Just a Little While

 

                              Just a little while,

                                   all these cares will pass;

                              Just a little while—

                                   we know this earth won't last;

                              Just a little while,

                                   then loved ones we will meet;

                              For in a little while,

                                   we'll sit at Jesus' feet.

The Watchers 4: The Ghost Within, p.147

Across the Water

 

Photo by Steve Dale, Nov 2023

            Across the water,

               I see the bright lights beckoning,

               Dazzling, colorful, happy, and alluring.

            Yet I'm only here,

               Not there.

            Here is dark and cold and lonely;

               But there is a comfort in its familiarity,

               A kind of solace begot by consistency,

               Fraught with insistence

                       Pressing in all the time.

            Yet, I see the lights across the water.

               How can I get there?

               It's too cold and far to swim.

               No boat have I, no friend, no aide.

            Yet across the water,

               bright lights beckon with bold beacon.

               Who will bring me to that welcoming, warm abode?

               Is there a path, a trail, a road

                   so my angst might weaken?

               A course to bring me there

                      —Across the water?

            Yet still I sit in silence,

               staring across the water.

                       Wondering.

The Quiet Dignity of Appalachia

 

Photo by The Appalachian Project

        There is a quiet dignity about the mountains of Appalachia.  An old, settled sort of grandness that comes with age and maturity.  Other mountains may be younger with sharper peaks and deeper valleys, but Appalachia doesn't have to show off.  She's not a youngster trying to make a name for herself.  She has the quiet dignity of an elegant majesty like an old lace doily draped over a family heirloom table.   And just as in your grandmother's old parlor, there comes a stillness in the Appalachian hills.  The stillness oozes from every creek, every rivulet, and every stone in each and every holler.  And all the more so when nature pulls the grey blanket of fog over herself to settle down for a well earned early Winter rest.