Grace In Darkness

Today’s Morning Prayer from the Liturgy of the Hours was soothing to me as I sat before the crucifix and prayed the ancient prayers. A selection from Psalm 92:

Though the wicked spring up like grass
and all who do evil thrive:
they are doomed to be eternally destroyed.
But you, Lord, are eternally on high.
See how your enemies perish;
all doers of evil are scattered.

It is indeed good to be reminded that there is nothing new under the sun, and that evil days have always plagued our race. The wicked are numerous. Those who do evil do thrive. But…I hope in the promises that God sees the truth and bides His time. Perhaps someday under the dome of these mean days I will trust in those promises as opposed to merely hoping in them.

While Jinx capered in the fields, I stopped and stooped to look at a pile of windblown oak leaves, dusted with frost and waiting to be thawed and broken down, waiting to melt into the earth beneath the mother-tree and become part of her food for the coming seasons. Their shapes moved with slight tremors when the freezing breeze pushed across them.

While we walked, I prayed some more. I prayed my secret prayers, and I asked St. Joan of Arc to pray for me. Into my thoughts came a fragment of a prayer written by William James Tychonievich, a prayer I am attempting to memorize, both for its utility and its beauty:

Unconquer’d Joan, O maiden brave,

To thee be this petition pray’d,

That we may see, through mist and dark,

Thy lily-spangl’d banner wave,

And, rising from the dust, be men!

That from thy flaming soul a spark

Ignite our hearts. O blessed Maid

Of Heaven, pray for us! Amen.

I stopped by a sawn stump that reminded me of a stack of pancakes, and I remembered that I was a bit hungry, and wondered what Mrs. Orr might be cooking when I returned to the house.

Jinx paused in the lane and sniffed at something white. I approached and saw that it was a small tuft of some sort of animal’s fur, coated with frost, looking like a miniature albino pocupine. I touched one tiny protruding hair and saw the frost retreat from the warmth of my finger with its whorls and loops. Patterns in all I see, chords in all I hear.

The sun was rising into a clear morning sky, and I was glad. We’ve been under dark skies for some time now, skies that have been pouring rain and snow and ice on us. I do enjoy the winter, but I am longing to see the sun and to feel the warmth. I want to see the yard dry out and I want my joints to stop aching for just a little while.

Light upon the land. That’s what I long to see. And though I hope otherwise, I think the winter in this land will be long.

~ S.K. Orr