, authenticity and work together — to make a pure, healthy point, understood through experience on Labor Day 2023.

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Nature’s Search for Equity

April 15, 2023

Learn to be silent and recognize yourself as a humble part of Nature & you may be given gifts. Today through an unseasonable spring, and after a dry but safe winter, struggling white blossoms strain their petals to appear on cherry and Goji bushes. Though not as many as in years past.

Alone? Mastermind? Or are we an integral part of this intricately woven Pattern of Life?

Feel the gift and strength of being part, however small yet essential, of such a glorious Plan and relinquish the fantasy of control to mutual respect, care, stewardship, awe & admiration for all creation connected to you.