Telling the Truth

connecting the dots of my life

Tag: Winter

March 12, 2018

warming to the sun

I

warming to the sun
thick snow relaxes
its grip on winter

II

listening to silence
broken by heartbeats
I hear God calling

III

when least expected
the tired old dam bursts
sweeping me away

What is this strange season? Just when I think I’ve got it, I have nothing. Nothing but unformed words that want to be written.

No great prospects for anything in print. Nothing but words that point in a direction I know rings true, but cannot capture.

Elusive as air, what I want to say comes and goes through my heart. Scattered clouds of connections and insights of a semi-experienced warrior feeling her way along.

I trust my heart and my fingers to find my way in this uncharted wilderness. Breathing deeply, I relax my mind and body’s fierce grip on wornout habits of self-preservation.

©Elouise Renich Fraser, 12 March 2018
Image found at walldevil.com

5 Comments
March 7, 2018

Consider the Orchids | Photos


Last week D and I took a day off to visit the Orchid show at Longwood. It wasn’t crowded, though the café and restaurant were closed for renovation. Still, it was breezy and bright, with temperatures in the low 50s (Fahrenheit).

The photos below show the entrance–not when we arrived, but just before we left late in the afternoon. The wall of orchid plants was an extension of the gift shop. Orchids for sale! The second photo is a close-up of what we didn’t buy.

Overall, I thought this year’s Orchid show wasn’t as spectacular as last year. I missed the giant ‘orchid tree,’ and didn’t think the main hall of the conservatory did justice to the theme. Nonetheless, D took some beautiful photos. Here are several of my favorites, minus their names.

Near the end of our visit we found empty seats beside the Conservatory stream and had a nice sit-down, and took photos to prove we were there.

Then D played with his camera while I rested my feet. Here are his Monet look-alike studies in water, preceded by a photo  of the waterfall and stream at the far end of the main entrance to the Conservatory.

Looking at all this beauty, even in retrospect, I can’t help thinking about Jesus’ words of encouragement to the crowds of people who brought him their sick and afflicted, hoping to be healed. In addition to healing, they heard these words–the words I can’t help thinking about when I see these photos.

Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will God not much more clothe you–you of little faith?

Matthew 6:28-30 (NRSV)

No promise that everything will be as we would like it to be. Just the promise that when we seek first the kingdom of God we will have enough. Even more than enough–when we share it instead of hoarding what we do not own and cannot keep alive.

These are troubling days for this planet and all its inhabitants. I’m grateful for the beauty of nature, especially in the middle of a bleak winter.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 7 March 2018
Photos taken by DAFraser in February 2018 at Longwood Gardens 

16 Comments
January 22, 2018

setting sun

setting sun
kisses cold western sky
clouds blush

The magic lasted only seconds, and this photo captures but a reminder of what my eyes saw. And still I’m drawn to it. A magnificent flame-out at the end of the day.

I wonder, are we not meant to flame out in the last years or moments of our lives? I picture the human spirit about to set off into another world. Sometimes in dire circumstances, yet always still a living human being. Never without beauty even though our eyes may not know how to see it.

Do I know how to see beauty when the photo or the reflection isn’t beautiful by my standards? We seem to have become a race obsessed with beauty. Searching for it, measuring it, trashing it and moving on quickly if we don’t find it in the moment.

I’ve often felt disappointed about what I see in the mirror of my life. Not all of it, but significant chunks of it. These  days I’m beginning to see it differently. I see the reflection of a woman making her way slowly, yet surely, from one revelation about herself to another. The kind that often come at the end of the day. Beautiful to behold.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 22 January 2018
Photo taken by me with my IPad, 21 January 2018

13 Comments
January 11, 2018

Counting the hours

A small
Limited world
Greets me
With a question –
And what of today…?

Indeed –
What of it?
With or without me
It will cycle by
Rehearsing its hours
Yet again in a chain
Of semi-predictability
Without need
For me to sit
At this window
Watching the day slip
Before my eyes
Through fingers chilled
By winter’s dull sky
And frozen vegetation
Waiting for spring
And release

Life is in a different key these days
I’m still not sure what it is
Or how to play it

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 11 January 2018
Image found at ytimg.com

4 Comments
January 3, 2018

majestic wings

I.

majestic wings
hang in winter air
descend slowly

II.

bird of prey
touches down in old oak tree
folds majestic wings

I can’t decide which haiku I like better, so you’re getting both versions! I wish I had a video of what I saw out my kitchen window this morning. I don’t know what kind of raptor it was, but it was gorgeous. Especially its wings–much like the osprey in the photo above, but probably not an osprey. I watched for a few minutes before it took off. It was surveying our yard and a neighbor’s yard. Looking for breakfast, no doubt.

We had a little ‘heat wave’ today. That means we got up into the high 20s (Fahrenheit). Tomorrow promises a shock to the East Coast, especially in New England. We may wake up here in the Philadelphia area to wind chill in the range of minus zero degrees Fahrenheit. And snow, of course, along with strong winds. So today included a nice walk with D outdoors in the winter sun, and a trip to the grocery store.

Hoping this finds you enjoying the outdoors as much as possible.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 3 January 2018
Photo found at audubon.org

17 Comments
January 1, 2018

sun rises

sun rises
climbs cloudless sky –
fiery hot

***

fierce brilliance of this morning’s sun
meets frigid breathless air of
harsh unyielding stony resistance –
stand-ins for rising discontent of the many
exploited in permutations unlimited
thinly veiled interests of the few
packaged in chocolate-covered poison

I believe
there is a Sun/Son of Righteousness
already rising with healing wings
invading this world with Truth, Justice and Courage
freeing as many Uppity Women, Men and Children as it takes
to bring healing in Real Time and Real Places
with Real Solutions that work from and in our hearts
not from greed or lust for power
or the misplaced desire to be what we humans will never be –
The Greatest and Most Beautiful of All

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 1 January 2018
Photo found at wayofsunshine.com

7 Comments
December 31, 2017

facing east

facing east
the red cardinal shines
in sun-kissed feathers

No, this isn’t the cardinal I saw this morning outside my kitchen window. But it’s close enough. One of the most beautiful sights ever on a cold winter day in the Northeast. Though not a discreet disguise for the faint of heart. Nonetheless, looking ahead to the New Year, I want to be counted in the red cardinal category. Bold, beautiful and facing into the rising sun.

Here’s wishing you a Happy New Year of unexpected joy and peace.

Elouise♥

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 31 December 2017
Photo taken by Mary Anne Borge, found at thenaturalweb.org

5 Comments
January 17, 2017

Winter Palace

ice-formations-wisconsin-dells-wi

Huddled ranks
Soar toward heaven
Stand guard
in ice-plumed headdress
before spiked doorway
Distant turrets beckon
Enter
if you dare

***

My first thought when I saw this photo was Narnia, under the spell of the Wicked Witch — who, of course, was eager to entice at least one vulnerable earth boy to her icy palace, deep within her icy world. Have you read The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, by C. S. Lewis? If not, get hooked and read the entire series. At least twice! Enter, if you dare….

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 17 January 2017
Photo of ice formations taken by walcek on 16 Jan 2017
in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin, USA
Photo found on the Weather Underground App

Response to WordPress Daily Prompt: Invitation

6 Comments
January 14, 2017

Breath of God Unseen

wind-sculpted-drifts-martin-nd-13-jan-2017

Breath of God
Unseen
Artist of my heart
And life
Breathe on me 

The wind is cold
Unyielding
To my vain cries
For mercy
Breathe on me 

Evening shadows
Lengthen
In fading light
Brilliant
and foreboding 

Deep blue sky
Darkens
Trees bend and sway
Breath of God
Breathe on me 

It’s late afternoon. This morning I woke to this photo on my weather page. I thought immediately about my life and the way God’s Spirit has blown through and around it, unseen and unbidden.  

Looking back, I’d say the outcomes today are beyond my wildest dreams. Not that I’m perfect or successful or even ‘special.’ Rather, this is about contentment. 

I’m at peace with myself, though not always with situations in which I find myself.  Or even with my behavior. Nonetheless, things have changed in my spirit over the last several years. 

Today I have compassion for myself as a child, as a young teenager, as a wife, mother and grandmother, and as a retired professional. I rarely struggle with feeling like a fraud, or with harsh self-talk that belittles me or accuses me of being The Problem with Everything. 

I’m not saying I’m perfect. I’m saying I’m at rest with who I am and who I am not. Especially from the inside out. The part that really matters. 

I like what I see when I think of myself as a huge pile of snow, sculpted by God’s Spirit through winds of change. I know, things aren’t exactly spectacular in the world right now. It’s just that today I’m at peace with myself.

Thanks for reading! I pray you’ll have a peace-filled Sabbath rest.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 14 January 2017
Photo taken by Brian Bender at Martin, North Dakota, USA, 13 Jan 2017
Found at Weather Underground App

Response to WordPress Daily Prompt: Unseen

26 Comments
January 12, 2017

rising moon

rising-moon-photo

rising moon
reflects warm glow
through tangled limbs

***

midwinter sign of hope
discovered this morning on my iPad

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 12 January 2017
Photo taken in Soldotna, Alaska USA by wildernessgrl, 12 Jan 2017,
found on the Weather Underground App

4 Comments