Sparrow

Today, I looked outside

and saw a sparrow

perched in its dignified little way

on the leafy branch of a river birch

that I had planted in the marshy, wetland soil of our pasture

a few years ago.

And the feeling that sprung up inside me I can only describe as this:

Shalom.

The peace of the delicate bird finding rest,

the health, the thriving of the tree, planted in just the right spot,

the wholeness of the cyclical pattern of well-being,

the rightness, and beauty, and harmony on display,

the pride that I was somehow part of it all;

bringing healing instead of destruction, restoration instead of ruin,

a glimpse of flourishing, of how things should be:

Shalom.

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