Preparing for Easter

little h hiking the Fort Leavenworth trails system. he hunts rocks, sticks, and flowers.

The forest and the desert were my church, for many years. We have been fortunate to find a great (actual, real) church to be a part of here in Kansas. This find has kind of renewed my belief in the goodness of the institution of church, which has likewise renewed my belief that my faith will always be renewed by being in nature. But now, instead of just being continually renewed, my faith is also strengthened (by fellowship). In celebration and honor of Easter, and the Grace which found me worthy of life, I wanted to post one more E. E. Cummings piece, my favorite. When I am an old lady, I hope I can speak these words to my grandchildren. I hope that they will get that this poem is about a tree. 

i am a little church 

by E. E. Cummings

i am a little church(no great cathedral)
far from the splendor and squalor of hurrying cities
-i do not worry if briefer days grow briefest,
i am not sorry when sun and rain make april

my life is the life of the reaper and the sower;
my prayers are prayers of earth's own clumsily striving
(finding and losing and laughing and crying)children
whose any sadness or joy is my grief or my gladness

around me surges a miracle of unceasing
birth and glory and death and resurrection:
over my sleeping self float flaming symbols
of hope, and i wake to a perfect patience of mountains

i am a little church(far from the frantic
world with its rapture and anguish)at peace with nature
-i do not worry if longer nights grow longest;
i am not sorry when silence becomes singing

winter by spring, i lift my diminutive spire to
merciful Him Whose only now is forever:
standing erect in the deathless truth of His presence
(welcoming humbly His light and proudly His darkness)