The Olympic Spring is in resonance with the Appalachian Spring in a symphony of colors and shimmering sounds. Many hues of green in the leafing trees and bushes sing out as notes from the woodwinds. Blossoms of dogwood extend out of the forest as oboes singing their solitary songs, or sometimes as a spray of a fountain in blossom. While the red of stripping madrona and red cedar feel like the bassoon playing their lonely notes. Winter wrens, song sparrows, swainson’s thrush and red wing black birds sing from the branches of the forest and marsh. Frogs provide the bass. Some unknown bird in the forest sings a sonata for clarinet. A symphony of simple elegance and beauty. Spring. The earth is alive and beautiful. Trillium and periwinkle dance about the forest floor.
Around the neighborhood the azaleas and rhododendrons are beginning to bloom. Cherry blossoms are giving way to apples blossoms, daffodils have given way to tulips. Lilacs are bursting from what were recently bare twigs.
East of the mountains the apple orchards are in blossom and the vineyards show thumbs pointing up for the new crops to come. The high desert plateau along the Columbia blushes green with desert flowers sounding their solos like violins in the clear, clean air.
The earth is alive, beautiful and sacred. We have been placed here to care for the earth and serve all of life, and not just ourselves. One of the key practices of spiritual living is to be of service, to other people and to other living things, such as birds, plants, animals, mammals, et al. For it is then that the principle of love is put in motion, in giving is the receiving, as we give, so we receive. And not, we get, so then we can give.
Every day is Earth Day and a good time to remember to practice giving and receiving with the earth. Give life enhancing nutrients to the earth and not harmful things, products and actions. I remember the first Earth Day, just weeks before I graduated from college 40 years ago. Then I didn’t really understand the significance of standing for the earth, rather than just on the earth, but I stood anyway. In the years following that day legislation provided protection for the earth, air, water and endangered species; environmental protection agencies and ecology. Even though we had to endure the 80’s and 2000’s when it was attempted to dismantle or disguise our intentions to care for the earth with economic and expedient overrides, we have endured.
As the First Nations Brother prayed years ago in the Mission San Luis Obispo, during a Thanksgiving service we conducted: “Take care of the water, you may have to drink it, take care of the air, you may have to breathe it, care for the earth, you may have to live on it.”
As I was returning home from my walk along a country road, enjoying trillium, dogwood and other songs of spring, I met a neighbor who was heading for a bus stop, a mile away. He told me that Dr. Masaru Emoto, (Messages from Water), was in Olympia to do a ceremony at the artesian well, downtown. So we jumped in my car and drove to the well. It was so exciting for me, and such an honor to be there and participate in a ceremony of blessing the waters. And with Dr. Emoto was a host of First Nations people to welcome him and all of us and they spoke and sang some sacred songs for the healing of the waters.
The first thing that Dr. Emoto had us do and the First Nations elders, including a wise Grandmother, was to get us to ask the waters of the earth to forgive us for all the damage we’ve done. Indeed! Forgive us, sacred Mother. Then we shared in speaking what he called the Grand Invocation. First in Japanese, then in English we recited this three times:
Daidangen The Grand Invocation;
“Uchu no Mugen no Chikara ga Korikotte
Makoto no Daiwas no Miyo ga Naninatta”
The Eternal Power of Universe has gathered itself
to create a world with true and grand harmony”
Now is the time for us to think, speak and do what we can to make this world a better place and to allow the earth to heal. Join me in picking up trash along the road - you do your road - I'll do mine; when you go out for your walks, help make it clean.
I call it ‘picking up after the kids’. Let’s join together and do what we can with love and gratitude to make this holy earth whole again.
Miracle Song (sung by a woman from the desert which I caught)
Eh, yo, yo, eh; Eh, yo, yo, eh; Eh, yo, yo, eh; Eh, yo.
Eh, yo, yo, eh; Eh, yo, yo, eh; Eh, yo, yo, eh; Eh, yo.
Peace, John
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