For the past several years, a pair of geese have settled into this lovely covered corner outside the pool at the gym.
It’s really a great location. It’s within walking distance of several restaurants and close to shopping areas. It also has easy access to the expressway so on the rare night when you can find an egg sitter, you can catch a show or concert downtown. The other obvious perk is a clear view of the pool—a crystal clear pond close enough to take a refreshing swim if it wasn’t for that weird invisible boundary. Though that same boundary does keep away the weird gangly creatures that inelegantly splash around in the pond.
This week I saw they had returned so I snapped a picture. Now, I don’t know if the same pair returns year after year or if some new couple discovers this spot and spruces it up each year, but what I do know is that seeing them settle in every year brings me the same hope I get from seeing green sprouts poking up from the ground and the first hint of buds on trees. There’s comfort and joy in the repeating patterns and rhythms of Mother Nature.
The famed poet Mary Oliver, who brought us the poem about Blue Horses I shared a couple weeks ago, wrote several beautiful poems that feature geese. So I thought it fitting to share one with you in celebration of the geese that have returned. To read the entire poem, click Wild Geese.
The first few lines, in particular, resonate with our message of Lent:
“You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.”
Beloved of God, this is the lesson Lent repeats year after year. That repentance is not about walking on your knees / for a hundred miles through the desert. No, the repentance God desires is for us to humble our hearts, to cultivate spirits of earnest curiosity, and pay attention the miracles playing out all around us. The miracles that proclaim grace and goodness.
The Spirit constantly calls us to pay attention to the workings of the world, the signs of resurrection, and the hope of new life that are always present around us. This year we’ve been paying attention to the many colorful ways these promises appear. We’ve been practicing how we’re called to receive and reflect those promises.
So like the wild geese keep returning, like their harsh and exciting calls to announce your place in the family of things, let’s keep returning to the promises of God. Let’s keep seeking to live into the full spectrum of God’s grace and keep proclaiming God’s love for all people.
In Love,
Annette