As I sit in our outdoor living room it is a cool 78 degrees with a slight breeze. I am torn between the need to journal and touch base with the process of life and the idea that what I am going through is much to complex to even begin to describe. That is the lot of the poet and blogger—what can really be known of this life that we are a part of and how can one even begin to make a dent into the fabric of understanding it on the cosmic level.
I feel a pull to create something new so that you will not be disappointed when you click the link to see if any progress has been made from my last post. I also am aware that time is passing and that I am at my best when images and words are flowing through my fingers and onto a page or computer screen.
In reality there is really much too much happening to even begin to tell the story of it. Each passing day adds a color here or a sentence there that when taken as a whole is quite significant and well worth waiting for—a good stew is allowed to simmer for a while before it is served up allowing all the different flavors to mingle and grow comfortable with each other to our mutual benefit.
It is twenty to eight as I type: there are one or two cicada’s beginning to make their evening song—by ten there will be hundreds and it will be virtually impossible to distinguish one from all the others. It is like going to see the symphony—as we sit in the audience we watch as each player comes to the stage with their instrument and find their place. First violin and second trumpet and so on down the line. They place their music on the stand and eventually begin to warm up until all are on stage and the concert master gives the signal to produce that one note that everyone will tune to. After this the conductor comes to the podium and brings everyone to attention and the musical program begins.
Last night as I sat in the very same place I realized that there were no words in my vocabulary to describe the song of the katydid or cicada. Their voice or song is a rapid click, click, click or a chica-chica-chic and sounds sort of ratchet like winding an old clock with a buzz/buzz/buzz and every other note a tone above or below the one before it. One beat and and half and then a rapid eight or sixteenth note run that starts on your left and fades to your right—the perfect surround sound experience.
Here is what I wrote then:
As dusk surrounds me
I have to wonder what it is
I am really seeing
As I look through eyes
Looking through trees leaves
into grey sky.
A stream of air moves the leaves
at the top of the trees
but leaves those lower branches
almost still.
There is a liquidness to the air tonight
as if there is a substance—a depth
of surface—thick and thin
at the same time.
What lies in this space between
You and me—what realities
are formed by that
invisable distance.
Oxygen molecules dancing
off one another—yet the air is still now—waiting
for a hand to reach down from the heavens
and give this substance
a push in my direction.
The cicada’s, like clockwork
grow louder as the day turns to night—one
voice here and another there—then a
symphony or cacaphony of buzzing
and humming and purring—motorlike
in its’ harmony—turn the key
and the engine fires.
Chicka, chicka, chicka
a certain fast ratchet—slow buzz-buzz-buzz
a music that has no nationality—it is ethnic
yet not refined—simple folk music
but an orchestra sized sound mixing gently
with a late August evening.
It really doesn’t get any better than this!
Looking For The Long Ride 
I’m glad we clicked onto th the katydids and cicadas tonight thank you for that, but what about the “In reality there is really much too much happening…” story?
I am overwhelmed with information about how I got to where I am and how to get to where I am headed. When Christ said 70 times seven he meant just that: it may take a while to get to the point of living in today and not what we have stored in our minds.I am gald that you are my friend and are able to look beyond my faults and and appreciate what God has made me to be.More later…stay tuned.
Since I was a boy whose bare feet were stained by Georgia-red clay, I have loved the sound of cicada and katydid. Your words put me in those sounds and in my youth. So what is and what do we do? Nothing and all the depth of that cosmos you attempt to capture in words. He has done all that needs to be done to unite us to the Father. Our search for satisfaction in any form is over. The depth we involve ourselves in is entering back into the chaos around us and bringing forth all the love our faith will release. Or so it seems to me.
Terry, I think I just posted as my e-mail address. It’s early! Can you edit our e-mail address off?Also, have you seen Borne Ultimatum? If not, do want to go this weekend sometime?
70X7…absolutely! Coming to grips with the wonder of this is life-altering for me. It is not a license to sin. Yet, as we work out our salvation with fear and trembling and begin to see the line between our sinfulness and our true self in Christ, we gain authenticity and stability as the whole person our new creation is. Among the functions of God’s grace is that we are not condemned for our many failures to make this distinction between our nature of this world and His nature within us. Ever. In Christ Jesus there is no condemnation. He is constantly at work to complete the work He has begun. He accepts us no matter where we are along the path of lessons we must face to understand what He is doing in us.Will some maintain a heart turned toward themselves and never understand, while justifying their love of sin by spouting 70×7. Possibly. Yet how can I back off in faith from God’s order of redemption because some may abuse it? I rejoice in His great, wonderful spiritual economy that meets me daily in my exact condition and works with me there never holding my failures from yesterday against me, but using them instead as lessons. In the midst of such grace my love for Him grows and my understanding of how to be sinless in Him, for Him increases.
My dog is sick (((
Bought a new TV!
That’s not just the best anwser. It’s the bestest answer!
It is instructive. But I would not have been able to.