There's a light inside...

There is.  There really is.

Feels as if I came closer to burning it out than I realized.  Of course, I don’t really believe anyone can actually put out their own light.  As long as you’re alive, it’s in there somewhere, glowing beautifully.

Still, you can get so busy you start to smother that steady flame with stuff and nonsense, and a speedy pace can make it flicker like a candle in a drafty old house.  That’s precisely where I was, and it is so good to clear some space and put the etched hurricane glass in place.  It feels right, to protect one’s own light, to choose to give it time, and peace, and gentle attention.

What shall I report to you from my days away?

The sky is an ever-changing mystery.  Did you realize that?

A dragonfly with a neon-bright crimson body skims the water and comes to rest on a stone inches from my nose.  Once I start breathing again, I remember to question my self-created illusions and give thanks for the pretty reminder.

My heritage of speckled beans grows as if these were actually enchanted beans from a fairy tale.  Is love some kind of magic fertilizer?

Forgiveness makes my heart light.  I always forget that until I am giving or receiving it again.

Storms swirl in during the late afternoon to thrill me with their lightning bolts coming so close I hear the electric blue pop in the forest canopy — several moments before the thunder rolls.  And then comes the rain, like a benediction.

The nights are for watching the fireflies dance.

I gather wild blackberries in a pink sunset and come home with my palms stained purple.

A pair of doves perch on a nearby power line in the golden-peach light of dawn.  A translucent moon hangs behind their heads.  They coo down to me as I pass.

Hummingbirds shimmer in their emerald green jackets as they sip from the sweet-smelling butterfly bush.  As one little one hovers and then suddenly reverses in midair, the word flexibility floats through my mind.  I smile, because I know I am getting better at it.

All it takes is a bouquet of Queen Anne’s lace cut from the roadside to fill an old pickle jar… and I am treated to a pristine memory long lost in the maze of mind.

The cats and I take naps in the heat of the afternoon, dreaming together of tuna and poems.

I’m woken one morning by the sound of my neighbor’s little girl walking in our garden, making up her own soft song.  I hope she will do that for the rest of her life — and that I will, too.  And you, also.  Are you singing your own song in life?

The crickets serenade me to sleep.  Their musicale must be the longest running in history.

F. makes me laugh.  We watch an old French movie together, cuddled together exactly where the couch sags in the middle.

One sultry evening I drag him away from the dissertation to journey to a truly wild place I found, not far from the house — but far from the world of cars and streetlamps and lawnmowers.

I just know he will love it, and I’m right.

The path is overgrown, dotted with wild chamomile and orange butterfly weed.  It leads us on winding curves through head-high stands of kudzu, until eventually we find ourselves looking down at the blue-black lake through a screen of pine.  In the deepening twilight we hear a splendid performance by a chorus of frogs.

Life is beautiful.  Don’t you agree?

For tonight, I’ll leave you with a lovely Irish blessing, maybe the best I’ve ever heard:

May you live all the days of your life.

Yes, do.

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