What Is Life?

By Phil Wood

Now for something completely different: a psalm inspired by the clematis that grew in our garden last summer. I highly recommend psalm writing. It teaches contemplation and engages you with your creator. 

 

What is life, Lord?

From nothingness to far flung, fiery stars

you made the universe: elements, energy,

atoms, solar systems, and something

different than all these things. Life.

From cold spring ground, through slender,

tender shoots, life climbs upward

grasping every vantage point

exploding into blazing purple stars.

And I am alive to see it,

enchanted by its hues.

Out of nothing I came into being,

from microscopic big bang to full-blown living soul,

blossoming into something beautiful

yet to be revealed.

And I am conscious of this happening,

dumbfounded by its mystery.

Teach me, Lord, to grasp the vantage points

and secure each stage of growth,

that I may know life to its fullest

and be all you created me to be.

Unfathomable is your universe, O God.

It stretches beyond my ability to see

even through the eye of Hubble.

The light from Icarus

the farthest star yet known

traveled nine billion years
to reach my eye

and reveal your boundless love.

And I am alive to see it,

astounded by its message.