poetry

Old and Useless

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

Not very long ago I was meeting some new people and was introduced to their family. I looked upon one of their children and he said to me “ You’re Old” I agreed and was nonplussed at the child’s observations and his immediate truth telling. Yes, I agreed, I am at least 8 times older than you. I felt a little sting. Aren’t we supposed to say afterwards: Wow you look great! I never would have guessed that you are that old.

I’ve said to several people and meant it too. I’m doing pretty good as my scribe puts it. Very active physically but there are deterioration’s that come with age. The saying is with age comes wisdom! Sometimes.

I can get a bit cranky without any knowledge of the segue to judgment. Usually these days when I am driving and get passed by a roaring vehicle on the double yellow only to have to slow down a half mile ahead as they turn left. Thinking quickly that I am commanded not to call anyone a fool, I use a Russian word and of course, the Lord does not speak Russian.

I indeed am old and gnarly but I have a nice smile. Shoppers at the big box smile back when they see me. Why am I not as blocked or mission focused as others are? They roar by me too, only to turn one aisle ahead and stop with another cart parked in front of them. I just shake my head briefly and cruise by as I look upon the crowded aisle of indigestible instant meals in boxes. I like Ramen but it’s not in that aisle. Betty Crocker meets the Roadrunner on aisle 5.

A piece of wisdom comes to mind from a Chinese story from approximately 2400 years ago. Looking upon a very old and twisted tree and relaxing in its shade were a young man and an older one. The older man said the reason the tree was there for them was it was useless for lumber and so left to grow old and large and give us comfort from the sun. Useful indeed.

The stumps around it testified to many chairs and tables There were no benches there. It indeed had grown well and it was very old. I like that story as gnarly as I am, I indeed am not useless either. You are now reading the wisdom I have read from before Christ our Savior. He does not consider me useless and neither does he consider you useless either. The vehicles that pass me on the highway are just eager people on the highway of Holiness. Perhaps they are eager to meet our Creator and lover. I must embrace that wisdom and I will smile and bless them. I’m getting better! It’s pretty good. Jack Gator Scribe.

Many thanks to Chuang Tzu amd Henri Nouwen.

The Aeolian Harp

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

Wind chimes, the delight of the flutter of blown leaves or the sway of a tall tree from a breeze that can be heard. These simple things generate a delight that can be explained that have never been explored in the emotion we feel.

The sudden pleasure and smile within our spirit is not even noticed in some ways. It’s just there. We are mostly unaware of the two forces within and without of us. There is a sudden flash of lighting and the instant thunder that shakes the house as the imprint on our retina starts to fade from the sun hot blaze strike.

We can then tremble at the power and fear felt or immediately be amazed in delight at the impossible power in a cloud of water. A thought that brings us to our spirit connection and the calm presence of our familiar lover of our soul.

The wind chimes again come to mind. That storm with the wind and thunder may have played a fast tune on them before they became tangled and perhaps so tangled that they could Knot easily be put right. [pun] Are we then to look about the strings and tubes and give up and toss the whole assembly? Or, take hold of the calm and rightness of beauty in the storm and take it apart lovingly, and bring the chimes back to life.

I have begun to see the connection between emotional storms and the music of the Aeolian harp that responds to the storm and gives us the steady center of our being. Full of sound and fury is the world and ourselves if we don’t listen for the calm and clearing skies within us.

“What if all animated nature be but animated harps diversely framed that tremble into thought, as o’er them sweeps plastic and vast, one intellectual breeze,

At once the soul of each, and God of all?” A.

We must be sensitive to nature’s voice if we are to be truly human. This is the whisper of God’s voice to us. I was at a prayer meeting where we were told to find a place where we could, in isolation, pray. I chose to go outside and sit on a porch. I began to hear wind and watched a very tall tree swaying it’s top. Prayer seemed unnecessary. As I heard the breath of God tell me, once again the old saying of no one really knows where the wind comes from and wither it goes. He was telling me that His breath indeed is the breath inside my lungs I can now use this inward gift to praise Him and live in His presence. An Aeolian harp sings and it’s pretty good. Jack Gator

1. Colerigdge Many thanks to the writing of Carl R. Trueman

The Agate Hunt

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

Often referred to as ‘rock hounds’ they are at home on the shore of the biggest fresh water lake on the planet. Superior. Walking among the big and medium rocks and peering down to see what treasures the fresh wash reveals. The pros have a flashlight to shine through the crystalline formations and see what is in there.

Julie and I visit the ‘North Shore’ once or twice a year and wander several beaches that are known to have agates hidden among the clutter and clatter of stones. The waves wash up and that’s a good place to look too.

Very old stories of rocks and water wash through our minds. How long has that incredible Agate been polished and tumbled about? Where did it originate from? Grasped with thumb and forefinger and turned around a bit in the light. Plunk. Into the handy bucket you are carrying or, if it is reasonably flat, and not an agate, it is skipped out across the water. Skip, skip. Skip, Skip plunk. “nice one, four! A little curl on the forefinger, spin and whip flat to the surface.

Tedious work and it can lead to forward bending that lasts a bit longer than the expedition. Bring the treasures home and then put them in a larger container. Everyone around here has one. Some polish them in tumblers and even cut them and make them into jewelry. Usually though, they wind up in a glass canning jar and the lid gets a bit dusty. Treasure, it’s like that. Acquisition is the thrill and the exchange of worth is one man’s treasure is another man’s..rocks.

This is why when I haul the garbage container up the driveway (empty) I look down at the gravel and every now and then, stop and pick up a likely candidate of Stone treasure. Nope. Maybe! Nope. It was raining today so I didn’t have to spit on one to see if it was what I hoped it was.

That’s’ my life. Treasure hunting. Books are the best place for me to hunt. Suddenly words catch my minds eye and I look a bit closer and see treasure. Stop and look. Can I see or hear without getting in the way? Centuries of beauty in plain sight and there is no purchase involved. Just look and gaze into eternity flowing into you. Don t’ forget to breathe. Tears are OK. They wash our stony hearts and the glow is seen that was always there. Once again Adonis is mine, and I am His. It’s pretty good. Jack Gator

The life of a Lover of Jesus

/ Norman Eric Peterson / 1 Comment

How can this be? A quilt of life that is surprisingly delightful and just as easily not comprehended. Everyone has this road of travel and when trying to explain our lives. For me, it seems like I am bragging about adventure and failure, fear and success and a thorough drifting about life as a blown about maple leaf in the street. Just there by some random wind. Wrinkled by the forces that put me there, run over a few times and still seen as it once was. Life that hangs onto creation, fluttering in the blown wind of God’s breath and now, seemingly bound for …somewhere.

To that leaf, it seems an exciting life, watching growth and seeing other maples growing nearby. Weathering snapping lightning and severe winds. Basking in life giving light and warmth and envying the oak leaves that are better at hanging on through the winters.

Being reborn every year and feeling the contribution of energy given in enough amount to give again the impossible sap that nourishes the created tree and the people that know the sap is also to nourish them with sweetness that always delights.

What is my purpose in life? To grow and feel my life unfold with reward and danger. Then be gifted and surprised by hearing it’s OK to be what I am and to move with the wind of the presence of God’s breath and guidance. It wasn’t always obvious I was being prepared to a purpose of serving when it seemed that survival and pleasure was my given life. Subjective or Objective reality. The Tau and the famous Greek philosophy or our own versions of truth which are subject to us and our emotions. Instead of listening to the perfect truth of Christ. ‘The abolition of Man’ by C.S. Lewis explains these things better than I can.

The trauma of violence of childhood, and then wandering throughout the land and being blown about by seemingly random events that formed me. Having my own secretary at 16 years old in a mansion in Minneapolis, working with the Boy Scouts communicating via Ham Radio to a far flung camp without a telephone. Then failing my calculus in engineering at MIT, joining the military and being caught up in a war at sea. More wandering and evading death in California many times, once with the audible voice of God I did not know, eventually I started an impossible auto repair business in rural Wisconsin. It was Successful and then I was blessed with marriage and two children and a beautiful and faithful wife. Hearing again those words that can’t be believed by many people. Gifts of God.

I saw my best friend, speak five words to me and enter heaven from 2000 miles away. Many things that eventually lead to leading worship in a tiny rural church that gave me and my wife documents saying we were now pastors. We put them in a drawer. My whole family built a house of prayer in a small empty main street shop if Frederic, Wisconsin and staffed it for almost 4 years. Singing and playing and praying. We were overcome with God’s beauty and love. We also traveled a little around the country worshiping with other lovers of Jesus. Our sons with us in DC and other places.

Now the maple leaf is indeed withered and quieter, still blessed with sustenance and beauty. And now joined with other people that have similar blessings and and need for sustenance and encouragement.

I tap into that flow of life once again that I am given by my creator, that gift of light and love that was always there. I am beginning to watch and stop and listen for the voice that is the best book and the words given to me. What’s next for the weathered one? Excited and puzzled and weary at times, I keep looking ahead to another chapter and move with that breath of life. Often I still look up at that tree of life and know the very atoms I am made from still spin within me. It’s pretty good. Norm Peterson and written by Jack Gator