The Zinnia Princess

 

                                                           

Creamy, tender skin is iridescent in morning light, plumped with life, like it's been filled to its capacity with the morning dew. It is the small hand of the Zinnia Princess, and she is out in her garden again. She points a decisive finger at her first choice, a voluptuous, hot pink bloom.

“Wower”, she aptly calls it. I, and all the others in the garden are hushed and stunned by this unexpected declaration. A light breeze jiggles the stems of the congregation and gives the flowers a responsive shutter as they receive the honor of their new name; “Wower”, indeed.

She reaches forward, clutching a chosen stem and I, her most humble servant, cut it loose from the plant with my pruning shears. She reaches again to fill her other hand; there is more than enough. She picks a coral pink this time, the perfect complement, a brilliant choice. The faint rippling of applause from the rosemary bush looses its fragrance with the sudden enthusiasm, and the aroma wafts into the air. 

 I carry her around the south side where a red zinnia wower blooms scantily along the picket fence painted a cedar color. Only three red blooms today. She will not pick any of these.

I, toting the princess on my hip, step over the stone border and enter the garden. I sit the princess down atop the mulch-covered ground and she drops her stems while reaching her hands up to hold mine. She disappears between the tomato and the okra, needing some assistance she is generously willing to take me along with her. It is a morning immersion, and she invites me along into her exploration. She is young-wise and I can easily see she feels there is much here to discover. I am intrigued. 

Her pause pales the importance of the ticking time in my head and the rush to get off into the business of the day. Her slow and purposeful gaze into tomato tangles is unique in these parts and I think I must imitate her if I possibly can. 

I glance down into the glossy pools of her dark eyes and find the stirring waters there.  Now I realize I had at some point wandered away in pursuit of something else less worthy and less wonderful. My heart lurches as two tears break free to race down my cheeks, and I feel the familiar, subtle stir in me once again. Wisdom hushes me, shutting me up to hear.  If I am willing, it will open me to see and to learn with this Zinnia Princess, Princess of the Wowers. Like the Pool of Bethesda where the wounded and ailing rushed to moving waters for healing, she is sensitive to the effervescence all around us. She has just recently arrived from God's heart, and the glinting of His kingdom is still upon her though she is unaware. So, she has come to preside over this garden, insistent in its mystery, and with an infant's watchful eye.        

Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.

 I slow myself and I follow her gaze flower to flower, and it becomes obvious to me why she has innocently insisted on a more expressive name, calling sorry eyes back to the WOW in a zinnia again. This is a most appropriate and sensible response in a dulled world, dutifully looking into the small boxes ever in our hands. She leans a soft nose straight into the brilliant color and sniffs it, pulling the subtle scent wildly into herself, and blowing it rapidly out, almost violently she breaths the scent in and out then turning her attention towards me, she points the pollen covered stamen at my face and demands I do the same. So, I do. And so, I yet will.  

Except you become like a little child...

I am Distilled

 

I drove between water because smart and skilled men made a levee and poured a road out on top. The sun showed through a sky stuffed with gray clouds and hit the lake tinseling the water and making me cry. The Lord touched my eyes with tinsel on water and gave me the word to tell it today. He touches my heart with tinsel and water, and my life is a wonder. I am distilled in tinseled water, in the plucks of guitar strings and simpler things. I’m distilled in the wisps of wind and warmth of sun and those little paddle-footed-waddlers quacking along a grassy path. I’m preserved in moonshine and fair things. I am clarified in laughter, in the eyes of a caring friend, in voices and cat purrs, in walks on fallen leaves, and thoughts of higher things. I’m distilled under warm covers and preserved in gratefulness. I’m purified in sun rays and sprinkling rain and baskets full of adjectives for what I see. I’m refined in vanilla peaches and love, in prayers at the table and on my soft couch. My shelf life has no care for I’m distilled in eternity. 

December 19, 2023

Rhonda Gunn

Come Let Us Reason Together

“Come let us reason together”, says the Lord. ”Though your sins be as scarlet, they will be white as snow.” Isaiah 1:18

Snow covered the yard and wind was relentless for days.  Nevertheless, snow is exciting, and tucks one into a cozy frame of mind, removing a myriad of options from a day off.  In the quiet house clocks tic toc the time, the faucet is dripping away to protect the pipes from freezing, and cars ease by on a snow covered 3^rd. 

I sliced a box of plump little multicolored tomatoes and slid trays full into the dehydrator, but not before saving some of the seeds. I covered the seeds lightly in a little box of soil and put them near a window.  Seeds have come up with no care at all in past compost piles and random spots in the yard and garden, so maybe these seeds will find their way to germination too. They will help with the wait for spring either way.  😊

I often dream of what I could accomplish if I had a string of days like this.  I imagine all the reading I would do, the notes I would take, the food I would fix and the plans I would make and accomplish.  Then a day comes when downy snowflakes fall from the sky and into my lap is a snow day.

And it has happened again, weather that says, “Just cozy up inside. There’s nothing for you out here. The view out the window is best.” Rain fell in the night and giant trucks slid over yonder, off the interstate pavement into the trees and up banks of icy ground. Ice is nearly non-negotiable and it’s not wise to try, but oh, how we try anyway.

Black birds visited the yard in a throng, pecking the ground looking like digital creations. Maybe they are searching for pieces of pecans discarded by gluttonous squirrels. They all rose and filled the hickory tree, filling in the gaps left by fallen leaves, but only for a moment before moving like a black cloud across the lawn to the pecan tree, then to the ground again before flying away to who knows where. I watched them from my second story window snapping pictures.

“Come let us reason together.“ 

I slice the tomatoes and dry them for a day. How different they taste when not carried in a splash of water, how chewy and sweet. In my excitement I held one finished piece in the light of my window before eating it. The winter storm had changed my dead yard to a glamorous, all white stage where the tomato became a marvel before it. As if before a spotlight now, I saw the seeds exposed in their deep and secret place suspended in time, an intimate peek into a scarlet explosion in the heart of the fruit, like little, fat exclamation points, like rambunctious, young sperm in pursuit of the egg. I’m shy at the sight of it. If they had a voice I’d hear shouts of joy and the whisper of…  

“Come let us reason”.

It’s been days still simmered on this theme, these thoughts pulled apart. I started an ancient practice in a jar on my kitchen counter, fermenting milk. It is silky and white and tart from growing bacteria that is good for me. Then I dried pounds and pounds of strawberries into sweet, red chips. Yesterday, I put them all in a plastic bag and felt so pleased with this work. The whites and the reds glaring again. A simple, messy life, tucked in a measly river valley town has things yet to say. Important lines to repeat out loud in my own simple way.

“Come let us reason“

There is nothing more or less going on in this life long mess of discarded strawberry tops and the feelings and experiences. It is all a boiled down in a line from Isaiah, older than the kefir grains preserving the milk on the counter. It’s older than time. It is of the foundation and that’s as solid as it gets.

“Come let us reason.”

It’s not “Just do what I say!” It isn’t, “Blindly follow me.” It isn’t, “Let me take you, use you, control you.” It is higher and bigger and breathtaking.

“Come let us reason.”

Engage the matter of your life and your outcomes with the outcomes of truth. Reason, dissect, use your intellect. God has nothing to hide. 

Morning Prayer Journal; April 8, 2019

Lord, how shall I celebrate a new morning?  Birds are already singing it up a storm out there, rooster is saluting the morn, frogs in the pond are piping and I, the tallest, weightiest of all sit in a silent stupor.  Why is this?  They are so fully invested with YOUR purpose, so without hesitation of their call.  It is You in their throats, in their chests, in their movement and song.  It is Your eternal purpose in them, without choice they go along happily it seems.  It is beautiful, sure, purposeful, comforting to know that they will always do what they were intended to do; not robots, but creatures full of divine, unaltered purpose.

It's the creatures with choice that falter.  It's us with our own navigation systems that go the wrong direction.  It is us with doubts about our purpose that sit in a stupor unhinged.  We, often as if sitting behind a curtain, live veiled from the movements of God-- adrift without a compass.

 Jesus said he did only what He saw his Father doing.  He showed what synchrony between the two can do. When he sparked debate at the temple or stood speaking to the crowds, when he struck out in a boat to meet a demoniac on the other side, he saw it first in the place that we also can see. He did what his Father was doing and put His hands and feet to this on earth. Isaiah 60:l

May

May I sit with you for but a few more hours and bless you for being you? May I smell your blooming flowers and watch your mulberries ripen soon? May I brag about the roses that choose your welcome to open wide? And may I bring you this offering, this feeling? I will try.

Your days grow sweetly longer, your showers come to find the soil that needs more water, the flowers and the vines. I breath you in to savor. I drink you in my thirst. I bless you in your breezes, I marvel at your worth!

The purest smell of privet, the dandelion blooms, daylily and magnolia all draw me from my room. I'll plant a little garden when I find a piece of ground, an orchard and a vineyard 'cause you'll be back real soon.

You are my shining favorite. I don't wish for you to go. Can't we just start all over? -- May 1st, I love you so. Your days passed by too quickly, your benefits astound and I am left to linger till you circle back around.

Little Worm

Who is this little worm, but a mite on my windshield?  Wiggling about, such a phenomenon. So small, not more than half a centimeter, but charged with the vigor of an athlete.  I thought his tummy must be full of food to have such energy-- and how did he light upon my windshield?  Had he been spinning a long strand of web too?

I had a trunk full of groceries.  I bought a little extra this time in case I can’t go back soon.  The little worm shrugged at me with a blushing of pink all about.  He has no care over powerful monopolies of food and such things. He needs no warehouse of goods to sustain him. He feeds in the open air as I plopped my bulk groceries down into a large cart. Alone in the warehouse full of people, no one bothered to look much at the other, all awkward behind masks.  He feeds outside of the system I’m in, I mused.   He does not envy me nor beg to come in.  What more could he need? Little worm, how I'd like to enter yours.

I, inside my car, trying to enjoy a moment beside a lovely lake, but concerned about the cottage cheese and meat in my cooler and concerned that I find a bathroom in due time. I’m caught up in a system chosen for me before I was.  Need it always be? 

Little worm, may I come into your way?  Leave the extra canned goods behind and wander in the ease of your dwellings?  The lake was mine for only a few moments, but it is yours your whole life through, though beautifully short and sweet.  We try much harder than you to extend ours.

"Get out of the car, get out of the race for the normal and safe", I say to myself. Let the world go on fading and the King take His place.  What am I saying?  Do I even yet know?   I’m only “considering the lilies” and a promise I hold.

Mathew 6: 25 "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes…….

 

 

Adams Rd.

I saw a parcel of land for sale for a solid sum. In the photo advertising, a large oak tree stood next to a shabby white house with ivy growing up the trunk.  I think I would give the whole sum for one oak tree if my bank account obliged.  Massive limb-arms made of strength and integrity and wood; great limbs stretch horizontal far.  And when any oak hangs its massive limbs low, like the giant arms of my father, for a daughter or a son of Adam to climb up, a transaction is made that can never be revoked. 

No one has ever forgotten climbing about on an oak limb, nor the feeling of bark against the skin; legs dangling over the earth, one would go even higher--knees pressed into the ridges struggling for ascent, blood rushing under the skin, and a breeze igniting a sense of losing the bonds of the earth. 

Adams Road, Ozark. 

 

Little Stars

He who made the Pleiades and Orion, who turns midnight into dawn

and darkens day into night, who calls for the waters of the sea

and pours them out over the face of the land—the Lord is his name. 

Amos 5:8

When You speak, Lord, You light a runner’s torch within us.

We’re compelled to move carrying Your dancing flame. 

And after the light burns low, 

when the last ember’s glow has just disappeared

one turns to investigate all that You said, this speech that sprang from the breath of a star; our Morning Star.  

 I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star. Revelations 22:16

Now we hold Your words under a light, still warm from the fire to study under a lamp Your guiding Words. 

Rendered speech too great for me, yet anchoring inside of me

and now the articulations of Orion drip from the tip of my own common pen. How can this be?

I’ve become bearer of light, too; His little star.  The Morning Star took His rightful place within us, now He shines.

                               

Oh God, You are the surge that chases through the cord and brings us into light. We are Your prophesied walking stars, tipping to spill into the night.

Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky. Philippians 2:15

And I am all human and, as this, I can only try.

We shine within an honor that no one can fully describe, this privilege of living as God’s image bearers; His Tribe.

We, luminous lanterns hung up through Christ against the dark, one by one by one through the ages hung by the Father of lights. 

Arise, you who sleep,

Arise from the dead,

And Christ will give you light.

Ephesians 5:14

The morning He set the cornerstone of the earth’s foundation-- when foundations were laid, angels and stars sang songs of awe and wonder.
 In our day, we pick up their chorus.  Job 38:7

Beloved, give your praise a song,  you walking stars, beloved lights on earth.  Orion’s belt--- truth pulled tight around your waists. 

He looks to earth and sees the darkness lit up, His racing heart proclaims, “My beloved! 

 Those who are wise will shine like the brightness of the heavens, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever. Daniel 12:3

A Farm Forum

A farm forum, ready to convene just for me.  A choir of frogs sing praise from a small pond out back in the middle of February.  They pass their invitation to join the preliminaries of song; their funny prelude to the discussion-- the discovery. 

 A surging within the forum of fields and yards tucked round with fences opens a morning wide.  A garden plot ready to tell mysteries to me, share ideas, reason it all out in the softness of ready soil; ready to receive the seeds that are questions in me.  I will tuck them in and wait-- soon to poke quietly through the earth in answer.

A forum of land and sky calling a morning meeting, preparing for a rousing discussion for a searcher and seeker! How have I attained such good fortune to be invited among such wise handlers of divine secrets? 

                                   

I stand among the furry-wise who take their places at their own gates, live their good lives, sowing and reaping just what they were perfected to. Minding their own business. One calls the meeting to order with a “baaa!”  I take my seat among them.

                               

A magnificent forum of farm and feeling, of astute players all knowing their place.  OH!  I hear a pony pounding his gavel down, with fine hooves he calls this session to order.  I humbly join the meeting, pen in hand.  

                                

Where is your forum of friends?  Where are you planted to preach a good word from the wealth of your own sown heart?  Where does your forum convene? :) 

                                   

If My Words

If my words had substance and could be seen as they launch out, would they lift and fill the morning sky? Would they praise up with the clouds?

If my words spoke out in shades of color, and if they were hot or cold, would my world be bright with rainbows, and would You cuddle in their warmth?

If my words had weightiness and could remain just where they fall, would they pile right up to heaven, and build a monument to Your worth?

If my words were lofty, and could speak to kings and queens, would  they hear Your invitation and come to the great wedding feast?

                                             

If my words were humble and if they were safe for all, would You trust me with the "least of these", and would You send me to the lost?

If my words could reach You, and I know that they do, I would set an echo in the wind to repeat my LOVE for You!

  

Marigolds and Mums.

A month or two ago: 

 Marigolds and mums, moonlight and Matilda Jane from the worn porch in Arkansas. 

Matilda Jane

 Midnight morning glories, as I go inside late,  and my home. 
Men in youthful glory, moms in aging beauty--yeah, it's beautiful being "mom". 

Muffled laughter, many voices, moments and memories made. 

Menagerie and me.  

More and more and more in Him who holds that moon up high in the night sky.  

Manifold awareness of manifold blessing.  Mouthing hallelujahs as best as I can and true as it is to me.

Sweet moments with my sweet ones.  Oh the love, and oh the feelings!  

Knowing the rest of being carried many miles, then walking, running and standing in "my place", made by my God for all time.  My Maker making my merry heart sound and free--ever may it be.

My mounting mosaic.

Now the frost has swept away the miracles in buds and blooms, but I'm o.k. with that.  And don't think there is only the prettiest of pictures here on this place of mine.  Don't look and think only precious moments parade past our path.  My pictures are pinches of the whole.  Beauty sometimes comes right beside the torrents, don't they?  I aim my words and my camera at the beauty.  This, a choice offered in the most Beautiful Book---to think of what is good. Philippians 4:8

--Though praise rises from it all-- all is met with Him, not apart from.  I have power to pay props in prose. So do we all.
Some call this perspective and I like that.  And aren't we all free to aim our own lens and focus on what we choose.  It's a wonderful, powerful choice.