Ruah Bull - Spiritual Director

 "Hope" is the thing with feathers -  That perches in the soul - And sings a tune without the words - And never stops- at all - And sweetest - in the Gale is heard - And sore must be the storm- That could abash the little Bird That kept so many warm - I've heard it in the chillest land - And on the strangest Sea - Yet - never - in Extremity, It asked a crumb - of me.

Not a single soul lacks a pathway to you. There's no stone, no flower- not a single piece of straw- lacking your existence. In every particle of the world, the moon of your love causes the heart  of each atom to glow.

  Sometimes, when it all is, finally,  too much, I climb into my car, roll the windows up, and somewhere between backing out of the driveway and rounding the first corner, I let out a yell that would topple Manhattan. How do you pray?

Sometimes from sorrow, for no reason, you sing. For no reason, you accept the way of being lost, cutting loose from all else and electing a world where you go where you want to. Arbitrary, a sound comes, a reminder that a steady center is holding all else. If you listen, that sound will tell you where it is and you can slide your way past trouble. Certain twisted monsters always bar the path - but that's when you get going best, glad to be lost, learning how real it is here on earth, again and again.  

 I am returning to kindness a place where I am strong in my softness I will start by kissing all of my scars and washing them in rain collecting dust from long journeys off my feet. The way they carry weariness from crossing rivers that should have had bridges. I will return to build crossing\paths over waters that remind me to be kind.

Days pass when I forget the mystery. Problems insoluble and problems offering their own ignored solutions jostle for my attention, they crowd its antechamber along with a host of diversions, my courtiers, wearing their colored clothes: caps and bells. And then once more the quiet mystery is present to me, the throng's clamor recedes: the mystery that there is anything, anything at all, let alone cosmos, joy, memory, everything, rather than void: and that, O Lord, Creator, Hallowed One, You still, hour by hour sustain it.

"Hope" is the thing with feathers- That perches in the soul- And sings the tune without the words- And never stops- -at all- And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard- And sore must be the storm- That could abash the little Bird That kept so many warm- I've heard it in the chillest land- And on the strangest Sea- Yet - never - in Extremity, It asked a crumb - of me.

In the dark pre-dawn mornings, I listen to the trees. Sometimes I hear nothing. Sometimes words sail into my head, like the goldfinches landing on my birdfeeder. Today they told me: Ground! Ground deeply. You will know people who get ill. You may know some who will die. You could even be one of them. Your task today is to ground and be a solid presence on this patch of earth. Watch us and follow suit.

One day people will touch and talk perhaps easily, And loving be natural as breathing and warm as sunlight, And people will untie themselves, as string is unknotted, Unfold and yawn and stretch and spread their fingers, And work will be simple and swift as a seagull flying, And play will be casual and quiet as a seagull settling, And the clocks will stop, and no one will wonder or care or take notice, And people will smile without reason, even in winter, even in the rain.