Pomegranateless in the Desert

Thus says the LORD: I will lead her into the desert and speak to her heart.” – Hosea 2:16

“And you can’t know a pomegranate without knowing a long season of pomegranatelessness” – Laura Lynn Brown

Blue Christmas

The year wanes; the holidays wax. Today I change my phone’s wallpaper to a photo from our fall trip in 2018 that included a day at Great Sand Dunes National Park. This is where I find myself — in the desert, pomegranateless.

The picture does not show the mountains that are there, just beyond the tallest dunes in North America, in southern Colorado. The picture only shows the sand and the blue, blue sky. The mountains are there, but I have no idea how to reach them.

And yet each day has its happinesses. I have plenty of tea, plenty of pumpkin spice granola bars. Sturdy hiking shoes, a broad hat, and sunscreen aplenty. Each grain around me is a poem, a story.

I’ve been here a long time. When sun assaults, I know where the cottonwoods dwell.

In my photo, five people are black blips, somewhere beyond footprints that trail nowhere. I am not here alone.

My heart is a pomegranate, bursting with sweet arils. From this desert I’ve harvested a feast of words. Each day is beautifulhard and wind-wonderful, so blue.

 

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