Dew
by Naomi Shihab Nye
A Kickapoo grandmother pulled
deerhide moccasins out of her bosom,
said, If you really want these
to fit your feet,
walk in the dew a little,
walk in the dew.
She lived in a cattail hut
ringed by mountains.
There was no road to her house.
I think of her every day
as I touch the forks and curtains,
the pens and melons
that line this life
feeling how we grow together,
things and the life beyond things,
one gradually fitted motion
moving home across the grass.
Not quite two years ago we moved and put our belongings into storage due to some uncertain and challenging circumstances. This was difficult for a number of reasons: my daughter wasn’t quite three months old, I had no paid maternity leave and thus had to remain mindful of work to meet short-term needs, and I left the neighborhood I loved (after 12 years, precisely) at a time when a sense of community would have been welcomed. But the hardest part was that, as a new Mother, my instinct, and my heart, body, and mind wanted nothing more than to feel settled and just tend to the precious gift that had been given to me, easing her gently and lovingly into this life.
As the time has passed, it’s not necessarily my belongings that I miss, it’s the tending to them: the small, silent rituals of routine we adopt in our places and in our lives. Putting a favorite book away, folding the same blanket and draping it across the chair when the house is quiet. Thumbing through old notebooks or letters from friends. What a gift it is to have a place to tend to, books that nourish our hearts, an instrument we play with joy and reverence, mementos handed down to us through generations.
The UN estimates that there are 70 million forcibly displaced people worldwide. Not only do they have little to no belongings, but most have no home, many no country. How much we have then, in relation to so many. How small some of our struggles in the midst of such anguish. As many of us stay close to home during this global health crisis, let us not lose a sense of how fortunate we are to have all we do, be it access to fresh air, a dog to walk, a friend to call, our Church waiting to receive us at the right time, and hope in our hearts.
Audrey Wood Corcoran
Appointed readings for today:
