Long Walks On Leafy Streets

5/13/2014 Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge, Wells, ME (Thanks to Nicole)
It feels like the birds could not stop singing during the past few days. I guess they are in a rush to find a mate! As I write this I can hear all sorts of birds calling around my house. I wish I could identify them all!
Although the semester is over and teaching duties have ended I still feel a bit pressed. There are many tasks I would like to finish by the end of this month, including typing up and submitting a paper that I had been working on for the past several years. Next month is the quadrennial world cup of soccer and I really want to watch as many of the games as possible. But at the same time I feel a bit of fatigue and the need to take a break of a week or two as I did last year, visiting Harper's Ferry and hiking every day and writing about it on these pages.
I am also feeling a little anxious about what is going on in India.
The elections just ended and the results will be announced this friday. I am hoping that people who care about the poor and minorities will come to power. To add to that is the continuing stream of bad news about the environment and climate change.
At times like this nature is my true refuge. Even though I live in the city there are ways in which I can connect with nature. On thursday morning I went for a run on my usual route. The streets were quiet and I decided just to enjoy the scenery and run at a comfortable pace. Running helps in refreshing the body as well as clearing up the mind. I enjoyed looking at the variety of plants and trees blooming in the yards of Takoma Park.
That evening I went for a very slow walk. I sat down by a brook in Spring Park, at the corner of Elm and Poplar streets. The sound of running water is always calming to the mind. I just sat there for a while, listening to the stream and watching the water cascade down the stone steps smoothed by the passage of water and greenish with moss.
Near that corner they had posted a poem by W. S. Merwin and another by Ted Kooser. Both talked about the beauty of plum blossoms in the night. This is part of the poetry project of Takoma Park. There are poems posted at various places on the streets. A poem is always a beautiful thing, taking your mind from the mundane and for a moment lifting it to a place of wonder and fantasy. These two poems were especially beautiful.
I posted the Merwin poem on the message board of the Nature Lovers Meetup that night. You can read it by clicking on the little photo at the top left of this page, then clicking on Meetup, then Discussion and then message board. The poem was posted on the ninth of this month. It starts like this: "Years afterward in the dark in the middle of winter I saw them again the wild sloes on the terraces flowering in the small hours..." The words take one's breath away. The lyricism, the wistful evocation of memories and fantasy...It takes you to a place deep within your soul, away from everyday worries, a place that you used to spend more time in when you were very young.
It is amazing how a little bit of time with nature and with poetry can refresh and calm the mind. All the worries that I had in my mind during the past few weeks seemed to disappear. I felt like I had returned to the place where it was, several years ago, when there were fewer responsibilities and conflicts. It was a time when there was more thinking about the deeper questions of life and more experiences in nature and imagination. But there is a time for everything. This, I feel, is a time for action. With every passing day the true ephemeral nature of the world and the sheer insignificance and toy-land like feel of our existence impresses itself more and more in my mind. Yet, as Krishna and Gandhi and many others have said, it is important that I act upon those things that I feel are important, to protect what I think needs to be protected and help those who need our help.

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