Listening to the narrative of so many. Voices speaking in the best and of ways … the life experience of so much narrative. Tides running this way and that… Rolling over, pulling under… the twisting rip of tide. A story made up for me … then a narrative of life experience as lived. The two, at times as a rip across a rising or receding tide.
Waking one morning, butt in chair, writing. Writing as a spilling waterfall. The fingers dancing over the keys and, as water, filling up and spilling over. Pouring as story. Pouring in narrative. Pouring down the steep mountain side and splashing in the rising and receding sea.
That same sea, slow tide rising, slow tide receding. In cycle with moon and sun… in cycle with spinning earth. Caps melting. Caps forming… a different sequence of tide. Belching gases… increase and decrease tide. The livingness of all creation… in pulse of tide. This sea narrative. This belching narrative. This caps forming and caps melting narrative. The heat of the air… making of a blast in storm… yet another narrative. A child born… a narrative. A dying down … another narrative. The experience of this or that… each a narrative. These tides of narrative… rip, and shift…
An image of sudden taking up. The story, laid down in years of telling. Suddenly in a living person, taken up. No longera story told … this moment a story lived. That narrative taken up. In the rising tide of taken up…
So, in this musing, the narrative of a breath taken. The narrative of a breath let out. The beating heart. The ticking clock… each sweep… another narrative. And all, the cacophony…
Should. Would. Could. In this moment, the still small voice speaks yes/and. A hand offered. A greeting of morning. A moment of uplifting as the altar of the world is in view. A prayer. A blessing. A giving of thanks. In these narratives… each a short story … a poem in a greater and lesser tide…
So the laying down and the taking up… in a moment of humble muse… the tides are calmed and run along in grand dance. In grand dance… even the rip is of a rising and receding tide. A rising and a receding… as a song, a psalm, a prayer… in still small voice. In a living moment. In all creation. Amen.
Lent 36
“No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again.” John 10:1-18