Tag: home

DOMINION

WORDS LIKE LIGHT

Friday, September 9, 2022

         I live with my wife in a small house on a small lot in a small town, but sometimes it becomes clear to me that my true home – my dominion, you might say – is far larger than that. The word ‘dominion’ stems from the Latin word domus, meaning ‘home’, and my real home is a vast one, stretching from the most distant stars to the deepest depths of the ocean. The truth is that, like all of us, I am an inseparable and essential part of a measureless universe.  My home is not Mystic, Connecticut, USA, but the universe itself, a universe where all things, from new-born babies to massive spans of mountains, are of equal importance. We all share dominion in this dominion of ours, this universe that knows no end to its territories and provinces.  From infinitesimal insects, to trees in forests, to presidents, to poor wanderers — we’re all kings and queens forever and everywhere — if only we knew it. This morning, lucky for me, I’m knowing it.



THE EMPIRE OF BLESSINGS
(about Patricia F., 46, Blessings, CT)

She calls the village of Blessings
a majestic empire, 
a dominion administered 
by each magnificent moment.
She says 
it’s the realm of royal trees 
and their noble leaves,
of sovereign thoughts
and endless regal feelings. 
For her, 
Blessings is the territory of friendliness
and the province of conviviality. 
Even small stones are kings and queens
in Blessings, 
and specks of swanky dust 
on tables and chairs 
call it their precious nation. 
She says 
she’s one of countless rulers here, 
along with princely winds 
and stately sparrows 
beneath bushes.

WORDS LIKE LIGHT 

July 7, 2021

HOME

            Delycia and I have a small home beside a river in a small town, but I wish I could more often feel like I’m home no matter where I happen to be. Home is our white stone house in Mystic, but home should also be the sidewalk I’m walking on, or the store where I’m browsing among beets and cabbages, or the forest in which I’m walking on a warm July day. Home, as we say, is where the heart is, and shouldn’t my heart be wherever I happen to be, whether at the beach beneath the soft ceiling of a summer sky, or in  a grocery store with shoppers whose thoughts and feelings are lit-up like lamps. Shouldn’t I feel just as ‘at home’ holding the door for a friend miles from our house as doing the dishes in our kitchen, and shouldn’t speaking to the clerk at a store be, in a way, as pleasant as passing words back and forth at home? I live in little Mystic, but I also live in the limitless universe, so perhaps my real home is as vast as galaxies. It could be there are countless doors in my real home, all leading to moments that could be called miracles, all opening to places as comfortable and kindly as our living room on Riverbend Drive.  

MAKING

A bird and a blossom 
making friends, 
a rooster helping morning 
make its entrance, 
a lawn mower making music 
across a lawn:
it's a joyful time in July,
when even an airplane passing over 
can make music 
in a happy heart.