Who opens the door?

Whenever I am outdoors tasting and savoring the deliciousness of air, earth, fire and water, the door to happiness cracks opens. And, if not lasting, at least long enough to rekindle the heart’s engine of desire for life and the pursuit of a sustainable, global peace.

This past week it was a ferry boat ride to the northern end of Lake St. Clair whose cold deep waters nestled among the peaks of middle Tasmania that provided this moment of grace.

The haunting quality of grey trunked trees mirrored in black water so still the landscape, though seemingly mute, spoke with such force my head rang and I felt almost dizzy surrounded by such beauty. A beauty so touching, one cannot help but beg for forgiveness for ever doubting its magnificence.

Tilicho Lake

In this high place
it is as simple as this,
leave everything you know behind.

Step toward the cold surface,
say the old prayer of rough love
and open both arms.

Those who come with empty hands
will stare into the lake astonished,
there, in the old light
reflecting pure snow

the true shape of you own face.

David Whyte

And later, stepping onto the shore beneath the myrtle tree with its own branching arms opened wide, I sensed a school room quality of “teacher with students” while standing among four tree ferns.

Immersing myself into the surrounds of Lake St. Clair allowed for the urgency of the world to abate for a moment. The day’s doors to happiness opened just enough to grant entry to the peace of wild things.

The Peace of Wild Things

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Wendell Berry