The boys upstairs await my final call of “Lights out!” I’m camping out with them in their room this week while my wife and two children are away. They’d much rather read until I come to bed for a few moments of reading myself before nodding off, book in hand.
The days begin to take their autumnal shape as the rhythms of a regular school and work day begin to emerge from the free-form life of summer. I venture back to my classroom for a few hours each day. The list of summer projects glares at me triumphantly from the kitchen desk, with barely one project completed. And I’ve just added refinishing the old church pew I bought for my entryway to the list.
Here, I am reminded to still myself, to sit in the sanctuaries of daily life despite the “miles to go before I sleep.” This is the companion piece to “Meditations: Lauds” written about a month apart back in 2019 … My seven-year-old has just come down the stairs again – for the third time. Perhaps it’s time I ascend the stairs and savor the waning minutes of the day. My deepest thanks to those of you who actually read and respond to these brief moments of deepening. You are a blessing!
Meditations: Vespers
Vincent H. Anastasi - 2019
I drift between the subterranean glow
of the LED cellar lights
and the afternoon summer sun
snooping about my library window.
I descend to kneel
before the sliding compound miter saw,
another prepared board on the altar
momentarily lit by a precise red flame,
the toothed blade held aloft
then plunged in a sudden mechanical wail.
By design I have learned to rend and pierce,
to cope and piece together a sanctuary
where meditations like these can be fostered
or one can simply sit,
windows thrown wide
patiently awaiting an evening repast,
or stretch heavenward, once again,
contented in the barred owl’s dusky lament
and the sun settling down beneath horizon’s sheet.
the deepening ground 