What keeps us here, grounds us from prematurely flying off back into Spirit where we belong, that Home, to which we are always—even if only on a subconscious level—yearning to return?

I think we are purposely oblivious and self-centered to ensure our humanness, wearing requisite ego-blinders.

It is that human thing which we must necessarily do.

To protect ourselves from remembering who we really are, which would lead us to long for Home, we pretend to forget for just a little while, the Magnificence from which we emerge.

I think it is the poetry of physicality, the lure of the next ordinary, beautiful thing that keeps us here.

We walk through life mostly asleep and on autopilot, and occasionally we rouse enough to stumble upon a beautiful thing, a beautiful person, a beautiful spirit, a beautiful idea, by which to be amazed and dazzled.

We long to wake up—but not too much—not enough to realize who we really are (bright, shiny, powerful Beings of Light with the entire Universe at our fingertips).

Oh, and every day you gaze upon the sunset
With such love and intensity
Why, it’s ah, it’s almost as if you crack the code
You’d finally understand what this all means

Oh, but if you could, do you think you would
Trade it all, all the pain and suffering?
Oh, but then you would’ve missed the beauty of
The light upon this earth and the sweetness of the leaving…

~ Jane Siberry, Calling All Angels

I believe it is the lovely dance of physicality that keeps us here. It is those moments of grace, authenticity, beauty and whole-hearted connection, as cumbersome, weighty and awkward as they can sometimes be, that cement us here, hoping for a few more butterflies-in-the-stomach moments before the “sweetness of the leaving.”

I believe it is the lure of the sun, soft upon the water.

It’s walking into a breeze in summer like soft curtains on my skin.

It is the weighty handfuls of wind out a car window that disappear when you try and catch them.

It’s the chick, chick, chick, chick, chick, chickchickchickchickchick staccato music of the sprinkler on freshly mown grass in summertime.

It’s his face in my hair, next to my ear, telling me I smell like woman.

It’s the red dirt clods upturned behind my daddy’s plow in the field when I was a little girl.

It’s the deep, dark, secret smell of my grama’s closet where we hid when we went to visit.

It’s that red mare after riding—lifting the saddle and blanket—her back damp.

It’s the familiar saddle leather squeak at a trot.

It’s sage after a rain like hard stones coming down, bruising.

It’s the old worn sheets on Aunt Dink’s bed, having been wrinkled by everyone in the family.

It’s the quilt on Big Mama’s bed—that read and pink one with the stars—thrown back when my momma was conceived and then again when she was born.

It’s the soft, stained rags my dad’s momma rinsed during her moontime.

It’s the musky comfort of my momma’s worn nightgown hanging on the bedpost.

It’s the deep black red of the rose.

It’s fresh-from-the-clothes-line cotton pillowcases, still warm from outside.

It’s papa’s soft, worn leather work gloves.

It’s the warm skin of my lover pressed against mine.

It’s the slow, squeaky slam of that old, green, peeling screen door out back.

It’s sunflower heads nodding heavy at dusk in the fields, waiting for the dark.

It’s hot, fresh red plum jelly, ready in the jars, lined up on the counter waiting for their seal of paraffin wax.

It’s that back pasture in the moonlight, tall grasses sighing in the dark summer breeze.

It’s big, red, heavy, rich tomatoes, sliced on the plate, fresh from the vine, still warm from the sun.

It’s the heavy, full grapes warm and ripe inside the arbor, hanging just out of reach of my little-girl fingers.

It’s the weighty heat in the orchard behind the house, the peach scent thick and heavy on my tongue.

It’s the little puffs of dust rising in alarm as giant drops of rain hit the ground.

It’s my daughter’s downy pink cheek pressed against my milky breast.

It’s the call to live like you mean it, to run with hair flying trailing laughter behind, to love like nothing else in the world matters as much as this one moment right here and right now, to connect with a ferocious big brave heart, to breathe deeply of another’s breath belly-to-belly, to dare greatly minute-by-minute thereby inspiring others to do the same, to simply be aware, to notice, to allow.

It is the sadness of the leaving, in the end—even as it is also the sweetness of the leaving.

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Editor: Renée Picard

Images: courtesy of the author