i recall an early teaching You gave me, Shiva, instructing through my daily living in modest but memorable lessons. one early sunny spring morning i set out to find wildflowers, delighted to greet the small blue blossoms scattered like confetti throughout the rolling country pasture by the newly greening woods. the tiny blue faces with their smears of dusty yellow pollen are pure & simple: innocent emissaries of the divine. they grow vigorously, lush & colorful where the soil is thick. there is a barren area too, rough with red clay & pebbles, yet i see one little uplifted blue face in the dry rubble. a single tiny blue flower, dwarfed, ragged & scrawny, is reaching upward into the light in the midst of the parched dry dirt. i bow in respect, swayed by the beauty of this frail survivor simply doing its best to grow in an unfavorable place. this touches me more deeply than the abundant clusters of bright flowers in favored locations, robust in their vitality. sometimes it is a heroic act just to be alive, seeking light. You don't refuse anyone who longs for the light of truth, Shiva: & so it is that i too continue resolutely onward.
THIS HAPPENED 