The extreme delicacy of this Easter morning
Spoke to me as a prayer and as a warning.
It was light on the brink, spring light
After a rain that gentled my dark night.
I walked through landscapes I had never seen
Where the fresh grass had just begun to green,
And its roots, watered deep, sprung to my tread;
The maples wore a cloud of feathery red,
But flowering trees still showed their clear design
Against the pale blue brightness chilled like wine.
And I was praying all the time I walked,
While starlings flew about, and talked, and talked.
Somewhere and everywhere like spoke the word.
The dead trees woke; each bush held its bird.
I prayed for delicate love and difficult,
That all be gentle now and know no fault,
That all be patient—as a wild rabbit fled
Sudden before me. Dear love, I would have said
(And to each bird who flew up from the wood),
I would be gentler still if that I could,
For on this Easter morning it would seem
The softest football danger is, extreme. . .
And so I prayed to be less than the grass
And yet to feel the Presence that might pass.
I made a prayer. I heard the answer, "Wait,
When all is so in peril, so delicate!"
-May Sarton
What a perfect beginning to a month in which we celebrate the daily miracles that make up our home here on earth--the delicate web of live in which we live. With the blue skies, deep green grass, and the feathery red maple blossoms mentioned in the above poem, its not hard to feel a special reverence for the natural world.
The Month of April is filled with events that celebrate this concept of the delicacy of our ecological place here on Earth. Indian born American Artist Subhankar Banerjee will be showing his amazing photographs at the Tyler School of Art this Wednesday, April 7th . Photographer, anthropologist, botanist, and filmmaker Wade Davis will be visiting the Stroud Water Research Center on April 15th and sharing his story "The Wayfinders: Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in the Modern World." On Saturday, April 24th West Chester University will host the "Awakening the Dreamer" symposium. Keep checking the blog for the latest updates about local Earth Day events, including all the details for this amazing symposium.
To remain up to date on environmental happenings going on in the entire Philadelphia area, I cannot recommend enough staying tuned into the GRID Magazine blog the Griddle. I have a special place in my heart for GRID magazine since Inverbrook along with a bunch of farmer friends were featured in their 2009 Farm Book. GRID will be celebrating its one year birthday on Saturday, April 10th at Yards Brewery.
Happy Earth Month, Happy Easter!
“A child raised to believe that a mountain is the abode of a protective spirit will be a profoundly different human being from a youth brought up to believe that a mountain is an inert mass of rock ready to be mined.”
– Wade Davis
