humility

This morning, when I went downstairs with Sydney, our lovebird, on my shoulder, and like many mornings, I first went to open the drapes of the living room window, I looked out through the window and through the porch windows and saw two tiny redpolls, one with a big bunch of dried fluff in its beak, the other bobbing expectantly on the wire beside it. The one with a mouthful of earth recyclables, darted straight into the cedar shrub that grows perilously close to the window panes of our front porch, planted years ago by some previous owner much too close to the house. With a flash, the other redpoll also darted into the bush.

I turned to Sydney and said, "Isn't that cute? Did you see that? Those redpolls are making a nest in our cedar bush." Then I put her in her cage.

I pulled downed one of my books off the shelf to find a poem this morning. Harmoniously, the poem that released itself from the spine of the book, mirrored the words of Raymond Moriyama, a renowned Canadian architect, who I heard on CBC radio as I made myself a cup of coffee. He spoke of the effects of having been interred as a Japanese Canadian as an 'enemy alien' in an internment camp in Canada, the racism he faced as a youth, and the lifelong lessons he learned from the earth speaking to him when he made a tree house as a sanctuary from the racism he faced. He spoke about how through his years of escape to his treehouse the earth showed him light, gave him the lessons he learned that guided the principles of the architecture he has designed, and the way he lives his life. He spoke of the 3 'l's": listening, learning, and leading. He also spoke of the words of his grandfather, of a saying his grandfather passed down to him, which translates from the Japanese to English to: "even the monkey falls from the tree." Moriyama says he has kept his Grandfather's lesson of humility in his heart.

The Holy may speak to you
from its
many hidden places
at any time.

The world
may whisper in your ear.

Or the spark of God in you
may whisper in your heart.

My grandfather showed me how
to listen.
~ Rachel Naomi Remen pg. 67 WomanPrayers