Through the Gate

The other day I received an e-mail from Don, a college classmate of mine who had just finished reading my book on Thin Places. He had some good comments including the mention that his wife had obtained six additional copies of the book to give to friends. Wow! Thanks. But it was his ending p.s. which really caught my attention. I have always admired Don's special talents. Even our professors saw that specialness, and so often gave him a better grade on communicating certain projects than the rest of us. Maybe we still got better grades than we deserved. But my friend Don always spoke with that certain authority of genuineness that is in itself a source of learning for the rest of us. He still does.

At the end of his comments, he noted two pieces of my writing in the book which really jumped out at him. One was a summary I had made of a poem I had written and included in the book describing my Thin Place experience at Kingsmill, Virginia, a stone's throw from where this Country was born. The other piece was an essay I included at the end of the book entitled "Wellsprings."

His thoughts have become an outline for this and the next blog post here. Below is the poem, then the summary, both from my book, "Thin Places and Five Clues in Their Architecture." My next post here will be "Wellsprings." Thanks Don.

Stale leaves crackled

against the rusty old gate

hung heavy on thick hinges

spiked deep in stubborn piers

near Jamestown, Virginia

hushed in off-season quiet

under a November dawn.

Its iron bars still gate tough,

with rods and hard welds

fixed like an opaque now, while

sensual spaces between bars

pave transparent avenues,

where dreams and time flirt

with the mooring river beyond,

among whispering ruffles, which

tickle tree roots along the shore.

And there, mingled in the mist

guarding its river secrets,

stands the veiled outline of a sailor

silhouetted below the yellow sky

staring across the river slick

at a small ship anchored in the fog

freighted with a handful of seeds,

navigated by gauges of passion,

fueled by winds yet forgotten.

He then leaned to the craft,

hollowed hands at his mouth

and megaphoned a discovery

out to tuned ears on board,

while I stood there mute, peering

through the gate's cold grid,

stretching against today's bind.

"Bring the others!" He shouted

joyfully in English tone with

unquestionable authority,

lofted out at the shadowing ship,

berthed just off shore, and

a few hundred years away.

"And the tools,"

he hollered again, loudly,

bellowing - "This is the place!”

And so it was, soon to be,

when a grandson, now long dead

might have built this 2-way gate,

to divide and separate,

yet open a glimpse of history,

this place to birth a destiny

right here -- through the gate.

We are all a part of a gate to potential Thin Places for others, aren't we?  Thus, we encourage others to look not "at" us for all they will see is rust, broken pieces, bent hinges and other examples of the opaque now.  We hope instead that we may inspire others to see the spaces between the bars, the moments when a light shines through us, to illuminate the transparency of the Cosmic Truth, and His fingerprints all around and through us.

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