“We cannot avoid using power, cannot escape the compulsion to afflict the world, so let us, cautious in diction and mighty in contradiction, love powerfully.”
―
Author: Bill Schulz
#1053 – beast mode 2
serenity, courage, wisdom
(Photo: Grindstone, Maine – September 2019)
Mr. or Mrs. Nobody – William Stafford
Some days when you look out, the land
is heavy, following its hills, dim
where the road bends. There are days when
having the world is a mistake.
But then you think, “Well, anyway, it wasn’t
my idea,” and it’s OK again.
Suppose that a person who knows you happens
to see you going by, and it’s one of those days –
for a minute you have to carry the load
for them, you’ve got to lift the whole
heavy world, even without knowing it,
being a hero, stumbling along.
Some days it’s like that. And maybe
today. And maybe all the time.
(photo: Abiquiu, NM – September 2017)
You know all my ways
O Lord, you search me and you know me.
You yourself know my resting and my rising; you discern my thoughts from afar.
You mark when I walk or lie down; you know all my ways through and through.
For it was you who formed my inmost being, knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I thank you who wonderfully made me; how wonderful are your works, which my soul knows well.
O search me, God, and know my heart. O test me and know my thoughts.
See that my path is not wicked, and lead me in the way everlasting.
From Psalm 139
(photo: Grindstone, Maine – September 2019)
#1050 – beast mode
Take Courage
Take courage, my children, and cry to God,
for you will be remembered by him who brought this upon you.
For just as you purposed to go astray from God, return with tenfold zeal to seek him.
For he who brought these calamities upon you will bring you everlasting joy with your salvation.” – Bar 4:27-29
The Feast of St. Francis of Assisi
From “The Life of St. Francis:”
At the hour of the passing of the holy man, the larks – birds that love the light, and dread the shades of twilight – flocked in great numbers unto the roof of the house, albeit the shades of night were then falling, and wheeling around it for a long while with songs even gladder than their wont, offered their witness, alike gracious and manifest, unto the glory of the Saint, who had been wont to call them unto the divine praises.
Pace e bene to us all.
Mowing – Robert Frost
There was never a sound beside the wood but one,
And that was my long scythe whispering to the ground.
What was it it whispered? I knew not well myself;
Perhaps it was something about the heat of the sun,
Something, perhaps, about the lack of sound—
And that was why it whispered and did not speak.
It was no dream of the gift of idle hours,
Or easy gold at the hand of fay or elf:
Anything more than the truth would have seemed too weak
To the earnest love that laid the swale in rows,
Not without feeble-pointed spikes of flowers
(Pale orchises), and scared a bright green snake.
The fact is the sweetest dream that labor knows.
My long scythe whispered and left the hay to make.
St. Francis of Assisi
There are many images of St. Francis of Assisi. This small work was in a classroom at The Franciscan School of Theology in Berkeley. I saw it most every day for the three years I was there. When I think of St. Francis, and I often do, this is who I see.
St. Francis, pray for us.
This evening, followers of St. Francis of Assisi will keep a memorial of his passing on October 3, 1226. I pray that his spirit of reconciliation and love for all creation bless each one of us.
Blessing of St. Francis –
May God bless you and keep you, smiling graciously on you, granting mercy and peace, granting mercy and peace. May God bless you and keep you, May you see the face of God, granting mercy and peace, granting mercy and peace. Amen. Amen. Amen.
Edge of Atlantic 