“There is a quiet light that shines in every heart. It draws no attention to itself, though it is always secretly there. It is what illuminates our minds to see beauty, our desire to seek possibility, and our hearts to love life.” –John O’Donohue
(Paintings by my daughter’s 5-6th grade students)
In the Tenakee Community Church a few weeks ago, Pastor Buck mentioned the medieval practice of trying to prove biblical truths, such as if angels have bodies, and if they don’t, or I suppose if they do and are very small, how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?
I think it was Billy Collins who wrote that the question is not how many – but rather, why do angels dance? Which, not to be too woo-woo about it, is also the answer, isn’t it?
I was thinking about this because I walked past the Buck’s cottage this morning with the dogs and the first light was foggy and so still with pillows of clouds on the surface of the inlet, that the boats in the harbor, the rooftops, the trees and the rocks seemed to be part of them somehow. Some looked as if they were lit from inside, like the type of clouds angels could dance on, and who knows? Maybe they were?
It also got me thinking about Mary Oliver’s poem about the roses, the one where she asks them some questions about cares and woe and how they handle it, and they reply they are too busy being roses to worry. Imagine being busy being a rose. Imagine being busy being you. Just you.
This is the poem I had picked out for you today, and in that weird way so many threads weave together to illuminate my mind when I think I’m not paying attention, it is a perfect fit. I picked it last night so I would not be rushing to fire off a thoughtful Advent meditation (which seems so wrong, you know?) before my friend drops off her grandson to help me bake bread so she can take a bath during women’s hours. (That could be a poem too, someday.)
But this one is about goats in winter, yes goats, and like all good poems, a lot of other things too.It’s by Naomi Shahib Nye, a beautiful human being and a great poet —you no doubt have read her popular poem Kindness, “Before you know what kindness really is you must lose things…”
300 Goats
By Naomi Shihab Nye
In icy fields.
Is water flowing in the tank?
Will they huddle together, warm bodies pressing?
(Is it the year of the goat or the sheep?
Scholars debating Chinese zodiac,
follower or leader.)
O lead them to a warm corner,
little ones toward bulkier bodies.
Lead them to the brush, which cuts the icy wind.
Another frigid night swooping down —
Aren’t you worried about them? I ask my friend,
who lives by herself on the ranch of goats,
far from here near the town of Ozona.
She shrugs, “Not really,
they know what to do. They’re goats.”
