Giving and Taking

From the Journal

7 AM, at my desk, much on my mind, sunshine on the walls...

Since an experience I had on Saturday afternoon, I have been thinking much about photographs...and the difference between giving someone permission to photograph you and someone taking your photograph.

I do believe the distinction is more than semantic. For me, when it comes to photographing people, one speaks more readily of relationship. One is to be with someone who relaxes you enough to say, yes, you may photograph me, you may ask of me, you may do what you need to do to set up the scene, and I will comply...I will give you permission to photograph and to be in charge for these moments. It's actually rather freeing, that feeling of trust and willingness. And it is steeped in things so fundamental and simple... care, story telling, attention, laughter, respect, comfort... steeped in grounding faith, really, that someone else will go to the effort to share that space with you and not have it be monumental, but rather a way of being in this world...easy, generous gift.

I am grateful when this happens. Whether at meals, photography, sitting alongside, or plain old extraordinary being with.

Buckets

It's a bucket-list Friday 5 brought to you by RevGalBlogPails...errr...pals.

1. Prepare my own version of Babbette's Feast and bring together friends from all eras/segments of my life.

2. Travel the Mississippi by paddle boat while reading Mark Twain

3. Learn to unicycle

4. Live in England

5. Help wherever and however I can by writing of discovery and revelation and sharing that writing with others.

Credo, Part II

A continuation of Credo

Beyond believing, I know, yes, I know that my redeemer lives and I will rise, I will rise…rise on the cool stone steps of Word that speak to me in the valleys; I will walk because I see beyond any valley knowing there are others that await but raising my face to the vision I have been given by a God of hope, a-ha, and insight. I will go forth because I believe the valley can teach and I believe mystery is an omnipresent element yet to be added to the periodic table.

I can say that I hurt because I choose to love and that I thrive because of the same and that I can not imagine doing any less; I can say life is amazing and God is amazing and sometimes the line between smiling and weeping gets blurry and that’s just the way it is.

Beyond knowing, I believe in paying attention and watching for the trees and sharing the fruit; in taking in and taking note and taking time. I believe that there are reasons for measurements like eons and light years and joules because we need ways to think about the infinite and the infinitesimal. And, I believe in leaving some things to speak for themselves, unexplained and curious.

I can say that joy lives in my pocket along side a string of beads I finger when my mind wants soothing and a handkerchief of my father’s. Joy breathes in my heart, fills my spirit, and will not be overcome.

Beyond believing, I know that suns will continue to awaken and moons will nightly ease, that fallow times come and visions expand and wonders never abate; I know laughter helps and God enjoys riddles as well as the concise clarity of “I am.”

I believe too that I am, my neighbor is, and so are the daffodils and God sees it all and says “Yes. This, and so much more.”

And so I gather and so I go and I do not know some things.

Nonetheless, the invitation is mostly irresistible and thoroughly promising.

Spin me a Wander

Spin me a Wander

I ache and I grace

and I cannot explain

beyond “Spin me a wander path

the color of light—

I will bough, I will Spring, I

will leaf and Fall and

stark rattle my branches,

calling the birds

to come sing in my hair."

©MperiodPress

Cool My Eyes

Cool My Eyes

If I was on the porch
with the honeysuckle
and the knowing

And I was inclined to start talking,
or singing—because it has to be
done that way sometimes,

I’d ask, Mary could you come
and cool my eyes?

let me see through you,
sweet, stone, smooth
sweet, stone, smooth…

Yes, I’d say
swing me low and wide
low and wide…

teach me where to find
the mint-water river
dancing me fresh…

Oh Mary, could you come
and cool my eyes?

©MperiodPress

Morning Music

After watching this video, suggested by a friend, I begin my day considering anew how passion can at once be so grounding and so freeing. It was a realization more beneficial than that second mug of coffee and for which I am most thankful.

Hum-Full Shimmies

I received a bottle of bubbles today...Take it literally or figuratively--it was an uplifting thing.

Happy Spring and peace.


You're Never Too Old

I dunk and purse
and aim with care—
Ah!

Hum-full
shimmies
of prismatic air!

Their skin is thin—
might pop
and sting your eye.

Worth it though,
to let them go—
whimsy in the sky.

©MperiodPress