GRACE

WORDS LIKE LIGHT

Tuesday, July 19, 2022

         On the walk Delycia and I took this morning at Haley Farm State Park, I started thinking about the natural grace we both were displaying as we walked along the trail. We weren’t doing anything fancy – just walking – and yet I saw stylishness in the movements of our 80-year-old legs. We passed over the stones and slopes and dips with senior-citizen poise, moving our old legs with marvelous suppleness. Really, it’s a major miracle how the human body does its daily tricks, and one of its finest feats is the fluid movement of the bones and muscles and nerves of legs.  How does this wonder happen – even the well-worn bodies of Delycia and me flowing along with seeming lightsomeness – and today, on a trail of rocks and rises and bumps? I guess I actually shouldn’t be surprised, since our two vintage bodies do these kinds of wonders on a daily basis – lifting pencils with deftness, walking from room to room with elderly elegance, turning our heads as easily as breezes bend and flow. Truly, a fine finesse is with us always, though I don’t often notice it. Even the act of typing these words has a certain nimbleness in it, arising, perhaps, from the simple grace of just being alive – and, luckily, old.   

Below, my beloved fellow hiker leading the way …

SAVED BY GRACE
(Bill M., 87, Blessings, CT, USA) 

He knows he is saved by grace - 
by the wind 
with all its wings 
sailing with poise, 
by the easeful brightness 
of even sorrow and darkness, 
and by the light-footed 
carefree or nervous feelings 
that circulate inside him. 
He sees finesse in all the moments 
parading through life, 
even the fearful ones 
that throw and spin themselves at him, 
but then bow with benevolence 
if he gives them his finest gift,
 an unruffled nod 
and a smile.