"My idea of magic doesn’t have much to do with stage tricks and illusions. The whole world abounds in magic. When a whale plunges out of the sea like a newborn mountain, you gasp in unexpected delight. What magic! But a toddler who sees his first tadpole flashing in a mud puddle feels the same thrill. Wonder fills his heart, because he has glimpsed for an instant the playfulness of life.
"When I see the clouds whisked away from a snow-capped peak, I feel like shouting, “Bravo!” Nature, the best of all magicians, has delivered another thrill. She has exposed the real illusion, our inability to be amazed by her wonders. Every time the sun rises, Nature is repeating one command: “Behold!” Her magic is infinitely lavish, and in return all we have to do is appreciate it.
"What delight Nature must feel when she makes stars out of swirling gas and empty space. She flings them like spangles from a velvet cape, a billion reasons for us to awaken in pure joy. When we open our hearts and appreciate all she has given us, Nature finds her reward. The sound of applause rolls across the universe, and she bows."
Michael Jackson ~ Dancing the Dream ~1992~ Page 50
My heart has been caught up in the concept of Magic for the past couple of weeks. How do we define it? It defies definition. As soon as you try to examine it too closely, it disappears like a puff of summer wind.
As adults, our lives are caught up and glued to some very un-magical activities like putting food on the table and gas in the tank, getting the kids up and dressed for school and making sure they have clean clothes to wear. The belief in magic is a very ‘childish’ thing and our society wants to make sure that we don’t have time to notice the magic that surrounds us in everything we do.
Whenever my heart is caught up in a concept, I write about it … and this week is no exception. This magic thing has me by the shorthairs and won’t let me go until I spill my guts on the subject. So, I’ve written a poem about it:
The Day the Magic Died
Magic is a nebulous concept
It shifts and reforms
Just beyond the comfort of definition
Weighed and measured
It is found wanting
’Til its absence is sorely missed
On the day the magic died
Magic is a newborn’s smile
When the doctor says, “It’s gas”
We know a smile from gas my friend
You don’t even need to ask
Magic is a cloud formation
That reminds of someone known
Floating high above our heads
When all our faith has flown
A breath of life
Flutters on a breeze
Delighting our senses
With gossamer wings
Stained glass tracery of perpetual motion
Until pinned against black velvet
Examined under a microscope
On the day the magic died
How does one define it?
Encapsulate it?
Is it illusion?
Or just confusion?
Unseen but surely felt
It hovers in the periphery of our vision
Gliding, spinning, it remains motionless
At the center of our decision
On the day the magic died
We grasp
Try to hold it still
But it vanishes like smoke
We want it
But reject it still
It’s alien, foreign
To the logical mind
It makes us laugh
It makes us sing
Until the day the magic dies
We love it
But refuse to admit
We need it
It just doesn’t fit
Attempts to group it
With similar kind
Fail and we are left
Bereft
On the day the magic dies
How to rekindle
That lost hope
How to untie
The fraying rope
We bind around our dreams
While burying them deep
Beneath the soil of our
Mundane, pedestrian lives
We keep them safe
While within we weep
For the day the magic died
Magic danced our dreams
Enlivened our souls
Breathed our most secret thoughts
Broke all our molds
Refused
To be defined by our roles
Moonwalked over
Around and through our boundaries
Enchanted
Enthralled
And humbly accepted our applause
Until the day the magic died
Do you remember
Where you were
On the day the magic died?
Since that day
The colors are faded
Our lives are experienced
As somehow more jaded
Less innocent
More sad
Less playful
Were we mad?
How could we reject magic
Wherever we found it
As well to reject the air we breathe
For magic is just another name for life,
For love
And life cannot be buried
Love is not confined in marble crypt
Magic lives forever
In our hearts
When we remember love
Magic is the mustard seed
He planted in our hearts
Magic is his smile we see
When we’re told we have to part
Magic is his laugh we hear
Through the tears we shed in vain
Magic is the song he sings
To chase away our pain
For magic cannot die!
That's what makes it MAGIC!
He tells us over and over again
That we are not alone
He reaches out his hand for us
He waits to take us home.
by Jan Carlson
Copyright (c) 2011
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