The Golden Light

The golden light at evening shone
With yellow lights and radiant tones,
Then quietly fell and sped away—
A gentle close at end of day.

- D. Benning

Unprocessed capture of the lighting just as the sun was setting.
Click for larger picture.

A Rock, A Stone, A Pebble

A rock,
  a stone,
     from mountain broken
carried down by gravity and time
  —and chance!—yes, always chance—

For there upon your lofty perch
   while viewed you hills and woods and life beneath you
   and overhead the starry nights
                  and sun-spangled-days
                  with clouds and wind
                  and ice and sprays
   turned ever on their dial
       for many long ages and a while
   until you cracked and splintered from your high-topped perch;
       you started, slumped and lurched
       before you tumbled, rumbled, stumbled—
       yes! and dashed and crashed and smashed
           down the incline
                         to your eventual decline
   where you rested before chance brought you lower still—
       lower than the hill under gray of night and fog that chilled
            you to the ambient temperature
                                 of mud
                                     and clay
                            and water, dirt and spray;
    and ocean's happiness was to pound you hard with billowy wave,
         like ruffian knave
             a beating gave
                and ensconced you within
                    a sandy grave
    where time and toil
       —and chance!—yes, always chance—
    left your jagged angularity muted by the restless flow
        and softened edges, rounded now, new-spun shape from beauty's brow,
    now polished, honed and smoothed
       —by quiet waves now soothed—
I pick you up and contemplate your form,
    your beauty and your troubled past.
Gone are the perils and waves and storms,
    all that's left of your tumults vast
               are the polished edges of your grace
                   and elegance, and artistry and comeliness.
It was not chance, though, that brought you here,
    but God, the artist, working to endear:
So now, no mere stone on lofty height,
  but polished pebble of my own delight.

- D. Benning

The Beauty of a Rainfall

The beauty of rainfall at mid day drops
   like the gentle sounds of a pot boiling in another room;
   like a soft, caressing press
         of an ambient gray sonnet soundscape squeezed into a green painting,
         of blue sky crushed into gray and seasoned with sunlight's kiss.









The sky of a rainfall at mid day glimmers with
   a glowing moistness beneath lowering, frowning clouds;
   a shining radiance on the cusp of coming brightness;
   a gathering darkness that breaks like the cry no longer able to be contained.










The passing of a rainfall at mid day leaves behind
   the stunning blue of a well-watered, weathered sky;
   the soggy soil slowing impatient bustle and hurry;
   the shimmering puddles reflecting parting clouds riding across watery trails;

        And my heart washed from cares—if only for a moment—
            while listening to the rain which at mid day falls.

- D. Benning

Storm Beauty

UC Davis, December 2014, © D. Benning

GLORY be to God for stormy days—
   For skies of sodden-color as of foggy air;
     For roiling clouds all bunched up, jostling forth in flight;
Fresh rainfall, water-fall on sidewalk plays;
  Landscaped tossed and mottled—dank, drippy, misty snare;
    And all winds, their force and bluster and might.

All things showery, soggy, wet, dank;
  Whatever is blowing, blusterous (who knows how?)
    With swift, wild, dark, light; flashy, dim;
God fathers-forth—His glory without rank:
            Praise him.

- D. Benning
Originally written in Oct 2009
 

UC Davis, December 2014, © D. Benning

The Fog

Rom 8:22 – We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.

Wispy, wavering, silvery light—
The fog stealthed in on feet of padded soft:
Laughing, crying, whisp’ring—at time scoffed—
Shrieking silence with her ghostly bright,
She draped the landscape with a deathly white;
And cast about in passion she would oft
Rain upon the earth a dew so’s not
To let it swell and whelm within her tight.

So tenderly the earth draws close the shades
That cover up the windows of her eyes;
And in the dazzling darkness she undresses,
Lays down, and with silent serenades,
She lulls herself to sleep with quiet cries—
There hides her shame and prays for perfectness.

The Fog at UC Davis

The Unseen Commander

 

Before me was encamped the enemy.
  His hosts were ready and prepared for war.
  I cried to my Lord and my Captain for
A plan of counsel to leave them with no plea
Except their ultimate destruction. But he
  Responded, "Wait." "Wait?!" cried I, "Whatever for?
  The enemy is arrayed right now for war
And you say 'Wait'? "Yes," said he, "by this tree."

So I waited there amid the trees of balsam
  And wondered what my Lord had thought to do.
  The enemy began to march. "I'm through,"
I thought; when there above me stirred a calm.
      He was marching in the tops of the trees
      And said: "Rise up. I've given to you your enemies!"

---II Sam 5:22 - 28

- D. Benning