Journal of Sacred Work

Caregivers have superpowers! Radical Loving Care illuminates the divine truth that caregiving is not just a job. It is Sacred Work.

About

Former President & CEO of multiple hospital systems and founding president & CEO of 20-hospital OhioHealth, best selling author, film artist, ordained minister, composer, published poet, syndicated T.V. host, trial attorney, federal prosecutor and Municipal Court Judge. Erie is internationally known as the founder of the Radical Loving Care(R)movement. He also heads Erie Chapman Foundation, Dane Dakota Productions, LLC, and Chapman Health International, Inc.

About

Spring?

March 8, 2007

Fortunately, flowers aren’t interested in the calendar. They listen to another song. Anxious to enter
this world, the daffodils in our garden aren’t waiting for the call of March 21 or the music of the Vernal Equinox. One of them is inching her face out of her green wrapping like a turtle sneaking a peek from underneath the shell that is his home or a serpent nosing the air. She will be full-born in days. Her older sister (below) has already made the leap.
More poetry is written about spring than any other time of the year. It is the season of hope. So it’s a special challenge to conjure phrases that have any chance of improving on those already written. Memorable for me are the images (and strange line breaks) created in e.e.cummings immortal poem, "in just," that begins:…

in Just-

spring when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman
whistles far and wee
Cummings, like all great poets, seeks to awaken us from our set ways of thinking. He plays thoughtfully with our frozen ideas of grammar and spacing, all the while inviting us to look with new eyes at the world as it births itself anew.
We can all say we’ve seen spring before because we have. But we have not seen this spring. We have not seen this daffodil emerge in exactly this way.
Today is Chanelle’s thirteenth birthday. It will be her last. She will celebrate it with family, friends and staff at Alive Hospice. I’m glad the flowers have begun to bloom here in Nashville for Chanelle’s final spring.
For e.e.cummings, spring was a "mud-luscious," "puddle-wonderful" time decorated with balloons. Language like that enriches our spring, whether it’s our last or not. Here is cummings poem in its entirety:

in Just-
spring when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman
whistles far and wee
and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it’s
spring
when the world is puddle-wonderful
the queer
old balloonman whistles
far and wee
and bettyandisbel come dancing
from hop-scotch and jump-rope and
it’s
spring
and
the
goat-footed
balloonMan whistles
far
and
wee

Happy Birthday, Chanelle!

-Erie Chapman

Posted in Meditations

8 responses to “Spring?”

Karen York

March 8, 2007

Thank you for the note to Chanelle and for the call to celebrate this Spring as though we have never experienced Spring before.

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Mary Jean Powell, MSW

March 8, 2007

The daffodil is so lovely. And the story of Chanelle is so heart-breaking! Thank you to people at hospice who give this kind of care.

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Tom Knowles-Bagwell

March 8, 2007

As I reflect on your meditation this morning, Erie, I find myself coming around to my “supposed-to-bes.” I mean, how are things “supposed to be?” When are daffodils supposed to emerge? How are poems supposed to be written? How many birthdays are children supposed to have?
Through the years, many of my “supposed-to-bes” have changed. Sometimes that change has been fairly quick and easy, like when are daffodils supposed to emerge. Other times the change is gut-wrenching and awful, like how many brithdays are children supposed to have? But every time I get reminded that I am not God. And actually, that’s always a good thing for me to remember.

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Jan Jones

March 8, 2007

How wonderful of you to celebrate Chanelle – thank you, Erie.
Jan

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liz Wessel

March 8, 2007

Last night we gathered in intimate circle to read and share ourselves, as women friends sometimes do. Emerging theme; how our minds’ set patterns of thinking and perceiving lead us down the same old path of predictable end results. Ever hopeful, each in our own way are experimenting by shaking things up a bit. New choices, changes within, leading to surprisingly lovely responses from those close. Spring awakens!
I hold Chanelle close in my heart today, on this her 13th birthday. May her beautiful young spirit flower as the pictured daffodil to reveal her true essence as pure love. May she know in her every fiber of being how much she is loved. And may she receive her heart’s desired gift and special blessings in her every moment of now.

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Diana Gallaher

March 8, 2007

One of my most magical (mystical) experiences from childhood occurred after a spring rain, playing with my cousin Celeste, with daffodils blooming along Otter creek. Happy birthday, Chanelle. I hope you have wonderful, magical memories too. May love, joy, and peace fill all your days.
Diana

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Diana Gallaher

March 9, 2007

Here is a link to a story that ran in today’s Tennessean re: Chanelle’s birthday party.
http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070309/NEWS01/703090399/1001

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liz

March 10, 2007

Thanks Dianna, I appreciate catching a glimpse of Chanelle via the photo.

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