My Beautiful War

It’s not that I have so much stuff.

It’s how I got it that creates the difficulty.

Ancient furniture from my father-letters with ink so faded to be barely readable and the books.

Ah, the books. Many of them were my father’s, the most intelligent person I’ve ever known, whose hands turned the pages, smoothed wrinkles and sometimes wrote notes in the margins.

Early on, the books grabbed hold of my heart and mind and imprinted themselves to change the way I understood the world.

Now and then I notice a name in my phone’s contacts—a name and phone number of someone who no longer dwells in this plane of existence.

What do I do? Delete the name and phone number as if my brother never existed?

It is eerie, picking through old things, things no longer used and probably not needed.

It’s easy to discard that which has no memories, no visions, no colors attached to it.

But the dreams.

Are recurrent dreams part of cleaning out?

I am standing alone in an attic of an old house—one in which I used to live many years ago.

I am surrounded by old furniture, some of which is broken, covered with blankets of dust. A peep of light streaks through a broken board of the roof. Dust motes drift in the light like tiny insects.

I look and oh-there is a favorite toy I played with as a child, there is a doll I made for my child and there lies a stack of books I read over and over as a child. On top sits Helen Keller’s autobiography The Story of My Life.

Is this what it means —to gain perspective? Am I myself ancient?

Is this physical or spiritual?

Is this the First Light of the morning or the last glow of day?

Do I await the sunrise with patient anticipation?

Or do I sink, exhausted, into my favorite chair and wait—for what I do not know.

I prayed this time, every day, before I set foot near the places—the steamer trunk my father gave me that holds the remnants of my years of teaching, the closets that hold much more than I can process.

Those closets hold my past, the last words of my loved ones, images of people who no longer live.

So I prayed this time-before I began and as I stood over the things.

I prayed for help and strength and courage to place my life into its proper perspective.

This melancholy life is exhausting because, whether I want or not, my being sees and feels and hears and remembers all that is around me.

And so I pray. Help me let go. Help me not weep. Help me to love what I have been given and discard that which I no longer need or can use.

Sometimes I am amused when I find some odd thing from years ago.

Most times, though, the memories flit across the screen of my mind like tiny beautiful birds in flight looking for a place to rest.

Other times, like the red cardinal of my father, they settle to rest on my shoulder like an old friend.

And, as old friends told me when I left teaching: ~Seek peace and pursue it.~

That is my goal.

To seek peace and pursue it, (Psalm 34:14) *******************        Seek Peace and Pursue It Acrylic on board