The
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LONG
KNOWLEDGE
By
Robert Brady, (KJ 65, 2007)
Heading down the winding road this morning under lowering mountain clouds
as the sun was just dawning above the lake, its long rays edging sideways
into the dark wedge of space beneath the thick clouds, I was perfectly
placed to receive the gift of fresh light livening all the dew the night
had draped on the mountainside, to behold in slopes of diamonds how
each blade of grass, each seed, each leaf, gathered and held its share.
On a certain type of grass about a foot high, fine hairs held the dew
in drops so small as to make them all seem a cottony vapor; patches
of that grass stood out like glowing clouds of mist hovering in place
just inches above the ground. Each type of grass I saw, each plant,
coddled the dew in its own way: the clusters of spider lilies scattered
along the roadside cupped the silver beads in the narrow curls of their
glowing red blossoms, stringing others in evenly spaced crystal orbs
along curving scarlet tendrils tipped with gold...
Though each of these individual plants was now existing for its first
and only time, there in plain sight was the long knowledge that each
of their line has gathered of early autumn in these parts, what is to
be expected in this anciently recurring brief turn of weather, what
to do with the happening, where and how-- to ensure that each drop of
dew is separately held so it doesn't run lost to the ground but remains
possessed, nestled, cradled, held close to vitalize seeds or evenly
strung out like beads to wait their turn at nourishment, each of that
whole mountainside of dewdrops holding in itself the sun, shimmering
in that moment of down-mountain breeze from out of the darkness...
May we hold as closely the sunlit dews of our own lives...
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