As Simple and Holy as a Bouquet of Cosmos

Bouquet of Sensation Mix Cosmos on Judy's desk October 2011.

***

THAT INNER CIRCLING SUN XXX. October 23, 2011
 In That Inner Circling Sun VIII. I wrote:
My path is clear now, and straight.
My all-too-human body has its twinges
and its doubts about all that I still plan
to accomplish, which is why that inner
sun must carry the workload and egg me on.
My greatness is an unknown, and yet I
feel it settle comfortably into the driver’s
seat, turn the key, and tell all the other
passengers: "We’re off."

In That Inner Circling Sun XIV. I wrote:

Lonely you
may be. You venture farther than most
writers want or dare to go. Your life is
lived inside a safety net around this work
you do of heeding every impulse of the
Muse. She leads. You follow. It doesn’t
get simpler, or harder, than that. Stay
where you are. Write and grow food.
Help people when you can’t say no.
Love your life, your work, every strand
that connects you to others and to your
world, where birds and other forest creatures
are as at home as you are now, here.

***
Let it be as simple and holy as a bouquet
of Sensation Mix cosmos, cut in a
neglected meadow, blown sideways,
then growing upward, living now,
so briefly, in a honey jar, their stems
drinking water but never fast enough
to keep them from dying. Pale lavender,
purple that is nearly red, pink--pale and
dark--white–with curving stems, buttons
ready to bud, but never with petals as
free and perfect as those that drew
their life direct from the soil, the last
heavy rain, and the south-moving sun,
A tangle of winding stems, spidery
leaves, they speak of freedom, careless
joy, and seed that persisted. The field
was bush-hogged, and they rose up
as if it had been cleared for their
benefit. Then the sweetgum saplings,
blackberry briars, tall feathery weeds
competed for space, soil, nutrients,
but they waved aloft their elegant
pastels, living and dying with equal
grace.

The fact is: I await sun.
The morning fog was warmed until
it disappeared. While they waited,
the hens groomed their feathers
back to gleaming white, huddled
for warmth, with enough space
to allow such circumspect cleaning,
like nymphs in the wood of Artemis
bathing around their goddess. When
I’m among them, they circle around
me. I’m taller, more powerful, but
Bringer of Food, Rescuer when
Lost, Speaker to their early morning
reluctant scratchy voices and their
last murmurs of contentment as
they settle at night, their dinosaur
toes gripping the wooden bars,
where they’ll sleep, and if it’s cold,
with feathers fluffed for warmth.

To put it another way, I wait upon
the Muse. If I’m a queen in the
human hive, it’s only because I’m
Her servant, desolate when she
disappears, fully alive when she slips
in again, whispering words I hadn’t
expected to hear so soon, which,
of course, subtract my power in order
to enhance hers. Servants do try to
outwit their masters. They sometimes
succeed. Oh, I can argue, and I do.
Postpone, if I don’t push it too long.
I can languish, and I do, when she
absents Herself. But then the sun
returns, it catches these variations
on the royal purple theme and
makes them glow with inner light,
and my soul becomes illumined,
too. So it becomes win-win. After
that, can I possibly believe that aging
will conquer me, or death do me in?
may be. You venture farther than most
writers want or dare to go. Your life is
lived inside a safety net around this work
you do of heeding every impulse of the
Muse. She leads. You follow. It doesn’t
get simpler, or harder, than that. Stay
where you are. Write and grow food.
Help people when you can’t say no.
Love your life, your work, every strand
that connects you to others and to your
world, where birds and other forest creatures
are as at home as you are now, here.
writers want or dare to go. Your life is
lived inside a safety net around this work
you do of heeding every impulse of the
Muse. She leads. You follow. It doesn’t
get simpler, or harder, than that. Stay
where you are. Write and grow food.
Help people when you can’t say no.
Love your life, your work, every strand
that connects you to others and to your
world, where birds and other forest creatures
are as at home as you are now, here.