Blown In On The Wind

"Twilight drops her curtain down,

and pins it with a star."

L. M. Montgomery

As the sun sets in the distant hills it turns my world gold, touching everywhere, even the air is filled with color ~ a live and changing, fleeting beauty. I long for words to paint the wonder around me, yet like so much of God's good earth, living and loving are the only way to capture it.
In all this beauty it is time for one of my last tasks of the day, to take in my laundry~ now crisp
and clean and smelling of the Sunshine that has blown in on the wind.

 



A hush has fallen over the neighborhood, calm and quiet. The birds sing their lullabies, I listen and pick out each song. The chickadees, the robins, and the catbird. The dove sings his soft, sad song and the goldfinch who sings on the wing. The cardinal sits in high in the Mountain Ash tree, in royal red, he sings his heart out. I await hoping that the wood-thrush will grace my yard this evening and venture forth from his home in the deep wood. And so he does.

"And where the shadows deepest fell,

The wood-thrush rang his silver bell."

~Longfellow

Or even better yet spoke John Townsend Trowbridge when he wrote ~

"Like liquid pearls fresh showered from Heaven,

The high notes of the lone Wood-thrush

Fall on the forest's holy bush."

Slowly as the light fades around me my world of color is now shades of gray and white and in the deepest shadows black prevails. The sky its self darkens until the first star appears, a small diamond shining for me. As I relish this time of quiet I remember days long past. When we belonged to Summer and it to us. Open, breezy, dew touched grass, the creak of a swing and a best friend's laugh. In barefeet and blue jeans, You and I, Old Friend of Mine, side by side on an old wood swing in your backyard. Fireflies and shooting stars, but we preferred the thoughts that rambled through our minds, we wove them into dreams and fancies that had blown in on the wind. Promises we made, You and I, to never stray from this where our loyalties lay. But life went on and we went searching, reckless, sad and foolish down different roads that are now far and away. And at the crossroad of our parting we left keys, for your heart and mine.
You and I ~ Blown away in the wind.

And so as the Heavens now fill fast with the distant stars, I am back standing on solid ground in the Cathedral of God's good earth. Born again and growing older surrounded by love and redemption, getting high on Sunshine and Beauty. A wooden laundry basket on my hip filled with crisp, clean Sunshine. The wood-thrush's last hymn is now sung, the notes blown away in the wind. I make a wish for Old Time's Sake, sweeter and softer now, then ever it was back then.

"Oh, LORD, let the day following

be just as beautiful as the one now done."

And wherever you are tonight, Old Friend of Mine, I pray the same for you.