All Creatures

Francis Walter presided at the Episcopal memorial service for a friend today. When Francis first met me, I was a child, perhaps 9 years old. My mother made the stole he wore when he became a priest. Francis did not know Mary, the deceased woman memorialized this afternoon, but after the service and spreading of her ashes in Abbo's Alley, he said he wished he had. He would have liked her, he said, and I know he would have, and she him.

Mary and her husband lived in New Orleans in the early 1970s; he even enrolled in the same degree program in which I earned a degree at Tulane. She knew an artist then with whom she worked. When I first met Mary here in Sewanee and she learned of my years living in New Orleans, she asked if I knew that artist. I did. I had worked with her, too.

As of this afternoon, part of Mary is now part of Abbo's Alley, one of my favorite rambles for photography. I will run across her often, and I will marvel at the forest garden in which she has been planted. And I will think of the hymn we sang for her:

All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful,
The Lord God made them all.

Each little flower that opens,
Each little bird that sings,
He made their glowing colours,
He made their tiny wings.

All things bright . . .

The purple-headed mountain,
The river running by,
The sunset, and the morning
That brightens up the sky.

All things bright . . .

The cold wind in the winter,
The pleasant summer sun,
The ripe fruits in the garden,
He made them every one.

All things bright . . .

He gave us eyes to see them,
And lips that we might tell
How great is God almighty,
Who has made all things well.

All things bright . . .

I don't know about divinity, but I do believe in little flowers and little birds, purple-headed mountains and rivers running by, pleasant summer sun and cold wind in winter, and eyes to see and lips to tell.

All things are bright and beautiful, especially those mysterious connections that weave us together as one.