Greetings, First Unitarian!

Today’s poem is a tapestry of sweetness.  The words gracefully weave together the threads of nature’s wonders with the sacredness of thought and the absence thereof.

The part that I find sweetest of all is the author’s momentary pause at the well of human love when he writes about the ‘warm clarity of a face that finds your face and doesn’t turn away.”  During this time of separation, there are some faces of our dear ones, beloved faces that do not turn away from our gaze, whose in-person company we are currently not able to savor.

While this is a challenge, it can also be an invitation.  There are other faces we encounter…unfamiliar ones whose paths cross ours on a walk, at the store, or across the alley as we tend our gardens.  These new faces can be gifts, as they bring opportunities for momentary connection.  So often in these moments we divert our eyes completely, or if eye-contact is made we immediately glance away.  How lovely it is when both faces don’t turn away, but meet however briefly, and warmly acknowledge the other…unexpected moments of grace that find their way into our days.

Perhaps you find this or another part of the poem especially splendid.
I hope so!

Sending love,
Lori

Splendor

One day it’s the clouds,
one day the mountains.
One day the latest bloom
of roses – the pure monochromes,
the dazzling hybrids – inspiration
for the cathedral’s round windows.
Every now and then
there’s the splendor
of thought: the singular
idea and its brilliant retinue –
words, cadence, point of view,
little gold arrows flitting
between the lines.
And too the splendor
of no thought at all:
hands lying calmly
in the lap, or swinging
a six iron with effortless
tempo.  More often than not
splendor is the star we orbit
without a second thought,
especially as it arrives
and departs.  One day
it’s the blue glassy bay,
one day the night
and its array of jewels,
visible and invisible.
Sometimes it’s the warm clarity
of a face that finds your face
and doesn’t turn away.
Sometimes a kindness, unexpected,
that will radiate farther
than you might imagine.
One day it’s the entire day
itself, each hour foregoing
its number and name,
its cumbersome clothes, a day
that says come as you are,
large enough for fear and doubt,
with room to spare: the most secret
wish, the deepest, the darkest,
turned inside out.

~ Thomas Centolella ~