Lewis’ Blog

Yesterday morning I found a beautiful feather on the ground—dark gray with a white outline all the way around the rim.  Though the feather itself was not cold, my fingers felt cold when I picked it up.  I noticed then that there was still blood in the quick, as if the feather had been torn from some bird before it was time.  Today, I learned that my cousin John died yesterday morning.

A house in a desert, very dry. Blighted land and dry sticks, no  trees. An empty place. Things must grow here, things grow everywhere, but you can’t tell. It looks empty. There is a house. The details are gone. There is a house, but no features. Just a place where somebody lives. It sits in a desert, alone. The inhabitant is abstract. The house is undefined. The landscape barren.

Here the only thing we can have is belief. We must believe that the man in this desert can become something. Otherwise the scene is boring. Not even terrible or sad, but simply not worth our while – a chronically alone man with no relation to you, so you don’t think of him.

But the vision may stay, and this staying is because we must believe in the potential of this man to become something more than this. A friend, a father, he may plant a tree, he may harvest its fruit. Even if he were to smile, that would be enough.

We do not need to wait and see, but we must believe.

The ravens and the astronauts
Will meet someday in space
And then
We’ll know who’s boss.