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The Sun over my Shoulders
In the middle of the journey of my life, I came to find myself, in a dark wood, where the direct way was lost. It is a hard thing to speak of, how wild, harsh and impenetrable that wood was, so that thinking of it recreates the fear. It is scarcely less bitter than death: but, in order to tell of the good that I found there, I must tell of the other things I saw there. Dark Woods and fear I cannot rightly say how I entered it. I was so full of sleep, at that point where I abandoned the true way. But when I reached the foot of a…
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What gives light in winter
“Still, what I want in my life is to be willing to be dazzled— to cast aside the weight of facts and maybe even to float a little above this difficult world. I want to believe I am looking into the white fire of a great mystery. I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing— that the light is everything—that it is more than the sum of each flawed blossom rising and falling. And I do.” ― Mary Oliver, House of Light Now through December we will slowly watch darkness overcome light. December 22 is the Winter Solstice, when one of the earth’s poles has its maximum tilt away from the…
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chiaroscuro
This week marks both the observance of Passover for Jewish people and the celebration of Holy Week with the culmination of Easter for Catholics, Orthodox Christians and Protestant Christians. The themes of light and darkness weave their way through both of these expressions of faith. Below is a beautiful photograph which a friend took in the middle of the woods. It shows how light can find its way in the middle of a dense forest and illumine the darkness. It is harder with mankind to see light in the darkness, but I believe it is possible to see hope when all is dark. Many thinkers and writers have written about the…
