The Feather Touch of Joy

It comes to me softly, like the feather touch of joy. I have awakened in the deepest part of the night, body suddenly an oven. Moonlight silvers the leaves outside the bedroom window, making them skitter like minnows in a great black sea. I have emerged from some deep dream -- there is something -- something like a warm room.

My grief has awakened with me, strong in the early morning quiet. I watch it swell. Just so. It is hard work and it makes me feel brittle and tired. But behind it I can feel the prayers of my friends, a weaving of support and love like hands linked all around my soul.


That warm place. I feel it now like a small point of golden light, no bigger than my hope. I chase after it as I lie in the darkness, and suddenly I am inside.

It is not a room. It is somewhere apart from space. It is as though I am held by some mammoth person. I feel his arms around me -- it is a "he" -- protective and comforting. This shocks me back into my quiet nighttime bedroom. It is truly novel; I don't think it has ever happened to me before, not at least that I remember; that a man has held me in this way.

Amazed, I return to my imagination. I am leaning against a huge chest. Arms still hold me and the deep booming beat of a heart is in my ear. Tears leak from my eyes as I recognize that aspect of Father I never knew -- or knew before speech, before abandonment.

Revelation follows, in the way of such moments, in a cascading series of understandings. I realize that The Father can be warm rather than judgmental, that he can claim me as his own. Perhaps this is the attraction in God the Father -- an image of God I've never before appreciated. He stands in a different relationship with me. The Mother offers nurturing, life, dance, connection, the power of holy anger, home and a place to which to return. The Father offers understanding and forgiveness. Having a Father, I suddenly have a place to stand in community -- and that leaves me with much less to do, much less to prove. I have never felt shielded quite like this before.

Behind me a voice rumbles like thunder, "I am proud of you, and pleased with you."

This meets some need in me so basic that I can barely stand it. A hard knot inside me releases. I suddenly realize I am feeling very little -- the little kid in me wide-eyed and totally vulnerable. "If you are just a product of my wishful thinking," I say to the great force behind me, "I will kill you." I recognize the absurdity of this statement but can't think of anything else to promise.

I hear an ozone-creating boom of laughter. "Dream on, bucko," says the huge voice.

I have a feeling that much more will come. For now it is just enough to feel the arms around me and the beat of the heart. I think of my son Mike, how when he was very little he used to lean against me as though I were a deck chair, arms folded behind his head and legs crossed. He'd tell me stories as he reclined there.

I think of sitting in this warm place as though it were a deck chair. I think of leaning back, arms behind my head, and telling stories. Something about how totally comfortable I feel with that image makes me grin. I drift back to sleep from that warm place, that tickling feather touch of joy.