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to Claim

it has been an Odd day.  I could use the word strange,  but that has too much a sense of …..well,  an ominous sense?,  not ominous at all,  but odd and strange.  Not at all ordinary.   

early this morning the word Claim came up.  To Claim something.   As i ready things here for Solstice of this year,  this word,  Claim is what rises.   A time to Claim.   Claim what.  I don't know.  I have NO idea.  But claiming.   it's about Claiming.   Claiming,  i think,  in the sense of acknowledging relationship to,  or maybe even love For.  Or maybe Primary Importance Of.   I don't know.  It's a new thought.

Mo sent me a Mary Oliver….from The House of Light….Singapore.   I took the book off the shelf and looked through the index to find this poem.  Then turned back a page to a poem called Spring.  About a Black Bear just risen from sleep and starting down the mountain.   The entirety of this poem is as Mary O always is….Clear and Stunning,  but it was just this one sentence that  was IT.

"There is only one question:  how to love this world."

and then the concept of Claiming.  The word   Claim.  

I had fed the goats their evening grass hay a little while ago and soon after, it started to rain.  Not a lot,  just light,  but they ran for cover.  And i went back out to the Way Back and turned all 5 feed Bowls upside down over the feed.  I've learned this.  In the past,  it would go to waste because they wouldn't eat it wet.  This way,  when the cloud burst moves,  they come back and i turn the Bowls back up,  pile the feed back in.  

I just now,  This Moment, did this.  And as i was,  the thought came….Claiming the Life that IS.

Not the life that is imagined,  but the life that is happening.  Happening.

Is this it?     ?    ?   

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i found this by the no freeze faucet when hooking on the hose for the Buck Goats.  Could this being have actually LIVED here?  or is it somehow here from somewhere else?   And i noticed that there are actually NEW Iris shoots coming up.   ?

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am going to send Wendy's Kids this dog cloth.  Some things to do,  but it's pretty much It.

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i took the face off this one and Look.  SomeThing Else entirely.  Maybe this is a kind of Claiming?

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there would be dull,  there would be Dark and there would be Light!   Back and Forth.  

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21 responses to “to Claim”

  1. patriciaspangler47@gmail.com Avatar
    patriciaspangler47@gmail.com

    hi Grace. i don’t often catch your evening posts until the next morning…but my oh my…i’m so glad i stopped by. every thing. every single thing you say here. and every single, singular image speaks so powerfully of a life intensely experienced, unwasted. speaks of, as you say, a life claimed. the last image, the light i’m thinking coming through fence slats? it’s a beauty, a keeper, a one-of-a-kind image now etched on my retina. for ever and in all ways.

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  2. grace Avatar
    grace

    this is Good, then.
    and you say
    unwasted.
    Because if unclaimed, it might be wasted. and it can’t be anything but what it is. so….
    thinking
    Claim It. Claim it…as is. As Is.
    that LIGHT from the Rim…in the West…shot through to the EAST of the
    Way Back…through the Goats…..
    I wait for you. Quietly and Patiently, but i am waiting for you. You are important to me. So i wait.

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  3. Michelle in NYC Avatar
    Michelle in NYC

    In all ways you LOVE the world itself, your world, our worlds, or so it seems to me.
    I can not see the cloths for the darkness. Sorry. But oh, the light! Sure can see that breaking through in all those last pictures. They made my spirit which has been laying in, rise up inside my rib cage!
    I came across this poetic description of
    A Day
    by Emily Dickinson
    I’ll tell you how the sun rose, —
    A ribbon at a time.
    The steeples swam in amethyst,
    The news like squirrels ran.
    The hills untied their bonnets,
    The bobolinks begun.
    Then I said softly to myself,
    “That must have been the sun!”
    But how he set, I know not.
    There seemed a purple stile
    Which little yellow boys and girls
    Were climbing all the while
    Till when they reached the other side,
    A dominie in gray
    Put gently up the evening bars,
    And led the flock away.
    This poem is in the public domain.

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  4. Michelle in NYC Avatar
    Michelle in NYC

    PS
    Meant to look up this word:
    dominie |ˈdämənē; ˈdō-|
    noun ( pl. -nies)
    1 Scottish a schoolmaster.
    2 a pastor or clergyman.
    ORIGIN late 17th cent.: alteration of Latin domine! (vocative) [master!, sir!,] from dominus ‘lord’ (formerly used as a polite form of address to a clergyman or member of one of the professions).

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  5. Marti Avatar
    Marti

    What a perfect post in the lead up to Winter Solstice: “Claiming the life that is…” accepting, understanding and honoring the life that is. How many wish for more than there is, or say, wait until, or if only I had this, then I could do that. Thing is, it’s just this one life and as we speak of just going, we can only claim one day at a time AND if you can see the quiet joy and dignity in each day, then that is it. Some days I really have to look but 23 years ago while I waited for the results of a breast biopsy, I told myself, accept what each day brings, no more no less and live it as fully as you can and I’ve tried to do just that…

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  6. Dana Avatar
    Dana

    Laying claim is another way of saying “This is Mine.” This, now, is what I have. My life instead of someone else’s. My choices, my givens, my burdens, and my blessings…I own them all.
    What drama the sun brought for you today. High contrast…darks and brights.

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  7. jude Avatar
    jude

    i like the faceless cloth

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  8. Liz Avatar
    Liz

    Solstice light … beautifully captured … claimed

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  9. cynthia Avatar
    cynthia

    such different light we have in this world that we share..this is so strong and so beautiful..you claim well grace..i am up and about but i keep coming back here to breathe this in..

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  10. Mo Crow Avatar
    Mo Crow

    that light!

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  11. Stephanie Avatar
    Stephanie

    A lovely post, Grace. And the light-filled pictures are beautiful and awe-inspiring. I needed this very much today and am grateful.

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  12. Stephanie Avatar
    Stephanie

    I also meant to say how much I appreciate Michelle’s sharing of the Emily Dickinson poem, too.

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  13. grace Avatar
    grace

    this is GOOD, because we need to let eachother know what matters
    to us…to tell eachother….yes

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  14. grace Avatar
    grace

    YES to let the Light fill our rib cage…i love this thought,
    the Light filling our rib cage

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  15. grace Avatar
    grace

    Solstice. Two days. to Look. to Understand what it is for each
    of Us. Individually. What. Beauty.

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  16. grace Avatar
    grace

    SUN
    i am so in love with SUN.

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  17. grace Avatar
    grace

    i do too. Very much. I look. Thinking. Wondering.
    the faceless

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  18. grace Avatar
    grace

    it’s almost upon us…Solstice….and this year, my love is so
    much even more

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  19. grace Avatar
    grace

    Solstice for you too, there, in that WonderLand of Vermont
    no matter where, it tips

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  20. grace Avatar
    grace

    yes. for me, it is Everything

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  21. grace Avatar
    grace

    thank you Stephanie that it had meaning for you too….that is
    the most i could ever hope

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