Tag: beauty

Early Evening Glory

On By Anna EastlandIn Photos6 Comments

Last week, after a vivacious spring day of intense showers interspersed with golden sunshine pouring through steely grey clouds, I snuck out while my kids were having their bedtime snack to drink in the early evening glory of the garden.    

       

I love the peppery purple scent of lupins…they always make me think of high school graduation because they were blooming abundantly in our back yard when I was finishing grade 12. We took pictures of me in my velvet green ( :> !) grad dress in front of a pink, purple and blue sea of lupins in our garden. 

        
Everything is glorious after the rain…the delicate ferns curling their fingers artistically…the billowy cotton candy clouds that look so bouncy and fluffy you could surely dance on them, if you could only get up there….the little pansy playing peekaboo underneath the blooming thyme bush.
Is it any wonder, with a garden like this (I take no credit; it’s my green-thumbed and maybe even fingered landlord) that taking out the compost is my favourite chore? 

  

  

Wishing you all a beautiful Mother’s Day Weekend, with many flowers and gorgeous sunsets! 

Curl Up With Me

On By Anna EastlandIn Poetry5 Comments

 
There are days when everything feels like so much

and I hide from You, Lord,

thinking I have nothing good to say about all this

and can’t deal with anyone else.

But when I hide under the covers

seeking the solitude of sleep,

I discover You there,

waiting like a loyal, warm cat

ready to just curl up and be with me.

And then I open the eyes of my heart a little

and start to see you everywhere…

in a single star in the early evening sky

in the eternal beauty of a long low bank of gray clouds on the horizon

in the tiny green shoots of sweet peas bravely emerging from the soil

and in the purple blossom of my flowering Josephine plant

saying, “I am here, I am here.”

Little Enough to See

On By Anna EastlandIn Family Life, Photos4 Comments

You would think having children would make you look down at the ground where they are, and be very grown-up and practical.

But actually, having children teaches you to be little enough to walk under trees and stare up at the blossoms in wonder. 

         

Such lush abundance couldn’t go uncelebrated!

Stars Tremble Brightly

On By Anna EastlandIn Poetry2 Comments

Outside tonight it’s chilly

and so windy the treehouse rattles 

and creaks.

The very stars tremble brightly

in the deep, dark blue of the sky.

I wonder how the earth looks from up there,

a patchwork quilt of cosy lights,

a humming globe of life 

burning in the darkness.

tiny bricks of beauty

On By Anna EastlandIn motherhood, Poetry12 Comments

Have you had the chance to do much art lately?

I ask my artist friend as she chats 

confidentially with her toddler on her lap,

which is blossoming with baby belly

under her bright pink shirt.


Not too much, she replies, 

Just surviving and getting ready for baby,

but looking forward to nursing as a time for inspiration.

Yeah, I reply, It’s that quiet contemplative time 

that is the source of inspiration for sure.

An openness to the divine, she replies, 

That’s where art comes from.


I want to tell her that right now 

she is cooperating with the most divine creation there is—

that of a human life—the artistic triumph of the world, 

a piece of art that is by its very nature immortal

but I get interrupted by one of my kids who needs a new towel.


So I can’t tell her that she is weaving with sinews of love

painting with brushstrokes of hope

writing with stories strung on tiny ropes of DNA

forging new paths for faithfulness

strengthening family bonds with tiny bricks of beauty

cells diverse and unique 

splendidly forming into 

a new child of promise.


  

The Consolation of Beauty

On By Anna EastlandIn Photos3 Comments

Since sorrow hit my heart I’ve become more of a photographer. I hoard the consolation of beauty the way a dragon does pearls.   

There is something about the ruggedness of naked branches, tangled and bare, but alluring, that speaks to me. They seem to say, “We have been stripped of everything but hope, and though we seem lifeless, sap pulses within us, and new buds will sprout again from our fingertips.”

  

     

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