Awe, Wonder & Wild Animals

I once read an article in the Huffington Post called “Americans May Be Getting Less Religious, But They’re Feeling More Wonder” (1/26/2016), and it defined “awe” as:

[Having an] encounter [that] is so expansive and mind blowing that it nudges you to change the way you process the world.

For me, there are few things which can inspire awe and wonder as quickly and reliably as being in the presence of wild animals.

 

Just seeing them causes my jaw to drop, my eyes to widen, and all the usual chitter-chatter of my mind seems to just mysteriously disappear.

I know I’m not alone in this, hence the popularity of places like The Bronx Zoo in New York and Animal Kingdom in Florida, but I must say I am curiously surprised at the profound effect these magnificent animals have on me when I am fortunate enough to have an encounter with them in one of these controlled settings.

I think it is because, when I am looking with amazement at these live wild animals,  I find my hyper-active use of intellectualizing, both as an endeavor and a defense mechanism, seems to get over-ridden; it’s like the effect of these animals on me is actually much more emotional and physiological than cognitive, leaving me with a feeling of my heart swelling with admiration and inspiration.

I know there is much debate about what to call these types of moments in our lives. 

Some call it mindfulness. Others call it flow. And still others call it spirituality. 

I say, call it whatever you want, but for heaven’s sake, notice it when it is happening.

The 20^th century theoretical physicist Albert Einstein (1875-1955) is often quoted as saying in 1930:

The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of all true art and science.  He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead, a snuffed out candle. 

These nearly century-old words have deep resonance for me because I truly do feel more alive in my own body when I bear witness to the wildness of these animals, and for this reason, it is a pantheistic experience to witness the majesty of a live gorilla, tiger, giraffe, or an elephant because I do sense the encounter as a portal in to god or the universe of which I am an itsy-bitsy, yet significant part.

Below I have included some photos I’ve taken in the past couple of years of these wild animals that I like to look at time and again when I am having a bout of feeling disconnected, or what Albert Einstein called “snuffed out.”  

[Please note, I know it would always be better for these animals to live freely in their own habitats…]

 

 

 

Poetry 151: The Gift

The Gift
 

Sweetheart,

open your eyes.

Look at me.

I

see

you.

Poetry 150: Consistency

Consistency

 

Only the paradox comes anywhere near to comprehending the fullness of life.

-C.G. Jung

There is sincere

relief and pleasure that

the small bird nest is built

outside my window

once again.

Filled with another family

of robins in this

early spring, in the

exact same branch

that perfectly

held the eggs last

year till hatch.

It seems like

such a gift

of consistency.

 

Because unlike

the reliance

of the robin,

I myself,

am a mess of

contradiction.

Calm and restless.

Hopeful and despairing.

Joyful and melancholic.

Here and gone.

On the other hand,

maybe I am

just honest?

Because it

seems to me,

to live in paradox,

is to live in truth.

And being whole

means being free.

So let me then

be inconsistent.

Let me be a

child and a mother.

A student and a teacher.

Human and divine.

-Me

Poetry 149: Tides

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final.
Don’t let yourself lose me. 
-Rainer Maria Rilke


Tides

The flowing water

moves in and out
like a current
in the canals
of my heart.

First filling,

filling, filling up;
then draining,
out into emptiness.

It is tidal,

rhythmic.

But I forget that.

Oh, how I forget

there will be
a next time, and
how excruciating
when that scaly,
bottoming-out
comes like a
drought that leaves me
feeling heavy as molasses,
yet bone dry.

How can it be, I think,

when just yesterday
I was riding
the wind into tomorrow?
And now, there is not
a  hint of breeze
within a 2,000 miles radius.

Now, the air

is thick and the night
is long, all I
I want to do
is crawl under this
desk and rock
the blackness away.

Though it is

true, there
is great freedom
for one who travels
alone, there is
equal sorrow.
Because in the
emptiness
I want to cry out,
but, like the canals
that run through me,
the tear ducts dried up long ago
when I realized nobody
would come.

For nobody

tells you about the day
after you take
the road less
traveled by,
with its extreme
loneliness when
the tides have receded
once again.

God bless the Chinese food,

the news feed,
the clothes from
the consignment store-
they can take the edge off.
But the underlying
vacancy will remain
until the moon shifts
position and the droplets
of hope begin
to flood
the heart again.

I must try to

remember that
the ebb and flow
of the tides
will never stop
while I live in this
plane on consciousness;
I know too,
they will not
destroy me.

Not this thirst.

This hunger.
This horrific ache.

Like the earth

Mother and her
flowing waters,
I will forever rise again.
And again.
And again.

So will you.

-Me

Poetry 148: Holding Environments

Holding Environments

I’m always surprised
when I feel held.

When the stool
I stand upon, the
chair I sit upon,
the bicycle I
ride upon,
humbly takes
me on for whatever
length of time
I determine I need
for that particular day.

It’s like the prayer
that reads me,
the church that
houses me,
or the rose garden
in the middle
of the city
that welcomes 
my summer evening
picnic- tenderly 
forcing a feeling
of being graciously 
held.

Or the mountain 
who lets me
climb her side,
and the ocean
who has never
turned me away…
Forever holding me
in her transparent
waves of unconditional
embrace, as I rhythmically
float along her bosom
to the sandy shore.

Though inanimate,
still like a womb,
that lovingly
cradles until
the water breaks. 

Time-limited

though a poem, a song,
a work of art may be,
when I’m there,
it feels absolute.
It feels enough
when these objects
of nature, nurture
the soft jewel of
my stardust.

Perhaps it is
our mammalian
DNA that craves
the warm envelopment
of oneness.
But it may be our
our humanity that
can taste it even
while bathing in
the delicious sunlight
on a park bench
in spring.

-Me