taking winter like taking medicine-- a bitter herb that goes down rough like the bare branches scraping against each other in the icy winds outside. taking winter, taking time in these still-long post-solstice nights to keep the inner life alive in the leaves of books and journals until the branches burst with spring buds. taking winter like taking part in the breaking of bread with beloved souls or in the dance of the earth around the sun, slowly tilting back toward new life.
Tag: stillness
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taking winter
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waiting for winter
The fields are bare now, ready to sleep for the long winter. We cook more soups as temperatures drop, watch more tv as the nights take up more hours of the earth’s rotation. I knit stitches on a sweater here, a hat there; pick up my phone to tap out thoughts to copy into a draft later. The work of life continues, but indoors and inwardly. It is a soft work, in which repentance and rest will be our salvation; in quietness and trust will be our strength (Isa. 30:15).
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on being still
pink clouds settling into the night There’s a certain smell to a late-summer Midwest evening; it stirs up from under your feet when you walk along the fields. Humidity radiates off of the corn with the residual heat of the day. Cicadas scream at you from the maple trees, making sure you know they have accomplished the Very Great Feat of bursting out of their crispy brown shells. Frogs chirp between the cattails as pink clouds fade into a navy blue sky. Fireflies and stars gently blink their way into being, joining the symphony of distant horses neighing, highways and byways whining with 18 wheelers, and trains singing their siren song. If ever there is a time to live in the moment, it is this.
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still summer evening
open fields, open skies This is one of my favorite summer hours–when the sun casts long shadows on the earth with hours of daylight still left in the sky, the winds calm and ever so gently rustling leaves high in the treetops, the temperature perfect enough to be comfortable in shorts or pants, T-shirt or tank top.
These are the hours for laying in a hammock with a book, taking a leisurely bike ride down an empty road, firing up the grill for a midsummer barbecue. These are the hours when it is easy to feel joyful and at peace. These are the hours when the soul can be at rest.
Angela At-Large 