Gates We Might Enter, Singing

 

   In a poem titled, "Things," Jane Kenyon celebrates the gifts of each moment:  "Never in eternity the same sound" of this specific pebble falling on that particular leaf.  Kenyon notes that even
            The juncture of twig and branch,
            scarred with lichen, is a gate
            we might enter, singing.
   Where do you find the gates you might enter, singing? 
   On our trip to Maine this fall, Jan and I saw spectacular sights: fall leaves painting entire hillsides; sunrise over Penobscot Bay.  What I recall today, however, is not some grand vista marked on all the maps, but a simple path through unremarkable woods.
The path began behind a Bed and Breakfast where we stayed.  Even our host did not know where it leads.  She had not followed it more than a few hundred yards.  Nor did I.  But in that short distance the path led me into stillness, under deep shadows, alongside an old stone wall.  Hemmed in by woods, undistracted by grand views, I noticed details.  The dappled light of morning.  Fallen leaves, damp and pungent, still rustling with each step.

 

 

  

 

  I took this photo along the way.  The first time Jan saw it, she asked if I arranged it.  No, I just saw it, because I took the time look.  I paused, and paid attention to red leaf on white bark.  A gate opened; I entered, heart singing.
   As we in the United States approach our Thanksgiving holiday, where do you find a gate you might enter, singing?  For some, it may be a huge event: the birth of a child, or new love, or the lab report that says "remission."  For most of us, though, we will find those gates by paying attention to the details of everyday life. 
   In her memoir, Lit, Mary Karr recounts how the practice of gratitude was crucial in both her recovery from alcoholism and her awakening to faith.  An AA sponsor challenged her, "Just find ten things you're grateful for."  She accepted the challenge, day by day, and slowly her life was changed.
   Take a look around.  Pay attention.  Give thanks for what you find.  Some simple thing may be the gate you enter, singing.  
 

     Long before I knew that Deo Gratias is a Latin phrase, or I knew any Latin at all, I got the jist of what Deo Gratias meant. There was a sense of something good and wonderful. My very young mind picked up on the feeling of the term weekly, and maybe even daily, at Mass. It followed the final benediction: Deo Gratias, meaning "Thanks be to God."

     Those were the days when I could barely say the name of the town where I lived, "Corpus Chrispi" but I knew what it meant: the Body of Christ. I didn't know that Corpus Christi was a Latin name but in my tiny immature mind, I knew I belonged to the Body of Christ.

     I look back at many of the blessings I enjoyed and the lessons I learned and know they came to me through no work of my own, but I am thankful. Many of the lessons in my adult life I learned through pain and tragedy; they too came through no effort of my own. After a particularly difficult year when I had no sense neither of belonging, or of anything good and wonderful, I wrote a poem at Thanksgiving. The poem named all of the things, happenings, and relationships that I had wanted but didn't get, for if I had, I would have been worse off. Writing that poem brought to mind the awareness that where I am on the path of life is where I belong, in the Body of Christ. Deo Gratias. Thanks be to God.