A tractor is humming with solemn duty — one of the goats must be buried before nightfall, before the coyotes descend. As I watched the farmhand carefully haul the goat from the adjacent field, the flock of sheep, a whole menagerie of beings, seemed to gather as a minyan in focused attention as their companion departed.
The farm is peaceful in early light, afternoon rain, and evening sleepiness. This place is a labor of love. But there is a ragged toughness too—rough hands and leathered skin, toiling and turning the soil with tools. There is loss and birth, winters of grey and biting salty wind, then the bursting of color with spring and the summer days with endless light.
Just before the tractor began its morbid movement, my son was nestling his face in fresh cut flowers, smelling each one and commenting on the different scents. Yes, I thought. As the saying goes (as cliched as it is) remember to smell the flowers, amidst this fleeting life. Don’t just admire them from afar—investigate and delight, protect and bless!
Lord of the springtime, Father of flower, field and fruit, smile on us in these earnest days when the work is heavy and the toil wearisome; lift up our hearts, O God, to the things worthwhile—sunshine and night, the dripping rain, the song of the birds, books and music, and the voices of our friends. Lift up our hearts to these this night and grant us Thy peace. Amen.—W.E.B Du Bois
Reflections by Rabbi Kim 