More Turning Aside

    Yet wisdom

is at our elbow, whispering,

as at his once: Progress

is not with the machine;

it is a turning aside,

a bending over a still pool,

where the bubbles arise

from unseen depths, as from truth

breathing, showing us by their roundness

the roundness of our world.

(R.S. Thomas 2004)

This notion of “turning aside” has captivated me. It seems to be accompanied by stillness and whispers and mystical ideas like “truth breathing”. As Jesus demonstrated time and again, our notions of direction and hierarchy are imploded and there is an irruption of numinous wisdom, ever present, closer than we knew. 

I knew a mathematician who studied the surfaces of bubbles. He received sizeable grants to do so! I remember being awed by this creativity and merger of science and amazement. I have a picture of our granddaughter mesmerized by a magnificent bubble. She is on the other side of it as though part of it, distorted by it and represented by it. I call it wonder.  

I think I will ponder bubbles today, their colorless colorfulness and their reflections of worlds to be explored.