turning the page…
by bam
before the light on this new year falls, i am bent at the old maple table, prayer unfurling. the incense simmers on the stove, an extra fat star anise tossed amid the tumble in my spice-stocked pot. i am straining to fill the air with those few pure things, those hopes, those determinations that this year — this nother round of possibility — might bring, other than the cinders we’re shooshing out the door.
i’m no fool, been knocked around enough to know that there’s no prestidigitation in all the world that will suddenly wipe clean the slate, cast all sin, open wide the barn doors for all those gentle kind and tender things we espouse.
but i’ve not lost hope, not every shred. and in finding the words of dear alfred lord tennyson on my doorstep here this morning, i am reminded that in the archeologies of time, strife is the stuff of human existence. it’s always been a battle of forces — of evil versus noble, of stingy versus bountiful, of cruel versus the world those gathered here do believe in.
tennyson, deep in grief at the ringing in of the new year after the death of his dearest friend in 1833, wrote these words in his great elegy, In Memoriam (in sum, tennyson’s masterwork is 133 poems — or cantos — in one), beginning canto CVI, or 106, “ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky…” and he went on to implore a rinsing, an ablution that rings eerily in echo of the now:
Ring out the grief that saps the mind
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.
Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.
Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
and in the last lines of this canto, tennyson implores:
Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land…
i sign on with tennyson. and believing in simple math — that the smallest increment adds to the aureole of goodness spilling across the undulations of our lives — i commit to baby steps.
sometimes, that’s the hardest truest place to begin. it gets us in the craw of who we are, and muscles up against who it is we aim to be.
so, in part, here goes:
i commit to shrugging off the unkind tone, the odd stumble in a conversation, not garnishing it as ammunition for a cockamamie theory that that someone never liked me in the first place, and thus it’s fair for me to assume defensive posture next time round. i commit to taking a deep-down cleansing breath and resolutely ringing the doorbell of the neighbor who seems to flinch from human contact, delivering without need for words a tin-wrapped loaf of kindness, or whatever seems the wisest gentlest peace-bridging offering. i commit to looking the lost, the hurt, the invisible, in the eye. i commit to picking up the phone, even when i’m dishrag tired. i commit to listening. and i commit to going first when i’m sorry are the words so needed.
if we want a world unlike the one hellbent on taking over, we need be the ones in the trenches. the ones who won’t retreat, relent, surrender.
i’m not talking sweeping social change, or abrupt reverse of course in the global policy department. i’m not so equipped. not steeped in all the necessary tomes for such bold move. i have figured out my place in the chessboard of this life, and i am all the more determined that it’s the fractional advance, the barely perceptible softening of the heart, the extension of the hand, the saying, i see you, i see your pain and i am here for you to lean on, i am here to embolden you, to put courage to your conviction. i am here to sit beside you, for however long it takes.
the daylight is up now, casting faintest shadow on the snow. it’s taken me that long to scroll the annals of my heart, to fix my spot on the map of the new year now upon us. more than anything, as the news pings roll in, as i hold my breath for the days ahead, as i pray the world begins to tilt in the favor of goodness, truth, and, yes, the deepest mercy, i turn to the heavens, i fall to my knees and i echo the good lord tennyson, ring in the larger heart, the kindlier hand, dear holy blessed Adonai, ring out the darkness of the land.
light is what we beg for. light is what we need.
let us be the wicks you spark this day. and the next and the next….
what might be the baby steps to which you commit? no need to write them here, but in your hearts, perhaps?
Beautiful.
oh, dear gracious, thank you!
holy mackerel! wordpress just told me this was the 1000th post on pull up a chair. i do believe we need to pop the bubbly! i’m stunned. xoxoxox blessings to you all, some of whom have pulled up chairs all 1,000 times! xoxox
Oh! 🥂 🍾 Congratulations 🎉 on your 1,000th post and how delightful that it occurs on the first morning of a new year! I fiercely commit to bringing light and hope and kindness and compassion and humor into 2021. We need all of that!
twas amazing to get that little ping shortly after posting. hadn’t thought about it, hadn’t tried to time it. just like that, it happened. i love your quartet of commits. all extraordinary, all in not-enough supply. blessings. xoxox
Echoing Colleen – Beautiful.
Congratulations on your “Mille” and you and your family remain in my prayers.
Love and Hope for this New Year,
MDP
thank you, beautiful MDP. thank you so so much. xoxox blessings on you and yours every single hour of this next whirl round the sun…..
I love this piece and these words really jumped out at me today…” i commit to taking a deep-down cleansing breath and resolutely ringing the doorbell of the neighbor who seems to flinch from human contact, delivering without need for words a tin-wrapped loaf of kindness, or whatever seems the wisest gentlest peace-bridging offering. i commit to looking the lost, the hurt, the invisible, in the eye. i commit to picking up the phone, even when i’m dishrag tired. i commit to listening. and i commit to going first when i’m sorry are the words so needed.”
Love how you left “i” lower case. ♥️
Happy New Year! 🎉
bless you. and grateful that those words are the ones that jumped out. nothing like a little vulnerability to splash into the new year. i am forever tossing aside most caps, except in particular instances, and out of certain respects. but i remain decidedly lower case. one humble posture to which i subscribe, at least here in blogLand. to a blessed new year for you and yours…..
It’s a lovely posture, one that i will remember. ♥️🤗♥️
I am reaching for the light with you. My baby steps are to nestle even closer to nature’s heart, to spend quiet hours with needle and thread, to be gentle in word and deed, to choose joy, to accept that I cannot do all that I would do, to love without borders. New Year’s blessings to you and your beloved ones, sweet friend. xoxo
ahhhh, sweet amy, as i sit here watching fat flakes fall, inhale the cinnamon rolls now wafting from the oven, hear the whistles of the football referees as the down-the-lane team (Northwestern) makes the boys in my life shout with glee, i love seeing your lovely face and gentle soul pull up here to the table, where i still seem to be sitting hours later.
“gentle in word and deed….”
amen, and yes. xoxox
love to you in this newborn year ahead. each and every day…..
I am in tears and walking those baby steps with you….thank you so very much. On to Tennyson I go!
love right back, dear teary one. sending so much love. across the miles, the years, and the proximities of heart. xoxox
What Beautiful Heartfelt words & wishes as we enter this New Year 2021! With Gratitude for your gift of putting pen to paper hunched over the old maple table! I commit to listening & understanding w/empathy & compassion, avoiding judgement. I recall the sentiment “we’re all walking each other home”. Let us continue our collective journey in Love & Light w/Joy & Peace in our hearts!
oh, B! so good to find you here. and the wisdom you bring, walking each other home, is truly blessed. we don’t know, any of us, when home will come, and that makes the walking side by side all the more breathtaking and more beloved……
welcome to this whole new year….
One of my favorite singer/song writers, Carrie Newcomer, has a great song that is my 2021 “spark” for the New Year. Not only great lyrics but a tune that lures me out of the blahs, inviting me to bust some moves! I highly recommend it!
PS Free concert tomorrow (Saturday) at 7 pm. Check out her Facebook page.
Congrats on 1,000! So glad I found a seat.
SO glad you pulled out a chair, and pulled it in tight against the table. will go search for this unnamed tune…….maybe it’s called spark. but fear not, i’m off to seek……
Oops! “Lean in Toward the Light”. Sorry.
bam, thank you for bringing inspiration every week, including early Christmas morn and before the dawn of the new year. It is a great commitment to sharing “goodness, truth and deepest mercy” in itself. And how auspicious that this should be your 1000th post. I join you in taking Tennyson’s words to heart and mind and soul. I have found the poem in my grandmother Bea’s turn-of-the-last-century leather-bound copy of Tennyson’s complete works. I am sure the care that I must take in handling this fragile, treasured volume will slow my reading and thus my absorption of the messages within. And I’m going to add reading more poetry again to my list of things I’d like to do in 2021. I believe we can make this a good year. Blessings to all who gather here.
now there is a treasure upon treasures….to turn the crinkly pages of a leather-bound volume. i love the centenarians in your care, hard shell, leather shell.
it is my great joy, and unending blessing, to get to put down words here, and trust they find their way. it is the darkness just before the dawn that i relish so so much, so there was no way i was going to sleep through it this morning. i needed this fresh beginning all over again.
sending love, gently and certainly to you, blessed friend. xoxo
you and tennyson, your words have the crisp clarity of bells on cold winter days. i commit. to a beginning. to steps, pieces, parts, not wholes. a shift, a lean. to breathe, shrug off. deliver, bridge, listen. to be present, continue., soften. to see. to look for the light.
barb your words shared so generously are light. thank you for the reminder that we are light. the spark. the hopes, the determination, we are the possibilities. as we step off into the new year, cheers to like minded souls and lights on the path.
love xoxox
ahhh, beautiful A…..(that is me inhaling the glory of you there in those three well-spaced ellipses). you walk the walk, live the life. you lean, you shift, you do and you do, every one of the action-taking, light-kindling verbs. this is the loveliest “i commit” to find here on a dark saturday’s eve, as this new year rustles into its newness.
sending love across the way. xoxox