Some keep the Sabbath by riding their bike

Ten o’clock Sunday morning. July 15, 2012. Out on my bike following the rail trail through woods and past farms and the occasional ashram.  Quiet morning, Along most of the first part of the ride the only noise was the whistling, shrieking, chipping, and meowing of catbirds.   Along the bottom quarter of the trail where the woods open up into damp meadows and muddy fields it was the croaking and buzzing and okalee song of red-winged blackbirds with a few cardinals singing cheerfully from the upper branches of close-in trees shading the path.  In between there were human voices, first a deep, sonorous male and then a chorus of males and females, chanting to drums and a sitar.

I was passing by the Temple of Peace at the Shanti Mindar ashram, “Chanting, Meditation, and Discourse Sunday. 9-12 AM. Kirtan and meditation Saturday 7-9 PM.”  I swung around and stopped by the open gate to listen for a while.

Some keep the sabbath by going to church, some keep it by taking part it a satsang. A certain poet kept hers by “staying at home, with Bobolink for a Chorister, and an Orchard for a Dome.”   I kept mine by riding my bike. 

Comments

[J. Dvorak]

Lovely, Lance. Glad you were able to get out and ride.

[melissa]

I grew up in Virginia. I'm happy where I am in Saskatchewan, but I do miss the Cardinals.

[Lance Mannion]

J.Dvorak, Doc says I got to do it.