Spent the day perched on my porch swing enjoying the glorious spurt of spring, the warm sunshine, the crisp white blooms of the pear and crab apple trees contrasting beautifully against the dark azure of the sky canvas. Woke up at 4:30 this morning to a bird singing a very loud aria to his lover, “you’re pretty, you’re pretty you’re pretty.” One look in the bathroom mirror assured me the songbird was not singing to me. That bird was singing his heart out perched on the gable of the front porch roof, his musical words of love floating throughout the neighborhood. Once the little lothario ran out of steam another bird began singing his lover’s lullaby symphony of “chirp, chirp, chirp.” I was wide awake now marveling at the persistence of the little songbirds. Rabindranath Tagore wrote, “Faith is a bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark.” When we have strong faith in a loving God we know when the uncertainty of the darkness comes we can trust the dawn will break beautifully with God’s holy light.

Every time somebody asks me what I’ve been doing I say, “Sitting on the porch swing and slobbering.” That’s the beauty of being old and retired! I’ve done lots of porch pondering the last few days. I love watching Father Sky create the day’s sky sketch, adding and taking away clouds, letting his cigar smoke put a thin veil of gray on the sky’s clouds. The Quote Garden reads, “God has clothed the clouds of the morning and the evening with evanescent beauty.” Sometimes we see the cloudy sky as gloomy but Mother Nature brings hope as she transforms the sky with her vivid watercolors. “As the vibrant hues of sunset paint the sky, remember that every ending marks a new beginning,” Facebook Post.

The sunset was perfectly beautiful this evening. The muted watercolors of coconut white, pale crabapple pink, and tropical ocean turquoise were lightly brushed in layers across the high heavens melting together into a maze of mauve as the mystical twilight bloomed across my neighborhood. Father Sky escorted the sun down the tropical colored horizon, the train of the sun’s sterling silver pageant gown pulling the darkness down across the landscape. Father Sky woke the moon to guide the night travelers and placed a halo of twinkling stars around him. “If the sky could dream, it would dream of dragons. Love that thought. Shannon L. Alder wrote, “The moon will guide you through the night with her brightness, but she will always dwell in the darkness, in order to be seen.” I’ve always viewed the moon as masculine, though.

Watching the day bid goodbye to the day’s light is such a wondrous sight. The day’s gloaming just might be my favorite part of my day. Mother Nature paints a gloriously sunset as dusk creeps slowly up the street, dragging the darkness with it, making silhouettes of the leafless trees. The day is quiet and silence takes over the neighborhood, even the birds are without songs, slowly the light dims and night arrives, the night sky punctuated with the luminous moon and twinkling stars. In the spring and coming summer the night critters will begin their songs and symphonies soon as the daylight dims. I look forward to sleeping with the windows open and seeing the yellow star flickers of the lightning bugs.

Scripture in Ecclesiastes 3:11 reads, “He has made everything beautiful in its time.” How can you not believe in God when you see the intricate beauty of the world as the day ends and begins so gloriously with its sunrises and sunsets, with his promised rainbows stretched across the heavens. God loved us so much he added color on everything his hands created. Rachel Carson said, “Those who dwell among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life.” I can be having a sorrowful moment and a few minutes in the porch swing looking out over this beautiful world brings joy back into my life. I feel God’s presence in nature and the earth’s beauty gives me strength and contentment.

As I compose this blog the words of the hymn, For the Beauty of the Earth, are running through my mind. I love these beautiful words — “For the beauty of the earth, for the glory of the skies, for the love which from our birth over and around us lies. Christ, our Lord, to you we raise this, our hymn of grateful praise. For the wonder of each hour of the day and of the night, hill and vale and tree and flower, sun and moon and stars of light, For the joy of human love, brother, sister, parent, child, friends on earth, and friends above, for all gentle thoughts and mild, For yourself, best gift divine, to the world so freely given, agent of God’s grand design: peace on earth and joy in heaven. Christ, our Lord, to you we raise this, our hymn of grateful praise.”

Be thankful for this wondrous world we inhabit. Give thanks for the coming spring colored by God’s love.

“Nature’s beauty is an art of God. Let us feel the touch of God’s invisible hands in everything beautiful.” ― Rig Veda