A Poem, A Proverb, A Painting, A Prayer: A Lenten Journey-- Day 23: Thursday after the 3rd Sunday in Lent

Today’s Theme: Rebirth in Spring


Poem: Forest Song
All around I heard the whispering larches
Swinging to the low-lipped wind;
God, they piped, is lilting in our arches,
For He loveth leafen kind.

Ferns I heard, unfolding from their slumber.
Say confiding to the reed:
God well knoweth us, Who loves to number
Us and all our fairy seed.

Voices hummed as of a multitude
Crowding from their lowly sod;
’Twas the stricken daisies where I stood.
Crying to the daisies’ God.
----------Sir Shane Leslie (1885-1971), Northern Irish baronet, diplomat and poet



Proverb:
“The composer Aaron Copland got it right. An Appalachian spring is music for dancing. The woods dance with the colors of wild flowers, nodding sprays of white dogwood and the pink froth of redbuds, rushing streams and the embroidered solemnity of dark mountains.”
----------Robin Wall Kimmerer, from Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants



Painting: Early Spring Bluebonnets, Julian Onderdonk, Texas Impressionist, 1919

     

Prayer:
We give you praise, O Loving Creator,
and lift our hearts in wonder before you,
grateful for your multitudes of blessings.

Guide us into wisdom and grace,
that we may seek out the stranger and the outcast,
seeing the face of Christ in all,
drawing wide the circle of mercy and redemption,
as you call us to do, O Lord.

Lift us on the wings of hope and healing,
that we can be witnesses of your power,
and draw the world closer to You, O God,
by the generosity and love
we bear for each other and all creation.

Holy One,
your tenderness is a balm in suffering,
and a reminder of the sweetness of the life of faith:
pour out your Spirit upon us,
and gather within your embrace
all those for whom we pray.
---------------- Leslie Barnes Scoopmire