~ A Joy Warrior's Journey
A single pink hyacinth opened today in my garden,
luring me with its irresistible perfume to come close,
closer. Lose yourself in her the air said. I could do
nothing else. And I cannot describe the pure cool joy of her.
It simply transcends words. But imagine a scent so heavenly
that you want to breathe it in forever.
Late in the afternoon, actually just before evening,
as the sun sinks behind the western hill, the treetops
on the east end of the southern slopes, their buds swollen
with life, glow in the golden light, their crowns looking
like pastel clouds afloat in the springtime sky,
Sometimes when I stop to look
the thought comes to me that we,
you and I, may be among the last
ever to see living nature in its context
through purely human eyes.
Really, that’s why I stop, why I trade
moments of my life for the sight
of these blossoms. We could be,
you know, among the very last ones.
Spring beauties cover the hillside now,
emerging from the layers of last year’s leaves
to dance beneath the sun. In the right light,
you might think for a moment that it had snowed.
But no; it is only these tiny, bright flowers.
Only this message of undeniable joy.
Only life appearing. Regardless of the odds.
That the branches of bare trees erupt
with bursting buds simply because,
so they tell us, the planet’s axis has tipped
toward the sun, is one wonder.
A larger one, it seems to me,
is that we walk past, heedless,
hardly noticing such marvels at all.
What a fantastic world, where
miracles occur in such profusion
that we barely give them
a ho-hum!
Let me tell you how this letter came to be.
I was settled at my keyboard with the day’s chores behind me, relaxed and gazing at the orange and rose and turquoise sunset outside my window. My mind was leisurely scrolling through random topics when it paused on a shred of lyrics from the Moody Blues’ album, “Threshold of a Dream.” I hadn’t heard the Moody Blues in years!
I could remember some of the opening lines, but one phrase eluded me. So I zipped over to You Tube and listened to the track. I found what I was searching for, and as a bonus I got to hear one of my all-time favorite lines: “Face piles of trials with smiles. It riles them to believe that you perceive the web they weave. And keep on thinking free.” Good advice.
I slipped into a dream of my own while the song was playing. (I’ll tell you about it another day.) And when I came back to the music from my dream, I discovered several songs had played without my consciously hearing them. The one that was playing now was “The Minstrel’s Song.”
I listened, and the lyrics put into words exactly what I wanted to say to you today. I knew what it was; I felt it so clearly, but it just wasn’t taking shape in my mind. For one thing, it’s Easter. And my mind was contemplating all the interpretations of its meaning and symbolism, all the memories it evoked. And for another thing, it’s spring, and I’m enraptured by its wondrous unfolding. The mix of emotions I was feeling was wide and deep. And all at once, there was this happy song, capturing it so nicely.
I smiled as I listened. I pictured the minstrel wearing the harlequin costume of a joker, an April fool if you will, prancing down a mountain path, heedless of anything but the feeling of delight that filled him. But that’s just a disguise. You can imagine him any way that suits you. What’s important is his song.
Here’s how the first verse describes him: “Words, a simple song a minstrel sings, a way of life in his eyes. Hear the morning call of waking birds when they are singing, bringing love. Love. Everywhere love is all around.”
I thought about the joy I feel in the morning when I take seed out to the birds and they come to my song and we chirp at each other for a bit, and about how grateful I am to begin each day in their company, and how it feels like such a sweet breath of love.
Then the lyrics say that all the nations hear the minstrel’s song as he walks by in their lives. It touches us all. It sings to all of our hearts. And all we have to do is listen. “Listen to the one who sings of love. Follow our friend, our wandering friend. Listen to the one who sings of love. Everywhere, love is around . . . around . . . around.”
That was it exactly, just what I wanted to say. Listen for the love around you, because truly, it’s everywhere. It’s dancing through your heart this very minute.
And that’s the story of how this letter came to be.
Wishing you a week filled with the Minstrel’s song.
Warmly,
Susan
Before you returned, the waters were frozen,
the ground deep with snow. No songbirds
fluttered through the stiff, cold branches
of the trees. Everything slept in darkness.
Oh, the world still held its beauty
in a stark and subdued way. But nothing
foretold an awakening; nothing hinted
at renewal. Hope was a forgotten word.
Then, in you came, with your warmth
and your gold,your earth-shaking thunder
and life-giving rain, coaxing everything
to awake, pushing it to rise, luring it
into the light, inviting it to open,
giving it reason to sing, to shiver
with joy, to remember that
love never dies.
Clouds, darker than those that already veiled the morning sky,
drifted in just before noon, and the world stilled. After a while
a soft rain fell, washing the trees’ swelling buds, and the twigs
and branches and limbs and trunks, and finally the new grass
and the mosses and tiny spring flowers. It stopped about three
and I watched the sun emerge, pale through the clouds,
but giving its light to the sky behind them. Once, long ago,
someone who lived for some time in a woods, where he no doubt
learned the spirits of the trees, looked about him and asked,
“Have you noticed how the light is always perfect?”
The Yes, whose merest spark of thought
creates vast worlds within worlds,
whose living laughter flows endlessly
between and around and within them,
whose joy knows no bounds,
whose forces flow in our blood,
whose light sings in our souls—
that Yes—plays here, right in the midst of
this moment in Spring, and its star children
dance to the song.
When your time in the sunshine is measured in days
you have to make the most of every shred of them.
Hold nothing back. Release all hesitation.
Give it your best. Give it your all.
Beam out your light.
Trumpet your joy.
Do you know? Can I tell you?
How you fill our hearts with gladness with your song!