It is winter time and above freezing, as the sun starts down in the western sky. I am staying in the mountains near Cast, in a warm Farm House with warm people. It is the day before the start of hunting season and everyone is ready to scout out the possibilities. I am a watcher and lag behind soaking in the beautiful scenery that is all around the house. 

I enjoyed seeing the four wheeler flying along between the trees, mostly hidden except for the orange caps on the hunters and the guns pointed up in the air. 

I walk and then sit between big hay-bale’s. I sit up straight, for a while,  then roll over and do legs up the bale and finally lie on the ground,  in my feathered coat, as I watch the evening lights change. The wind is blocked by the mothering bales of hay. 

All the while I am doing mantra, praying and trying for silence, as I sit in the silence in a place where the only sound now is the distant caw of a crow or the wind rushing leaves up into the air and making them fly like birds.

In my prayer I become pointed towards God asking for connection in a relationship where love is the goal.

The Mountain between me and the sunset becomes blue black and blacker still, as the sun gets ready to go behind the mountain. Above the mountain the sky becomes a paleness of blue green full of peacefulness that connects with my soul. This brightness juxtaposed with the black mountain beneath pulls me out into the light. I get up with my walking stick and cannot leave off looking towards the pale blue westerly direction, where gold flecks bounce on an orange clump of cloud.

I am tapping into that time of day when the sun goes down and many peoples of many persuasions make sure they are outside to partake of the sacrament of releasing into, letting go into the darkness of night, bringing with them the glorious glimpses of a heaven pulled back too late.

The time for prayer and mantra and the receiving of an awareness is in this interval before the western gates close.

The interconnectedness between people, be their friend or enemy roll into me from out of that pale blue green light, hitting my heart door ajar a little – just enough for me to see that I can send love to my loved ones and especially to the best of my enemies.

When I send love out in this way I am lifted out of my mundane world and like the grey clouds,  something in me is struck with a golden light of God, the long time sun shines upon me and all love surrounds me. 

Next afternoon I sit in the south facing porch and stare over at the bales trying to regain the awareness I got from the sunset strip of the blue green last evening.

Is it that the love of God I send, strikes out of me and boomerangs back?

Is it that the recipients are lit up by the light of God and that light answers in them?

Is it that my light answers to the light that is my inheritance, hidden except now?

I am my brothers keeper. We were all spit out in the same breath from God and given free will to be on the mountains dumb struck by the beauty all around, as we ask to be held in what is our only refuge. 

I catch away from the world of opinion and from the cares of the world into a rapture right there in the evening light. Was it that the love I received from God strikes me, my hands and my feet and all my bones?

Was it a glimpse(from a dream)of a lively white ridges on my big toe reclaiming the light of God?

As I finished up my meditation after the sun is set, I glimpsed two does that climb the knoll near me, turning around to show me their leaping tails, up and down in the falling dusk,  I too turned around hoping to keep myself open in my heart and to know, that is the only requirement for life, for connecting with my sole(soul) refuge. 

Long May you love. Long May your love be. May your longing bring you into love as deep as the valleys in West Virginia and as deep as outer space and make your heart open into the love that dances with the leaves and brings a movement and motion into you that loves you all the way. 

And now as I sit now on Sunday Morning, a week later, in a silent and focused mood, those mountains flash into my inward eye, summersaulting me into the bliss of solitude, filling my heart with pleasure of feeling and seeing and dancing again with the deer in the mountains in the breath of my Lord, my soul’s refuge.

Pray for me and I am praying for you. Collectively we are bringing something together that is strong, that is fearless, that is in love.

Love from Rose.