“The sky is the daily bread of the eyes.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
“It is better to have your head in the clouds, and know where you are . . .
than to breathe the clearer atmosphere below them,
and think you are in paradise.”
Henry David Thoreau
Decades ago, I plastered my teenage bedroom walls with posters of singers, actors, surfing, fighter jets, and a collection of beautiful landscape photographs embellished with phrases touching my heart and spinning my mind. Among others, the following influential writers of their time, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and William Wordsworth, intrigued me with their reverential expressions of nature and man’s place in the universe.
Decades later, now, I fill my phone, camera, and computer with inspirational landscapes I encounter in my travels.
I revisit some of the quotes I love and overlay a few of them in my photographs.
“Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting.
Not in entire forgetfulness, and not in utter nakedness,
but trailing clouds of glory do we come.”
William Wordsworth
“The man, who has seen the rising moon break out of the clouds at midnight,
has been present like an archangel at the creation of light and of the world.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
There’s something of divinity in the clouds that fill my heart, calming the internal seas to a glass-like state. Watching shapes appear and transform right before my eyes, I envision magical, mythological creatures travelling with me beyond the veil between realms, where I love to journey. I wonder at the movements and marvel beyond my scope of understanding.
As a little girl laying beside my mother, in the backyard, near a campfire, on the sandy beach, or when floating on my back in the water, I experience acquaintance with time, constellations, clouds, and silence. Some things never change. That little girl remains a constant companion.
Awe-inspiring awareness, push and pull me as winds of choices provide shadows of my clouds. Drifting upon incredible moments of enlightened understanding, I navigate my sky.
Clouds
- What are clouds? Metaphorically
- What is their purpose? Symbolically
- What is a sky without clouds? Simile
Thursday, June 17, 2021 — Under a cloudless sky, I lay on my blanket near the waterfront, studying holy books of writ, scriptures. Pondering words I read, I look up to see a very unusual cloud formation, unlike any I had seen previously. Coming out of the blue, I watch, absorbed. No longer cloudless, a few other wispy trails appear, just to the east, as this particular collection of matter loses some of itself. My eyes revert to remain affixed to this vertical anomaly.
Shifting and stretching,
feather-like softness,
struggling together,
being pushed and pulled,
or splitting apart,
wind painting whiteness,
or shaded with greys,
on a blue palette.
Grabbing a toe-hold,
my sigh on the air,
meditatively
drifting on breezes,
hanging, upside down,
right side up, over,
perspective to gain
from my clouds of life.
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My clouds of life
- cherished relationships
- faith in God and His divine guidance
- gratitude
- paths of enlightenment
- a heart that knows to feel
- nature’s invitations/inspirations
- prayer
- sacred, solemn moments
- sorrow, pain, and struggle
- happiness and laughter
Sunday, June 20, 2021 ~ Familiarity with self is part of a phrase I heard this morning. I was listening to a lecture given by Hazrat Salaheddin Ali Nader Angha from many years ago. For some reason, these three words sink deep into my soul, and I lay on my back, looking up, thinking, until my sigh indicates readiness.
Closing my eyes, I see myself, serenaded, in a diorama of time. What do I know of me? How familiar am I with myself hungering for truth, wisdom, and understanding of spiritual matters, eternity, in balance with all nature?
Feelings overwhelm my senses. I know more now, in my present. My heart, cracked open by powerful breaking waves of challenging experiences, awes me. I bow within a cloud of gratefulness.
A vision of cloudy pillows opens where I nestle, softly drifting, upon the whispering winds singing a lullaby. I fall asleep, peacefully resting on divinely appointed clouds, my clouds of life.
How familiar are you with yourself, especially when life happens?
“A cloud does not know why it moves in just such a direction and at such a speed,
it feels an impulsion… this is the place to go now.
But the sky knows the reasons and the patterns behind all clouds,
and you will know, too,
when you lift yourself high enough to see
beyond horizons.”
Richard Bach
Jonathan Livingstone Seagull
“The air up there in the clouds is very pure and fine, bracing and delicious.
And why shouldn’t it be?–it is the same the angels breathe.”
Mark Twain
What is a cloudless sky?
A cloudless sky is like a life without refreshing rain, beautiful snowflakes, and protective shadows.
A cloudless sky is like an extreme exposure to nakedness, burning sensitive skin, and withering life.
A cloudless sky is like nothingness: devoid of imaginative exploits, laughter, joy, dreams, hopes, and magical expressions of living and loving.
A cloudless sky is like promising a feast without food.
A cloudless sky is like a blank canvas waiting for pencil, chalk, pastels, or water colours to bring it to life.
A cloudless sky is like books without pictures or words: disconcerting.
A cloudless sky is like the earth in seasons of disparaging drought.
Pleading for nutrients, suffering punishing heat and thirst, she waits. Patiently standing still, she feels (drop by dripping drop), mercy’s life-sustaining blessings drenching her to the core.
Clouds appear when looking upwardly, within. Opening her eyes and mouth to accept the reigning offerings, she revives. (reigning ~ a symbolic play on words)
A cloudless sky, I am not.
I am familiar enough with myself to know this much is true.
The other thing I know is my life is my sky.
I will cross horizon touching my clouds, and those I do not yet see.
(Though there have been times when looking up, I could see only the tiniest particles. Often times, my sight is dim.)
I think we fail to see the truths that lie beyond our understanding.
Clouds form in many layers.
Exploring our present requires an effort to see beyond visible horizons,
some of which we unwisely choose,
but know,
there is always more than meets the eye.
Our vision can, and will, expand into universal depths as paths merge in one’s heart.
Life Happens . . . so, go ahead, and Touch a Cloud, or two, or more.
Feast on your daily bread!!!
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A few of my tags from previous posts. Reader beware of a sky full of clouds.
Choices contemplation contemplative voyage depression dreams emotions faith family friendship God grief healing heart Holy Bible hope Jesus King James Bible life life changes Life Happens loss love memories metaphors mountains nature Ovation of the Seas peace perspective photographs poem poetry prayer prose reflections scriptures self-awareness self-discovery self-knowledge spirituality storytelling symbolism Travel voyage of life water
In my flimsy metal, noisy contraption I have sought eagerly to climb out of the bumpy silver haze to cooler, smoother, clearer air above the pillowy cloud tops, but then inevitably, as my short student-driven lessons proceed through the day, the billowing cloud tops begin to accelerate upwards, surging skyward far faster than my meagre motor can struggle to pull me. The students are uncomprehending and unaware of the power I see growing to millions of times more than the few horsepower we command. While they focus on heading, rate-of-climb, angle of bank, and turn-and-slip indicators, I look in awe at the staggering might of a simple updraft, created by warming earth below, acting on humid air to make it boil up to expand and cool, but slower than the temperature of the stationary air around it normally decreases with altitude. I sit transfixed by the sight as the updraft, only a bump at first, now fueled by drawing in more moist air into it’s burgeoning tower, demands my respect as I continue my second-nature patter to the student. Too soon, the lesson plan closes and we descend into the muggy, hot air that I asked my little, two seat trainer to escape, grateful the prevailing wind is carrying the simple updraft, now ready to become a thunderstorm that will only stop at the stratosphere, some eight times higher than higher than I could attain, away from the airport and down the shores of Lake Erie to Hamilton.
My view of clouds was one of respectful appreciation more than fanciful earth-bound daydreaming or meditative pondering. Nevertheless your insights to think of clouds or the lack of in new relations to myself is eye opening and mind broadening. Thank you.