Shms

Soul, heart, mind, spirit. Shms. Shmystical shms. The emergent portion of our being. Like the waves on a lake that would not be predicted or possible except for wind. That are not inherent at all in the water itself. That emerge because of certain properties of the water and certain properties of wind. Maybe.

Shms. If emergent in us, in response to what, one wonders. In response maybe to circumstance. Or necessity. Or others. Other humans. Or Other—all that is not us. Or God. God manifest in Other. In Circumstance.

Is there magnitude, one wonders. Is there size or scope. If there is scope, is it measurable or merely qualitatively sensed. Does the scope of one’s shms matter. Or is this a false question. Is all water merely water. All water the same. And the difference between wave height and shape and volume dependent on circumstance, merely.

Dependent on matters outside of us. On activities and material and spiritual realities outside of us.

And is our shms merely our song. How we respond to the day. The song we contribute to all the songs of the forest and the plain and the prairie and the mountain and the swamp and the water and the water’s edge.

Are we merely water given shape, given life, by a mystery maybe. All that is not the water. All that is not the song that we in response provide. That we in response must make, or we find ourselves making. Or we find ourselves in the making of. The song we find ourselves singing and singing. The song and the singing the same one thing. The undivided thing.

I’m reminded of a description of the water-ouzel. A John Muir description, full of wonder. Full of respect. Full of the particular and the general. A description of this odd bird that lives in Sierra waterfalls. According to Muir, each individual sings its own song, somewhat different from all the others. A song that is variable but confluent. Confluent I believe is the word he uses.

Bluish gray. A bit of brown around the head and shoulders. A thrush. A bird that does not chorus with other birds but that sings on its own, in the midst of the beaten spray. The lovely Merced River spray high up, for example. At 7500 feet above the level of the sea. Buried in the water’s roar. Apparently delighted. Singing in the foamy light. Singing in the way gravity takes this dazzling quick water down. But not altogether audible. Altogether distinguishable. From the water music. From the way the water sounds as it rollicks, filling itself full of light and air, as it finds its way to the sea.

Also reminded of Ezekiel. Ezekiel in the Valley of Dry Bones. Ezekiel speaking God’s word to the bones. And the bones assembling themselves. The bones putting on flesh. Flesh made of water that is nowhere in sight. Fleshed bones that turn human with the breath Ezekiel tells to enter them from the four winds. That are brought alive again by the supernal. By Yahweh himself. By his breath out of the four winds and by the speaking of a man. By what Yahweh gives him to say.

I will put my Spirit in you, says Ezekiel-Yahweh, and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the Lord have spoken, and I have done it, declares the Lord, through Ezekiel.

God the miracle worker. Man the miracle worker. This son of man saying merely the words he is so generously and inexplicably and mysteriously and implacably given. Surprised as anyone. Shocked as anyone would be in similar circumstances, I imagine. To see what words. Mere words. Can do. And out of my mouth, he’s thinking. And out of my mouth. Who knows what words may come next. What words he might give me next. To say. To perform. What these might be. Or do.

And so it may be something placed in us, then. Something that is a little like the bird in the waterfall, say. Or the wave in the water. Something enlivening. Something imparted. Something that operates on its own principles but that lives. That has its own existence. Its being. Here in the water. A gift to the water. A gift to the flesh. To the basal, the fundamental, the initial, the elemental, the living, breathing, feeding, defecating, copulating, killing, moaning man. A guest maybe. An honored guest in the humble house of our flesh.