Buzzard
I was out on my porch trying to meditate. There was a stiff breeze and scudding clouds. A day which seemed to love all within its embrace. I didn’t close my eyes. There were things going on that seemed in harmony with my meditation audio and my mood. Birds circled and called, their music blowing out of the trees and into the freedom of the wind. A squirrel froze on the side of a tree, seemingly under the influence of the meditation sound from my porch. I was caught by the sight of a Buzzard sailing on the breeze high above. Amazing how graceful he was then. On the ground this ungainly, ugly scavenger picking at the remains of road kill, is not at all what we think of as graceful nor beautiful – yet here he was, music in the air, beautiful to behold. Others of his kind came and went - one came near, tilting and threading himself through a narrow slot between tree limbs and out into the open over the marsh, letting the wind lift him ever upward. They never fight the current, of course. Their instincts tell them what is called for. They use it to their advantage. I was admiring the bird and his flight, but then realized that was only a part of it. He was not performing alone. It was a duet. The unseen was a major part of this music in the sky. The wind, you say?
Well yes, the wind was his partner, the dominant leader of the dance. But there is more still. What contains the wind? What is all that within which we all perform our dance? What is that? We don’t see it, but it is most certainly there. Space? Is there such a thing? Time- with which we embroider our tapestry; our story, does it really exist? Are we really alone, divided up into bits of matter floating in space? If matter, as science tells us, is not really “solid” are we simply a facet of a whole, which is also us? What is that which surrounds us, then? Is it us without form? And if our eyes could not separate what we see into separate bits, could we possibly understand it?
Hoo boy!
So, contemplation does not always facilitate meditation, but can be its offspring. The artist in me prefers to think on the paradox of the homely buzzard as a beautiful thing when in the sky, allowing himself to be carried along, in his wisdom knowing when to use his own strength and skill and when to use that which is gracefully given to him on a beautiful windy day. All he has to do is be what he is and allow the unseen to do what it will – just trusting, accepting.
I was out on my porch trying to meditate. There was a stiff breeze and scudding clouds. A day which seemed to love all within its embrace. I didn’t close my eyes. There were things going on that seemed in harmony with my meditation audio and my mood. Birds circled and called, their music blowing out of the trees and into the freedom of the wind. A squirrel froze on the side of a tree, seemingly under the influence of the meditation sound from my porch. I was caught by the sight of a Buzzard sailing on the breeze high above. Amazing how graceful he was then. On the ground this ungainly, ugly scavenger picking at the remains of road kill, is not at all what we think of as graceful nor beautiful – yet here he was, music in the air, beautiful to behold. Others of his kind came and went - one came near, tilting and threading himself through a narrow slot between tree limbs and out into the open over the marsh, letting the wind lift him ever upward. They never fight the current, of course. Their instincts tell them what is called for. They use it to their advantage. I was admiring the bird and his flight, but then realized that was only a part of it. He was not performing alone. It was a duet. The unseen was a major part of this music in the sky. The wind, you say?
Well yes, the wind was his partner, the dominant leader of the dance. But there is more still. What contains the wind? What is all that within which we all perform our dance? What is that? We don’t see it, but it is most certainly there. Space? Is there such a thing? Time- with which we embroider our tapestry; our story, does it really exist? Are we really alone, divided up into bits of matter floating in space? If matter, as science tells us, is not really “solid” are we simply a facet of a whole, which is also us? What is that which surrounds us, then? Is it us without form? And if our eyes could not separate what we see into separate bits, could we possibly understand it?
Hoo boy!
So, contemplation does not always facilitate meditation, but can be its offspring. The artist in me prefers to think on the paradox of the homely buzzard as a beautiful thing when in the sky, allowing himself to be carried along, in his wisdom knowing when to use his own strength and skill and when to use that which is gracefully given to him on a beautiful windy day. All he has to do is be what he is and allow the unseen to do what it will – just trusting, accepting.
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