June 21, 2020
Yesterday was Summer Solstice and the official first day of Summer. Today was a day of radical rest… that is what my daughter shared with me this night. I picked her and my granddog up from the airport today. She has just graduated from college and is hope for a break and for rest as she sees how her next chapter will unfold. After we got her and her luggage in the house; and had some lunch, we both took naps. There just seems to be a deep exhale and opportunity to rest for each of us. So this night I am reminded of Mary Oliver’s poem, The Summer Day.
I dedicate this poem as prayer for all those in the midst of transition and pondering what is next.
The Summer Day - Mary Oliver
Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean--
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down --
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
With your one wild and precious life?
May it be so…