270. Nature looks dead in winter because her life is gathered into her heart. ~Hugh Macmillan

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She (nature) withers the plant down to the root
that she may grow it up again fairer and stronger.
She calls her family together
within her inmost home to prepare them for being
scattered abroad upon the face of the earth.
~Hugh Macmillan

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Early morning light steals across straw-colored grass and slowly warms the biting chill of a February dawn.  Splinters of sunlight glisten and sparkle as they move over the garden’s frost-laden, bare bones.  From my vantage point inside I can make out a lone, reddish leaf, not quite ready to be a memory, clinging tenaciously to a branch in the ornamental cherry tree.  It reminds me that a wellspring of life lies dormant below in nature’s “inmost home” where “her life is gathered into her heart.”  My attention is diverted next to the dogs I hear barking up and down the alleyway.  The feral cats must be on the move in search of food.  Then birds begin to show up at the feeders and high above their flutterings I see the first squirrels running the high wires.  Soon birdsong breaks morn’s silence, and lights start coming on in the once darkened houses around us.  The neighborhood is coming alive and gearing up for the day, but no, not I.   Since retirement I’ve been able to linger as long as I like most mornings and from my well-situated chair watch the days and the changing seasons pass over my yard.  Nature’s recurrent patterns and rhythms have always comforted me, and it’s delightful to be able to partake of her daily feasts.  Though evidence of God’s grace is readily apparent in the spectacular moments of life, perhaps sweeter are the ones ferreted out of day to day, ordinary living.  These are blessings that are not unlike the contrast of a mass of diamonds scattered out on a dark piece of velvet in which all are lovely but none seems particularly more special than the other and that of a singular diamond’s loveliness on the same piece of fabric which in its aloneness is brilliantly stunning.

For the word of the Lord is right and true; He is faithful in all He does.  ~Psalm 33:4  ✝

269. Will not a tiny speck very close to our vision blot out the glory of the world and leave only a margin by which we see the blot. ~George Eliot

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You shall see them
on a beautiful quarto page,
where a neat rivulet of text shall meander
through a meadow of margin.
~Excerpt from “School for Scandal” by
Richard Brinsley Sheridan

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Margins–our lives are lived within all kinds of marginal edges.  In botany and entomology scientists talk of margins when they cite data about borders around leaves or the borders of insect wings.  The earth itself has what I think of as margins.  For example, phenomena like mountains, rivers, forests, or oceans hold things within or without; walled constructs built by the sea are held by nature and man.  Even our written documents and texts are kept inside a border of blank space called a margin.  In literary works poets and novelists speak of garden walls as the margins around growing spaces.  The margins around my backyard gardening spaces as well as the ones in public gardens I visit are fences.  Interestingly, at one time the margins around my yard were solely the fence lines, but now it is contained within its confines in places by an assortment of trees, some planted by human hands, others that sprang up by their own devices.

In the scriptural passage below God is telling the people of Jerusalem that although they are in a city without walls, He will protect them by being the barrier between them and their enemies.  The Lord does that for His children even when they misuse the reins of free will to wander poorly chosen worldly paths. Fortunately for us we never get so far down those potentially dangerous paths that we are out from under the spread of Yahweh’s mighty wings of grace.  When asked, He will pull us into a walled sanctuary where His forgiveness is an ever-standing offer for contrite hearts.  And as a fellow blogger noted, He walls our hearts with His love.

“And I myself will be a wall of fire around it,” declares the Lord, “and I will be its glory within.  ~Zechariah 2:5  ✝

268. “The true meaning of America, you ask? It’s in a Texas rodeo, in the sound of laughing children, in a …” ~Audie Murphy, one of the most decorated American combat soldiers of World War II, actor, songwriter, and horse breeder

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I wanted to be like my father,
who was a cattle man and rodeo roper.
And that was – he was my hero,
and I wanted to be more like him.
~Dave Brubeck, American jazz pianist and composer

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Shortly after the beginning of the year, a sign starts flashing “this thing is legendary,” and huge trucks loaded with equipment roll onto the grounds of Will Rogers Coliseum.  But before the livestock comes, before the vendors come, before the riders come, before the spectators come, the carnival trucks are unloaded and construction of the Stock Show midway begins. Soon afterwards the Ferris Wheel and other rides rise high above the surrounding fences, the midway opens, and the “oldest continual running livestock show and rodeo” becomes a daily part of everyday life here in Fort Worth once again.  And each year when I see the Ferris Wheel on the stock show grounds, I’m transported back to my childhood in Long Beach, California, and that stretch of beach with the amusement park about a mile down from our house.  Even though I was forbidden to go there alone, the call of the midway fun and the cotton candy was just too strong to resist.  So from time to time between the ages of 10 and 12 I’d steal away to Rainbow Pier with a few dimes in my pocket and secretly partake of the Pike’s allurements.  I must have picked my days well and not tarried any longer than I should because my disobedient treks to the Pike faded into obscurity undetected.

Our move to Texas when I was 13 not only brought an end to my life in southern California but also to my childhood.  Its halcyon days, however, continue to be my “precious, kingly possessions” and a treasure house of cherished memories.  And I hold fast still to the pleasures and memories of that portion of my life which was filled with a constancy of joy that has never since been equalled.  But then perhaps, it is not the constancy of joy that changed, just the earnestness of the seeker to look for it because according to Scripture we have a promise from God that joy comes in the morning, every morning.

He will yet fill your mouth with laughter, and your lips with shouts of joy.  ~Job 8:21  ✝

267. God waits to win back His own flowers as gifts from man’s hands. ~Rabindranath Tagore

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Flowers don’t worry about how they are going to bloom.
They just open up and turn toward the light
and that makes them beautiful.
~Jim Carrey

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Small children pick flowers for their mamas, men bring flowers to women they love, flowers are thrown on a stage after a stellar performance, a bride carries flowers down the aisle at her wedding, returning warriors were once showered with flower petals, a coffin may be surrounded by flowers at a funeral, and on and on go the roles that flowers play in our lives.  We adore them and deem them worthy tokens of admiration, love, respect, and honor.

I’ve tended the soil and planted flowers for my own enjoyment and because I feel close to God in my garden, but until I read what Tagore said, I’d never thought about it as being a way to give gifts to God.  I’ve known that how we live and what we do with our lives is to be an offering to the Lord and done for His glory, and now the thought of presenting Him with my posies as gifts adds an even greater level of joy to my labors in the garden.  Although the time has not yet come for a miraculous flower like the one in the photo to bloom, I offer up this one from last year’s bounty as a thank offering to the Holy One for the coming of another spring and for His continual presence in my life and for all the ways He blesses me.  I chose this Star Magnolia because it lights up whatever darkness surrounds it in the same way the stars light the heavens and Jesus lights the darkness around us.

And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body.  And be thankful.  ~Colossians 3:15  ✝

**Over the past 10 years, a plethora of research has shown that flowers increase the levels of positive energy and moods, reduce the likelihood of stress-related depression, and help people feel secure, relaxed, optimistic, and happy.

266. When hope is hungry, everything feeds it. ~Mignon McLaughlin

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Though you lose all hope,
there is still hope,
and it loves to surprise.
~Robert Brault

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Goodbye January and hello February!  Whew, January is a long month, isn’t it?!  So much so that it makes my hope very hungry indeed.  Dada, dada da da da!  I said hello, February…well hello February…It’s so nice you’ve finally come around again.  You’re lookin’ swell, February…And time will tell February…That spring’s a comin’ February…  Okay, to appreciate my attempt here at “cleverosity” with the previous lines, you have to try to remember a song from a musical by the same name called HELLO DOLLY.  Okay, so maybe it was a lame attempt, but today is just that kind of day, one that puts a song in my heart.  Why?  Why you ask?  Well…

About the time the barrenness of winter starts putting asunder all hope of anything different, February saves the day by bringing forth visible signs of the new spring.  And so it did this year on its very first day.  After I’d watered and waited and watched the bulbs I’d started weeks ago in the greenhouse, I was rewarded today with several emerging buds.  The result: squeals of joy peeled forth inside its walls along with hallelujahs and praise for such glorious surprises amid winter’s gloomy, brown and beige drabness.  But they’re just flowers some might say, but pshaw!  They are pieces in the puzzle of Creation itself, blessed and holy and full of purpose.  They’ve been touched by the very hand of God and then ordained as part of the faithful and reoccurring provision not only for man’s needs but for his pleasure as well.  And if flowers are inconsequential why are so many poems and pieces of literature devoted to them, and why are they considered by many as desirable gifts, and why are their scents revered for use in perfumes, and why have they been worth at times more than gold?

“Come, therefore, let us enjoy the good things that exist, and make use of the creation to the full as in youth.  Let us take our fill of costly wine and perfumes, and let no flower of spring pass us by.  Let us crown ourselves with rosebuds before they wither…”  ~Wisdom 2:6-8  ✝

265. Of the six million species on the planet, only man makes language. Words. What’s more — in evidence of the Divine — we string symbols together and then write them down, where they take on a life of their own and breathe outside of us. ~Charles Martin

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I write because there is nothing larger in life than
To be read, maybe even reread by another–
To be examined and then verified of being
Understood, or trusted like a saint–
I don’t imagine being immortalized
Or stacked in a library for hands with a million
Oppositions to wander through for
Poetic justice either–

Perhaps purpose is purchased or earned or even
Inherited by some mystic right–
But it is my reasoning I hearken to,
All that I am resonates with inscribing, putting down
My Self on the papyrus of today,
Like a manuscript never quite decrypt but
Interesting to the soul’s eye
For perpetual encounter.
~Deborah Jeanne Avila

All the kings of the earth shall praise you, O Lord for they have heard the words of your mouth.  Psalm 138:4  ✝

264. Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. ~Erich Fromm

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Sometimes we write love in small letters-
Spreading the butter on his toast or
Wiping down the kitchen counter dabbed with
Peanut butter and jelly…

Love is often dangling on a clothesline
And snatching a peek at a sleeping face;
It is the giving up and giving in
To another’s want with joy…

Blowing, kissing and holding tight is
Love’s voice upon a sore finger, a wrinkled
Cheek, a weary shoulder than saunters at
Days end hopelessly…

Minutes are just as vital in love’s scaling
Upward climb to perfection, the afternoons
Picking strawberries and the morning
Prayer that’s an alloy…

Write love, in capital or small, it doesn’t matter–
Pen it with every touch; add it to tuna casseroles
And let it water down every heartache at
Your midnight soliloquies

But compose it…
Jot it down
and engrave it without restraint!
Dirty your hands in it
and clean a soul with
It…
Like the only work you’ve employed.
~Deborah Jeanne Avila

If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love,  I am a noisy gong or clanging symbol.   And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing…  ~1 Corinthians 13  ✝

263. Don’t grieve for me now. I am free. ~Author Unknown

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This post is in loving memory of Debbie Jeanne Avila , a friend and fellow blogger.  Tonight I’ve chosen bits and pieces of some of Debbie’s poetry to honor her, and because she loved my photos of flowers, I’m including one with each excerpt.  Sweet Debbie you will not be forgotten, and I am comforted that for you to be absent here, means that you are now and forever in the presence of Jesus.  Till we meet again.  Love, Natalie

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I had forgotten what LIFE was all about,
Those dark chocolate nights dipped in indubitable doubts,
Wonderful wonderings if this was all there is,
And if it was, then, we had bitten envied bliss.

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as sad as a morning glory that has never met
her glory I am damp with seeds that have never met
the portent wise sunlight–
damp with grinding dreams at my hoof and
damper after they sodden cold with dawn’s
twilight–
nothing reverts or inverts, if all formulates into
winter’s beginning and continuance

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Help me with my un-perceived progress
I stand still, everything around me sweeping
Like a Kansas tornado.
So many
voices within, held down and pressed,
It scares me to hear such a composing
Of songs I alone know

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September vivifies the introspections of soul like
The glaciating mountains in silence-
Ruminating, finding their niches so to sleep and then
Shake at springs kissing–
It embers gently, suspiciously as if someone would
Snuff it out too soon–

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Miscreant as it may some times be with the unexpected
Heat and elongated sun-kissed troubling–
Days are slightly shorter for most living breathing ways,
As I turn down the lights,
Pick up Keats and Dickinson, Rumi and rosehips
For morning simmering decadence. (http://girlwiththepen1118.wordpress.com)

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“Where, O death, is your victory?  Where, O death, is your sting?”  ~1 Corinthians 15:55  ✝

262. If God had wanted to be a big secret, He would not have created babbling brooks and whispering pines. ~Robert Brault

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You, O God, are the beginning of all that is.
From your life the fire of the rising sun streams forth.
You are the life-flow of creation’s rivers,
the sap of blood in our veins, earth’s fecundity,
the fruiting of trees, creatures’ birthing,
the conception of new thought, desire’s origin.
~J. Philip Newell

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Creation has been described as “the grand volume of God’s utterance,” and isn’t it grand to know that we are a part of that utterance.  When we seek God then we should not look “away from ourselves and away from creation, but deep within all that has life” including ourselves.  We can and should search for Him in Scripture, but God is found in more than religious moments and environments.  Simply put, He speaks to us through two books: Creation and the Bible.  Because He exists in all contexts, His light is woven throughout the whole of Creation’s fabric.  Whether recognized and acknowledged or not, nothing has life apart from God, and if we want to look for Him, we need to start in places where He yet dwells.  I start in my garden because, like all gardens, it is a microcosm of the grander macrocosm of Creation itself, and even in a small piece of Eden is the whole of the mystery of God.  In it I see the same ebbing and flowing and rhythms that I see in my life and Creation at large, and I know that I’m as connected to its Source as the infant in a mother’s womb is connected to its life-giving source.  One of my friends told me once that when she was in college she would sometimes go lie down in a wheat field and look up at the sky because she knew to go out into Creation was to find Yahweh.  She had learned as have I that wherever and whenever we look and listen, we shall find Him, and I pray this is a week where your encounters with the Holy One are many.

I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and your glory.  ~Psalm 63:2    ✝

**In the photograph is some French Lavender that I found blooming in my greenhouse today.  Even it speaks of the blue of our planet and the heavens.

261. Miracles are a retelling in small letters of the very same story which is written across the whole world in letters too large for some of us to see. ~C. S. Lewis

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Every gardener knows
that under the cloak of winter
lies a miracle–a seed waiting to sprout,
a bulb opening to the light,
a bud straining to unfurl.
And the anticipation nurtures our dream.
~Barbara Winkler

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Miracles!  Where would any of us be without the existence of miracles?  Bad things happen on planet earth, but miraculous things occur on a daily basis too.  And many times out of the dust and devastation of catastrophic disasters arise changes for the betterment of life and living conditions as well as the inevitable uplifting examples of an amazing goodness that exist in the human soul.  I garden not just because of a love for flowers but more importantly because I find day to day evidence of the mystery and miracles of God and His goodness in the garden’s confines.  Spending even the smallest amount of time in my garden brings repeated awarenesses of the Lord’s abiding presence, and that keeps me focused on Him and not on my own smallness or limitations.  In spite of Creation’s brokenness and my own heart’s sufferings, I am guided to wellsprings of life and hope amid earth’s unmistakable hallowed workings.  Both contentment and enlightenment can be found in the orbs of the heavens, in the green of the earth, in the flowing of its waters, in the warmth of the sun, and in the wind, that like Yahweh, can be felt but not seen.  That in turn teaches me how to respond to life and its sometimes terrifying circumstances with a spirit of peace and love instead of anger, confusion, and frustration.  Understanding is not promised unto us, but peace that transcends understanding is granted to those who seek the Prince of Peace and search for the true heart of life.

The Mighty One, God, the LORD, speaks and summons the earth from the rising of the sun to the place where it sets.  ~Psalm 50:1   ✝