Writing this at stupid o'clock, because I've just come down from a local hilltop where I had the privilege of sharing in the scattering of ashes of a member of my congregation. Her husband is a Kiwi, and it is, he tells me, a Maori tradition to do such things at dawn... I've been to the top of this particular hill for dawn services before... but those have been at Easter, at a time of year when the sun has the decency to lie in for a bit... This morning we had to be there for shortly after 4am. I needn't have bothered going to bed!
Anyway, my body clock was clearly worried about missing my early start and I was up even earlier than I needed to be... And as I thought about what was to come, both this service and a later more conventional interment of ashes, I made a start on this short poem/reflection, which I finished on my return a few minutes ago...
So this is for Carole, Paul and family...
Dust on the breeze
Is that what life comes to?
A hilltop offers fresh perspectives,
New insights on how things are
Down below.
But is that the revelation
in the cold light of dawn
and the chilling wind
of this transfiguration?
Are we a random assortment of elements
Briefly bound together
In an animated form?
From dust you came
And to dust you shall return -
Nothing more.
But what of the years in between?
The love, the laughter,
The anger, the tears,
Hopes and dreams and memories
And faith.
Are they little more than
Dust on the breeze
Motes momentarily catching the light
On the updraft?
But the light is the light of the rising sun.
First light speaks of new life
In the risen Son
A dawning day and a coming kingdom
A sure and certain
Hope
Anyway, my body clock was clearly worried about missing my early start and I was up even earlier than I needed to be... And as I thought about what was to come, both this service and a later more conventional interment of ashes, I made a start on this short poem/reflection, which I finished on my return a few minutes ago...
So this is for Carole, Paul and family...
Dust on the breeze
Is that what life comes to?
A hilltop offers fresh perspectives,
New insights on how things are
Down below.
But is that the revelation
in the cold light of dawn
and the chilling wind
of this transfiguration?
Are we a random assortment of elements
Briefly bound together
In an animated form?
From dust you came
And to dust you shall return -
Nothing more.
But what of the years in between?
The love, the laughter,
The anger, the tears,
Hopes and dreams and memories
And faith.
Are they little more than
Dust on the breeze
Motes momentarily catching the light
On the updraft?
But the light is the light of the rising sun.
First light speaks of new life
In the risen Son
A dawning day and a coming kingdom
A sure and certain
Hope
Selah
Comments
I wish you a great many more early/creative mornings :-).