Movement

We've gone to the park.
Cool breeze and warm sun,
first day of summer,
the softball leagues have begun.

The noisy kids play while the trees,
their leaves in the wind, are rustling
high on their branches, green and full,
swinging and swaying, hustling and bustling.

It's a wonderful time,
a day for the senses,
the sun and the breeze on my skin.
The players yelling, "swing for the fences!"

At a weathered and worn picnic table I sit.
And the world is clear on this summer day.
Black ants run on the table while I write.
Nature is alive, action and movement, motion and play.

I'm rather immobile and not by choice.
Something about movement is a trait of life.
The oak, under which I sit, is able to move in the wind.
And down the road as she runs, I'm able to see my love, my wife.

I used to run, compete, and play.
But stillness is good, at least for me.
A time to reflect: creation, nature, gift upon gift,
by not moving, allowing grace to set me free.

Don't we all ask for the reason we're here?
It is not in doing, accomplishing things,
that we were created and made.
But it's just in being, that like a bell rings;

clanging in our depths,
the peal of the bell rings bright and true,
through fog and storm, through light and gloom.
to lead me as I sit, sometimes blue.

The depths are dark, dank and deep.
And so, like these ants, the trails seem trackless.
Wandering, wondering, is this the right path?
Afraid to move, uncertain and scared I confess.

My spirit is free and it can still fly.
So in my stillness, on this breezy day,
I can enjoy the ants, the trees, the game on the field.
For movement now escapes me, it's gone away.