Morning contemplation

When you are lying against me,
satisfied and still,
save for the swelling of your breath,
nothing else in all the world matters.
Not my scribbled lists and leftover tasks,
nor the disorder in my thoughts.

Only your perfect form,
smooth, warm,
the faithfulness of your pulse,
this hushed and holy joy.

Here is an oasis of being,
a Sabbath amidst the striving.
Here is a haven of rest,
you and I,
unmediated.
Understood by kindred cells -
          real presence.



~lg

The beauty of the earth

Ivy Joy. 

You are the thrush that sings in the morning, sweet with joy from the crown of the tree.

You are the laurel about my head, victory green and new. 

You are the sun, faithful to smile the day into being. 

You are the brook as it laughs around the corner, kissing the rocks till they sparkle.

You are the wild rose, pink and smooth against my cheek, delicate fragrance in my breath.

You are the beauty of the earth,

the dew of youth from the womb of the morning,

the hymn I raise to kiss in praise.

*photo credit: Denise Bowman

~lg

Movements of Morning Prayer

It’s morning, and time for prayer. I uncurl, adjusting to the light. I lay flat, not really ready. I try to form thoughts, but they are slow and drowsy. My brain can’t focus. And so I pray with my body.

I stretch. Awake.

Awake me to Your presence. Wake me to the shining light of Your smile. Awake me to Your truth, goodness, and beauty. Wake me to Your voice. Wake me to wonder, wake me to you.

As for me, I shall behold Your face in righteousness;

I will be satisfied with Your likeness when I awake. 

(Psalm 17:15)

He awakens me morning by morning,

He awakens my ear to listen as a disciple.

(Isaiah 50:4)

The LORD’s lovingkindnesses indeed never cease,

For His compassions never fail.

They are new every morning;

Great is Your faithfulness.

(Lamentations 3:22-23)

I stretch upward. Offer. 

I offer all that I am for all that You are. Weary arms, feeble knees, wandering feet. Day breaks and I pour out this offering once more. As I raise my offering, raise me to life. 

Present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, 

which is your spiritual service of worship. 

(Romans 12:1)

And you shall love the LORD Your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, 

and with all your mind, and with all your strength. 

(Mark 12:30)

I stretch outward. Align.

Align me with Your plans and purposes for this day, and these people. Align my energies with yours so that I will not grow weary in doing good. Align me with Your heart. 

Thy kingdom come.

Thy will be done,

On earth as it is in heaven. 

(Matthew 6:10)

For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, 

which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them. 

(Ephesians 2:10)

For it is God who is at work in you, 

both to will and to work for His good pleasure.

(Philippians 2:13)

I stretch. In You I live and move and have my being. In all that I do, let me move toward You. Ready for this day. 

Awake ~ Offer ~ Align

~lg

We are a chestnut

We are a chestnut
round, curled and smooth
One life hidden
One life warm from the womb
Together the perfect shape of newness
From here we will unfurl and branch into otherness
But for now we are one
The mystery of who we will be yet concealed
in the folding of our limbs
Our breath, our body, our beauty
swaddled in this seed
Hushed and waiting
Hushed and wondering
Still only, sweetly, ours

~lg

The World About to Turn

I wrote this the day before Ivy was born. I could feel the change coming, and the heavens seemed to reflect this sense of being "in-between" one reality and another. 

~

7 am, and I am alone in the quiet downstairs at dawn. I woke to the subtle glow of pink in the east, and over the river’s source the sun will soon rise. All this I will welcome from the dining room window. Yet in the kitchen and in the west, the beautiful full moon still lingers, suspended round and gold, but whose glory will soon fade and fall beyond the pines on the hill. 

I don’t know where to look. At the fullness of this moon which I will not see again, which lingers as if to bid me farewell and keep me a few minutes longer in its power, or at the changing colours of a sky awakening to new light.

I am in the in-between. Between the setting of the moon and the rising of the sun. Between the calm beauty of winter and the ruddy rush of spring. Present in a world where the two are meeting, yet I cannot see their coming together. I can only look west or east.

Softly now I pace the floor, not wanting to miss either wonder. The moon is falling fast, and soon I will have no choice.

And yet…

It is, after all, the same light which draws me to both. The beautiful fullness of all that has been, now quietly sinking, is lit by the energy of what lies ahead. They are not opposites. Their dance is part of this greater turning, the “marvel” of our blue-green sphere. 

I pause at the kitchen window. The moon is barely visible behind one of the great pines, who will brush it with a final kiss and tuck it behind the horizon. Good night, moon. Well have you shone.

And now the dining room fire is crackling, and another row of pines is shocked into silhouette by a bright patch of light, and I am sitting by the window, waiting, waiting, for the sky to break wide and the sun to fling its beams into the valley.

There are these brief moments in which I can see neither moon nor sun. And yet there is light. There is beauty in this hush of in-between, in the being of waiting.

I am held here, in just the right place, till just the right time.

Ah, here it comes . . . a fire so bright I cannot look, only be seen . . . the day has come. 

~lg

Noon prayer: magnified joy

At the height of a mid-March day,
the sun is hidden beyond layers of stratus clouds.
Snow falls and a trio of ravens circles the sugar-topped pines, gliding above the slow footed creatures below. They glide above the slush and mud and slump of this temperamental season.

A the height of a mid-March day,
they remind me to look up.
To number my blessings by the flakes that descend,
to hold each crystalline wonder against the black pupil of my mind's eye,
to behold their beauty suspended in this moment and give thanks.

These blessings can float by unnoticed, small as they are, but now I enlarge my vision and capture them for what they are - all the little gifts that collide and stick together to shape my hallowed landscape.

The ravens move on, and so will this day.
Time to turn from window-gazing to worthy work,
but I hold these frames yet, and I will go imprinted by magnified joy.


~lg

Single-Handed Theology: The Piper in the Striped Pajamas

Little boy blue, come play your pipe -
Enchanting with every step
and sound from your lips.
You pull me out of bed by your tousled  head,
catch my eye with a flutter of thick lashes,
warm me to the morning in your cotton striped pajamas.

I'm a little bit in love,
and it's a good way to begin a day.
You don't even know your magic,
and it was not yours to begin with,
but the fruit of a multiplication of love.
And now the proof is in the pudding -
you are filling my earth with the blessing of old,
and I see the blush of the Tree of Life upon your cheeks.

I did not know that such a song could stir me out of myself,
out of my sleep, and into a shining new creation.
You, little seed, are crushing my darkness.
In the chestnut-gloss of your eye
I see us all as we were meant to be.



~lg

The Blessed Thorn

Where would I be without this thorn in my flesh?

Resting on plastic laurels of pride and vainglory.

This thorn - it keeps me near His crown. It pricks me to my knees, where my heart learns humility, to the ground of a tear soaked garden.

Without this thorn - whither the rose? Whither the scarlet hue and scent of beauty? Whither the unfolding of life, rising from dark and secret places? Whither the bloom of rooted victory?

This thorn - it keeps me real. It keeps me wrestling. It keeps me desperate for the blessing that comes to those who persevere in His presence.

Without this thorn - where would strength break through my shell?

This thorn - through its piercing the whispers come: My grace is sufficient for thee. My power is made perfect in weakness. 

I will not despise this wound, for through it the lifeblood flows.

Without this thorn, oh whither the rose?


~lg

The Slow Awakening

The clouds are blushing for the sun this morning in anticipation of his arrival: golden pinks and purple with a lavender secret, fresh scrubbed fleece and the far treed hillside on fire. It's a slow waking this December day. Muted greens and browns wait in the hush for the day to give them voice. A lone raven circles the riverbed, and he is first to greet the glowing king of the day.

A bird begins to sing outside the window. The little creature has my heart this morning, and I can't help but wonder, would the world change if we all stopped to watch the sun rise?

What if we stopped to watch the way a little boy runs headlong into his childish delights?

What if we stopped and held the sleepy girl a few more unnecessary minutes before moving on to matters of so-called import?

What if we stopped to breathe in the nuances of this morning's fresh air, and remembered to offer our thanks and praise?

What if we stopped and counted the colours of dawn, the heartbeats of a hug, and the notes of a songbird's hymn?

Perhaps this slowing would steady our tilted gait and ground us in the reality of our shared creation. Perhaps the light would heal our blinded eyes and reveal the hidden beauty. Perhaps the sun would cast his blush over our faces and kiss us awake to joy.


~lg

Choosing Light

What happens when you decide to choose joy, and your week starts off horribly wrong?

Somehow I manage to wake up more tired than when I went to bed. There’s no milk in the house to put in my coffee.

Arden wakes up sobbing because she didn’t see the red moon last night. She “stayed up” in a chair by the window, and we promised to wake her up when the moon was red. We did. We brought her out to the chilly porch, and talked to her, and turned her around, and keep talking, and she mumbled a bit and opened her eyes and kept falling back asleep. She doesn’t remember. Now, all she knows this morning is that she didn’t get to see the red moon. She’s crying bitter tears of disappointment, I’m crying too, then the two-year old starts.

Two of out two pigs are supposed to be on their way to the butcher today. After wrestling, wrangling, multiple escapes, stepped on toes, and general pig stubbornness, there’s only one pig in the trailer. Jack’s apple fell in the pig muck, and he’s more upset about that than the fact that he nearly got plowed over by an animal eight times his weight. At the end of it all I’ve got pig poop smeared up my legs and there are a dozen burs stuck to the back pockets of my jeans. I need another coffee.

It’s going to be a long day.

How do you choose joy when Monday morning brings everyone to tears?

At the Rend Collective concert on Saturday night, amid riotous singing and dancing, they paused to say joy was a spiritual discipline. It’s something we need to cultivate. It’s a choice. I knew I needed to choose it again. For too long this giant of discouragement has been looming large over what I thought was going to be a happy season. I’ve been living in a shadow, where I know the light exists but somehow it just can’t get to me. I’ve been eclipsed.

I was given a beautiful painting earlier this year. It’s called “Choosing Light.”* It meant something then, at the beginning of the year. And now on this wearisome Monday, I go into the living room, pull back the curtains, and stand before it. The sun isn’t immediately visible in the brush strokes. But it’s there, behind the clouds. And if I look closely, I can see its golden presence, the promise that if I reach out for it, it will shine back.

So I determine, again, to choose joy.

As the kids are waiting in the car to go on the ride to the butcher with Daddy, with just one pig in the trailer, I make funny faces at the window. I press my face right up on the glass, squishing it into all kinds of contortions which little children find hilarious. There could be bird poop on this window for all I know, but I don’t care. I’m going to make myself a little ridiculous if it means putting a smile on their faces. I stand back to wipe the drool off the glass. I can see my reflection. Sure, a little tried, maybe a little harried. But I’m smiling.

I can do this, even when the week starts off all wrong. I won’t be eclipsed. I’m choosing light. I’m choosing joy.

~lg

* "Choosing Light" by Katy Rose. See more of her beautiful work and the goodwill living it supports on her website. 

Falling in Love

No one tells you, when you choose this life of marriage and family and sticking to covenant, that you will get to fall in love again.

It happens all at once one morning, when you are drinking coffee at the breakfast table, and there is a little boy sitting there eating bread with jam and chatting about airplanes and bad guys.

It happens when she sidles up unannounced and slips her hand into yours, even though she's a big girl and doesn't need you in the same way she once did.

It happens when you catch a particular smile you've never seen before, because he's just discovered something of importance and his hair has never been that shade of sun-kissed before.

It happens when she jumps off a new height and puts a little dizzy in the pit of your stomach, but you hide it because you are so flushed with pride, and as she turns to grin she has suddenly sprung up taller.

No one tells you the unending capacity children have to make you see things new, to be plunged into love in a thousand wondrous ways. You thought that "to forsake all others" was to shut up your heart to the thrill of love, but this narrow path of two-become-one floods into acres of freedom. This life of co-creation is deep and wide, and here is all your heart's desire.


~lg

Morning Prayer :: The morning after five years

This morning, a newly minted five year old snuggles in for a cuddle on the front porch swing, while the first green of spring bursts out on the trees. "The same old world, but new."* And every breath she takes against my body, every glint of light upon the river, every birdsong carol, all are morning prayers rising from the fresh dawn to the Father of creation.

Here is perfection, often glimpsed yet rarely grasped, and it lives and breathes in my arms.
Here is beauty so pure, and who am I to behold it, and how can a windswept hill make me want to cry for joy and longing?
Here is wonder in the warmth of a freckled face, and the curious nature of seeds, and this one child that I have woken to each morning for five years.

Here is life, life more abundantly.

It is right to give our thanks and praise!

* From Come and See: A Christmas Story by Monica Mayper

~lg

When the Snow Crunches

At minus twenty, the sound of snow beneath my boots changes – it's the sound of my childhood.

When the snow crunches, winter has settled in, and no use fighting it. Its tune is infinitely more joyful than the slushy shuffle-step of warmer days. It is the sound of Dad splitting chunks of spruce and pine on the big chopping block, of chickadees seed-diving and scolding the squirrels, of a cardboard Polar Express racing through the backyard after dark. It is the sound of my fingernail scratching peepholes in the frost of my bedroom window, and the breathless hush of northern lights over the Slave River. It is a single sigh – the beauty of resignation.

When the snow crunches, we have an understanding, winter and I. Our friendship goes a long way back, to the dimmest of infant remembrance – me and my red parka tumbling off the toboggan in the shadow of Bear Rock. It embraced me from the start, and I had no reason to let go. There is freedom in bringing out the long johns and Sorels, which is the only real way to dance with the season. For after resignation comes delight. When the snow crunches my toes still tingle with the frostbite of our more intimate moments.

At minus twenty, the sound echoes in some deeper soul chamber, formed by a reality that chose me before memory, and shaped me like fast water flowing under the ice. No use fighting winter when the snow crunches. 

~lg 

Made for Beauty

I long for beauty. How can my heart ache for something so frivolous, so unnecessary? Isn’t it selfish to want the icing on the cake when so many are starving for bread?

But what if beauty isn't unnecessary? What if beauty reveals something desperately true about humanity, and about God?

Our God could have made a world of bread and water, of pragmatic production, of sufficiency.

But he created the possibility of chocolate, a riotous spectrum of colour, laughter and fiddle music.

We could have made do with walking, one foot in front of the other, single file please. Get the job done. But he gave us dancing. He made us for dancing. He made us for joy.

He made us to thrill at the first explosion of spring yellow – a daffodil. He made us to gaze at pigment skillfully stroked onto canvas. He made us to relish the wordplay of a master storyteller. He made us to sigh at pretty things all in a row. He made us to be captivated by that particular shade of blue in a baby’s eye.

Are these unnecessary? Well, yes. But they are not any less important for their seeming superfluity.  They reveal a God who delights in abundance, in giving freely and joyously, in a cup overflowing.

Beauty matters because it catches the glint of heaven and reflects it back to us. Beauty matters because it is the laughter of God.

So when we give bread, which we must do, can we also not give wine? When we give blankets, which we must do, can we also not give a lullaby? When we give shelter, which we must do, can we also not give a sanctuary?

We are meant to do more than the necessary, more than the sufficient. We are made for beauty. 

~lg

little boy beauty

Beauty is a brown-eyed babe,

Flannel soft and smiling.

Beauty is the steady gaze,

Tender and beguiling.

Beauty is a dimpled cheek,

Smooth and round and warm.

Beauty is the hushing body,

Tucked into my arm.

Beauty is a holding hand,

Whispers of the skin.

Beauty is beholder’s eye,

Wide to take it in.

~lg

planting beauty

It’s not the way I usually would have done it

The apple tree sat waiting

In its plastic pot

Roots circling round and round

Without any room to breathe

I wanted ideal ground

But our “back 40” was less than so

Ground ridged by rocks and weeds

A pile of twisted rusty metal

neglected museum of days gone by

A heap of brush sprawled and sticky

like a shock of unkempt giant’s hair

A collection of broken glass, old medicine bottles

and the evidence of beer drunk in secret

A jumble of dirty plastic, torn and tattered

but never decomposing

I wanted to clear away all the ugliness first

Prepare a perfect environment for our darling sapling

A smooth lawn, a clear view, a clean start

But that was more than a few weeks’ worth of work away

I was almost loathe to do it

Behind the brush heap I pulled up weeds and grass

Collected more fragments of the last few decades

We dug a hole in the middle of it all

Sharp spade cutting into red clay

Filled it with rich, dark dirt harvested from the sea

And there

Surrounded by the brackish heaps

of our pioneer work in progress

We planted beauty

And there it blossoms even now

Unfurling roots and leaves, deep and high

Peeking over the giant’s mop top

Waving to the kitchen window

Happy only to be given a place

Yes, I will give up my stifling idealism

And give beauty a place to grow

~lg