I begin my mornings by meditating on our three season porch. With a blanket and a warmer on my neck and back, it has become and three and a half season porch. I doubt I will sit there next Sunday morning, when it’s forecasted to hit 16 below. But today, at a balmy 24, it was quite nice.
I
usually bring a mug of hot tea, light a candle, arrange the blanket and try to
just listen. It isn’t always easy; my
mind often seems to be sitting on a lake of liquid hot magma that throws fears,
questions, doubts and random thoughts up into my consciousness. Maybe you have all experienced that at some
point. When it gets real bad, I tell
myself that my “job” is to just sit there and not worry about what my mind
throws up. Just sit there and listen: to God, to my body, to the world around
me.
This
morning, there was a train whistle, quickly departing. A single sparrow, chirping. The crows started coming in, returning from
their night in community. They seem
louder in the morning, even though there are fewer of them. Near sunset, when they all begin to gather,
there are so many of them, their raucous caws turn into something like a giant OM:
a multitude of crows keeping festival. Yes,
I know that a group of crows is a murder.
But murder doesn’t seem what they do in the early evening. Rather, family, communion, solidarity.
When
the crows return after dawn, their individual greetings stand out, sharp and
somewhat harsh. I imagine they are greeting each other with words like Blessed
morning. Good fortune on the hunt.
I
had mostly tuned out the crows this morning, when I heard a pleasant bird
song. I was pretty relaxed into
meditation at the time, and my semi-conscious mind thought that’s a pretty
song. And then it hit me: it was a
cardinal singing—the first one I’ve heard this winter! The cardinals usually begin singing in our
south Minneapolis neighborhood sometime in February, but I don’t remember ever
hearing them sing on the first day of this shortest month.
It
seems quite likely the groundhog will see its shadow here tomorrow, and the
high for Super Bowl Sunday is forecasted to be 3 below. But with the change in administration, the
arrival of vaccines, and especially this solitary cardinal singing this
morning, I can hear spring. I can listen for it, even when it is far from
coming.
Here’s
a poem with a cardinal in it, part of my book “Quitting Time”. It officially launches February 18 at 7 pm
CST. Here’s a link to register for the
webinar:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_Bha30g3AR6S-9eKL81PDVg
YOU ARE IN NEARLY EVERY DAWN
You would
love these cardinals
in late
winter, courting from
the highest
branch, the rabbits
that race
the backyard snow,
sparrows
who never abandon.
I sit on
the porch and imagine
your face,
a child I have never seen.
I have no
photos of you as a boy,
no First
Communion, no lost
teeth or
family picnic, and yet
I see your
smile as clear as wind:
a breeze
that arises in the east,
messenger
in a cloudless sky.
Be
beauty. Be justice. Be kind in
listening.
Patrick
