Catch the Light

Here is a poem and picture from my friend Judy Todd. It speaks so well to the challenges of staying engaged and present for the pain and darkness; keeping our hearts open and not becoming brittle or blocked to the pain of the world, while letting the beauty of this amazing planet continue to feed and nurture us. Thank you.

Photo: Judy Todd

There is something about looking at things quietly and close up. I was out in early fall admiring birds, mostly geese, as they whirled and gathered like magical currents of feathers, landing and filling the pond. But the early morning gleam on this feather was what really stopped me. The way the light caught the tiny drops on the curves and the down as it perched along the dark stone with the big black crack running through. The feather hadn't fallen in, but rested there. And there it remained, unlike the geese, who moved about noisily all morning.

I'm doing what the feather showed me, not the geese. Staying near the dark cleft, holding there. Studying that dark perhaps, yet not falling in. Knowing it's there, and it doesn't care if I am in or out. But I want to catch the light, and I want to catch the drops of precious water on the edge of that darkness all around us, darkness that is so big, so near, so easy to fall into. I intend to be like the feather and practice a new kind of being -- gleaming like the feather -- for all my kin, whether or not they notice.

                                                                                                                        Judy Todd
                                                                                           
Judy's organization, Nature Connect:

...offers opportunities to reconnect and foster kinship with Nature in many ways and places through the seasons. We wander each landscape waiting expectantly for its teachings. We learn from other-than-human beings – stones, cedars, and antelope. We study watersheds and spider webs. We offer gratitude to ancestors and oceans. We are building a village in harmony with the web of life. We do it for us now, and for future generations. We invite you to join us.

Bird sheltering from the rain. Credit: Sue Peabody