A Psalm for the Charles

Yes... I know that this is the non-church blog.  Still, this is more about nature and spirituality than anything else and that is really what this is about.  I am taking a course/workshop online about ecojustice and ecological literacy for religious leaders.  We had an assignment to write a "psalm of praise" for our local social ecosystem.  The "praise" part hung me up a bit because humans--even well-meaning ones--make quite a negative impact on the environment wherever they live...and that is pretty much anywhere.

But this is what I came up with after taking the kayak out on the Charles River (Quinobequin in Algonquin).  I could praise the river and the life it supports, and the people who are fighting to restore and protect it...

April on The Charles: A Psalm of Praise   
by: Adam Tierney-Eliot

Praise God for the awakening of creation
In the In the temperate biomes of New England
In the Inland marshes and deciduous forests of Massachusetts
In the fertile valley of the meandering Quinobequin

Praise God in all the miraculous wonder
That emanates from its waters
From the kin-dom of animals;
The turtles;
     Both sliders and painters
          Rolling off the logs at another's approach
The rustling on the banks of new life;
     Of Rodents and their predatory foxes
          finding their place by the water
The swans on their nest,
The geese (mostly Canadian),
And mallards on the river current
     Searching for insects darting under the surface
And in the air;
The red-tailed Hawk,
The Herons hidden away
     Waiting for their fish,
And the frantic flight of the red-winged black bird
     Reveling in the new growth
          Of new buds and insects on the old decomposing logs

Praise God for the kin-dom of plants, too;
Growing river grasses pushing up amid the spindly burning bushes
     on the wet, spongy soil
          Too new to know their names
And the first buds on the pines, the maples,
The milkweed,
The native skunk cabbage
     That thrives early on Quinobequin’s banks

All these many organisms and more
Diverse yet overlapping helping, feeding, being fed upon
Native, non-native, and invaders
In a constant cycle of life, death, and new life
Each organism reaching out to others
     Both hostile and hospitable

Praise the power of life and wildness
    To flourish in the cramped confines
         Of human sprawl
And praise the river-keepers
And dam-breachers
     Working for its return
          Walking onward toward reconnection
              To the ecosystem no living thing can escape

Praise God for the power of creation
From the small local habitats
To the grand biomes
That ebb and flow
According to the shifting
Of temperature, water, light, heat and cold

God’s creation is beautiful in its complexity
And its interconnection

Beautiful Creation in its complexity
   We are connected and interconnected

Praise for all God’s people
Praise all God's beings
     Who also praise and act
          And bring us closer
To the divine universal interconnection

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