Places I Would Rather Be

I wish I were this lake, this house beside the lake, this fine serenity.

It all comes together, comes to that.  I’ve been practicing a Lake Meditation, in which you envision a favorite lake somewhere (I usually choose Lake Como, sometimes Lake Louise), and its constant changes of mood (reflective, ruffled, sunlit, holding moon and stars, birds and clouds, lights of passing boats or processions), through all of which it remains enduringly itself, deeper and stiller than all of those.  And then you see yourself as lake; you feel what’s surface and what’s depths.

So now I am this quiet place, this June retreat, holding a family of sisters, maybe, or a lone writer.  May Sarton or Virginia Woolf, recovering from a loss, walking a dog three times a day, baking savory scones with scallions, gruyère, goat cheese, apples.  Making sorrel soup.

image:  House by the Sea, Michele Cascella (Italian, 1892-1989), Seven Arts Friends