Gathering In to the Hearthfire

The Sacred Nature of Home
A Meditation in Three Parts

I.

The center of the home is warm, alive --
The flame is there, the hearth is there.
The primal nourishment of body and of soul takes place
In this sacred heart of our humanity.

Gathering in the cold and in the darkness of the year,
We celebrate the warmth, the comfort and familiarity of home,
Of origins, traditions, symbols of the season
Handed down the years.
We come to the feast of thanksgiving
For what we have in hand,
Accomplished,
Harvested and stored against the future need.

Yet for a moment we will set aside the thought of future --
Dearth may come, or it may not;
Now is the moment to give thanks
And feel the warmth within us.

We gather to the flame,
As we have done since our first hairy ancestors
Discarded fear in finding the devouring beast of fire
Might be controlled.
We tamed ourselves
To earn the warmth of ancient hearth,
To learn the magic of the culinary arts,
To bask and let the elders at their wintry eventide
Remember and teach. In the warm circle of light
We civilized.


II.

At the great cauldron of the ancient Mother God
All are fed.

The stones of the hearth retain the warmth
Of creative conflagration.
The season’s sacrifice is made.
Our feasting done, we nestle in the glow of dying embers,
And find again our strength in our communion,
In our shared nature. We reaffirm our family ties,
And repeat to one another the tales that make us
Who we think we are,
Stories of beginning, and of wisdom learned through vast
Experience of time. And all is relative to us,
The Family of Man.

From the great womb of the Divine Mother
All is born.

In the embrace of darkness, glowing
We are at one within the Now, unfolding universe
Within itself
In reflection of all possibility.
This is the body of God
Remembered.
Whole, full of all potential, in every moment.
This is the great sire of our tribe of starborn beings
Blooming to awareness in the microscopic shells of flesh,
As in the macrocosmic pulsing of living spirit
That ensouls the galaxies.
The Divine Father cries a single tear in which swim all the worlds
And all the words
And all the wills
That are or are to be, or ever were,
And in whose being we are born.
Thus are we gathered in, a family of one made all, made one,
Made each and every one, and all is relative to us,
The Family of God.


III.

Look back -- Home is the place where we are born and nurtured,
Take our first steps, or skin our knees
In clambering up a favorite tree. Home is our house, our street,
Our neighborhood, our school, our town, our state,
Our country … planet … solar system … galaxy …
Home is our source, our origin.

Yet home is more than the parental womb,
Than any construct made of rooms and walls,
Or clod of stone and metal, or of dancing gas and flame
With myriad attendant whirling satellites,
They with their own attendant spheres --
Yet it is all of these.
Home is the heart of Being.

Look here -- Home is the place where we may rest and feed,
And find our family, our loved ones near.
The feast is moveable; the nomad’s tent is home, wherever it is set.
There is the meal prepared, there is the gathering
About the fire, there thoughts are shared and new ideas
Digested; there, the cradle rocks,
Wide eyes reflect, and dreams are born.

Still -- here’s the paradox:
We learn, when from our flights we are returned,
That home is only truly known by leaving it.
What seemed at first a cozy darkness with a glow
May grow to be a great hall lit with stars,
Or more -- a universe of lights. We only clearly see
as our perspective moves away.

The Nadir of Light

As we move toward the depth of winter, the light fades,
Weakens, moves sideways.
Rising late, thin, attenuated like a ghost,
A wraith that moves silently in mists and cloudy twilight,
The light shivers in the clear chill of icicle mornings,
And wraps itself in fleecy pastel afternoons darkening
To evening.
Darkness falls, a black drapery muffling the change of scene,
And light appears again.
Within the wilderness, a fire burns, a meal is prepared.
A window glows golden and welcoming to the traveler in the night.
Above the dark earth, the jewels of the sky gleam as diamond-bright
Sequins cast upon a velvet ground.

Death stops by for chats these days;
A familiar presence come to spend a bit of time with me
While I muse and sip my tea. We are old friends by now.
Death never says much; doesn’t have to --
The wheeze in my chest says it all,
Says I am vulnerable, says I am old,
Says my friend and I are growing closer by the day.
And the days are short, and cold in winter,
And sleep seems sweet and warm, deep, enfolding
Like soft arms, or great, dark wings ….

Death is a flirt, catching my eye suggestively
Only to look away again.
It is a game we play; we both know
Which of us succumbs.
This is an ancient wooing dance we do,
A courtship ritual played out at last
In a life lived long enough to understand the partner
And the steps.

The year glides into its turn. One hemisphere enjoying
Sun and summer warmth, the other bearing a cold face,
In winter‘s grip,
The earth orb pirouettes through space
In company with the corps, the coterie of the nearest star.
And each star in its own great cycle spins,
And moves in its great pilgrimage to ending and beginning
Never-ending. The aeons in a choreography process.
The long nights draw cold, sharp as a knife, across the lives
Of the sacrificed. All that has passed is holy, and all that is to come,
And this moment, most of all;
Now is holy. The turning point
Hidden in the moment - in every moment - the potential
Is here, present, perfect
In process.

The dark stain of blood upon the snow
Marks where a creature passed into the maw of history,
And another found sustenance.
Life feeds upon itself, in constant revolution of
Darkness and light.
The scythe has passed, the husks lie empty on the cold ground;
Freed of the flesh, the warm blood no longer coursing
With the pulsing of the chambered heart,
The essence flees from light to dark;
Womb-dark, earth-dark with the richness of loam
And decay
And there, the germ of life takes fire from heaven
Within; Growth begins.

At the turn of the year, as winter claims the sacrifice
The antipodal summer reaches apex, and the light
Begins its redirection.
The apex of humanity, the conscious eye, surveys itself,
What dies and what remains and grows, and feeds upon
That which has gone before, and changes,
Unfolding possibilities.

Another year, and old bones growing colder,
Brittle, like the dry sticks feeding the fire.
Ah -- grind the cinnamon into the mug, just so --
And breathe the scent of sacrifice;
The tree’s life gives spice to warm the blood.
Soon enough my essence will be freed to dance
In the space between the stars, where neither cold nor heat
Are sensed, and all is the light-filled darkness.
But for this day, in time, as the year moves to its turning,
I hold the warm liquid still in its cup, and inspiration
Brings me content,
Absorbing substance of a subtle sort.
Here, at the portal is a glimpse of immortality:
Life and Death as one moving essentiality, the spirit
Traveling, timeless and eternal, in infinity.

Easter Morn - A Romance

Art by Herb Leonhard http://www.herbleonhard.com

Darkness fades,
Lightening into morning through all the shades of gray.
And then comes pearly, silvery dawn before the dawn --
Clouds swirling in nacreous patterns,
Almost iridescent with the coming light.
Day break looms, the sky expectant, swells
With tints of mauve and blue and pink and gold,
Oestre breasts then the far horizon, bursts and blooms
With color.

There was little sleep the night before;
There were tears, and a sad shouldering of duty.
Before first light she went to the tomb;
It was empty.

I AM the Light that leaps up with the dawning,
Rising in the sun
Undying.
I Am the Love that holds all possibility within me,
Renewing life, enkindling spirit.

Dark confusion, and fear, and questioning, and mourning
War with hope and trust, and love that is undying.
She seeks, and finds,
And in the dawning witnesses the Living One, arisen,
And knows him not
Until He calls her by Her name.

Lover and Beloved meet on Easter Morn.