New Year

The moon, it just sat there tonight,mostly eaten by the old yearand its shadows,the year to come like its bright skinshining, burning away the rest.They say it's God's fingernail,but that's only what we can see of it.In reality, the whole underbelly is bulgingwith lighton the other side of our atmosphere.Anyway, it couldn't be that only … Continue reading New Year

When the Northern Lights Came South

I was down in Arkansas one evening last summer when the storm hit—a great clash in the heavens of solar wind sweeping off the sun’s surface and crashing into our atmosphere. The aurora borealis–a geomagnetic storm–was raging somewhere over the Canadian Rockies, but on a hot evening in Arkansas, things were quiet. We had a … Continue reading When the Northern Lights Came South

Consider the Hummingbirds and the Seas

I remember the way I described the Atlantic Ocean in my letters to Papa Larry from Cape Cod, when we walked the easternmost hem of Race Point Beach with the sea "rising and falling at our sides." But the Pacific, I now realize, does not "rise and fall" like some prim lady curtsying. It cracks … Continue reading Consider the Hummingbirds and the Seas

I’d Hate to Think

I'd hate to think that somedayI could be watching a soap operain a beach motelwhen,outside and across the street,there is a full-bellied moon risingover the crashing tideslike a great, golden peachin a storm-tossed orchard.I'd like to think that somedayI'll be like the man with the long camerawho'dsearched the Internet and watchedfrom his car for weeks,and … Continue reading I’d Hate to Think

Where the North Wind Blows

Sitting across the coffee shop table from her, I cannot see the Spirit of God in her---just as I cannot see the wind that’s whipping up off the cold Missouri river this morning. I do not know where these January gales come from, or where they’ll lie down tonight. They’re sharp, cutting right through my … Continue reading Where the North Wind Blows

Look East

A Story of Christmas Yet To Come Race Point is the easternmost I’ve ever been— in fact, it’s just about as eastward as you can get in the States, at the fingertip of Massachusetts’s arm. It was a strange thing to stand with all North America behind me, to face the horizon of sea, to … Continue reading Look East