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BURNING BUSH FOREST CHURCH
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Rewilding our Souls

Hosanna, save us

4/13/2025

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Small white hepatica flowers among the dried brown leaves on the early spring forest floor.

Hosanna whisper the hepatica,
First ephemerals of the forest floor.

Hosanna groan the elder beach,
Succumbing to disease.

Hosanna sing the nuthatches,
Drowned out by the roar of traffic.

Hosanna proclaim the deadwood,
Offering life to others.

Hosanna spoke the oak,
Matriarch of this place.

Hosanna shouted the stones,
When the people were silent.

- Wendy Janzen

Inspired by Palm Sunday passage in Luke where Jesus says that if the people were silent, then the rocks would cry out, as I listened to the voices of the forest around me on a Sunday afternoon walk through Breithaupt Park. 

Hosanna means "save us."

​

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Winter's Joy

2/12/2025

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Winter's joy comes in fluffy snow
brightening the drab landscape,
pillowy soft to catch my falling body,
sculptable magic inspiring creativity,
insulating life and promise.

Joy comes in howling winds
and stormy weather that shuts
down roads, schools, meetings,
creating space to curl up at home
and the joy of missing out.

Joy comes in the persistent
song of a cardinal in February,
perched high atop a bare tree,
brilliant red against brilliant blue,
singing for love and life.

Joy comes in remembering 
we are enough in who we are today.
we are not our labours.
We are not our achievements.
We are deep, strong, resilient, connected.
We are made for joy.

​- Wendy Janzen
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Slow down

2/10/2025

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Picture
This is my found poetry based on a quote I shared in our February newsletter. Here is the full quote, followed by the poem I created.

"Once we stop wishing it were summer, winter can be a glorious season in which the world takes on a sparse beauty... It's a time for reflection and recuperation, for slow replenishment, for putting your house in order.
Doing those deeply unfashionable things--slowing down, letting your spare time expand, getting enough sleep, resting--is a radical act now, but it is essential."
(Katherine May, in Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times)

My poem:
Slow down.
Stop wishing it were summer.
Winter be a glorious season
the world a sparse beauty.

Time for reflection, recuperation,
slow replenishment.

Do deeply unfashionable things
let spare time expand
get enough sleep.
Rest is a radical act.

​- Wendy Janzen
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I believe

1/11/2025

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(Inspired by a prompt from Pádraig Ó Tuama)

I believe in breath, and sunrises,
in getting handwritten letters in the mail,
in memory and imagination.

I believe in the companionship of trees,
in crows roosting, in the sound of 
water flowing over rocks.

I believe in spring melt, abundance,
colours, texture, silence, and sweetness. 
In candlelight and darkness.

I believe in vastness. In expansive
living skies. In dense fog, shadow, and what 
I cannot see beneath my feet. In gravity.
​

With absolute certainty and
absolute uncertainty, I believe
​
in solace and wonder, in poetry, in God.

- Wendy Janzen

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An Alternative to Self-Care

12/5/2024

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Maybe what we need isn't self-care.
Maybe what we truly need is
grounding, connection, and
entanglement with all that is.
We are not created for
independence or self-reliance.

Maybe we need to open our being
to the gift of life around us, and
remember we are not alone.
We are light and love from others
and for others, our souls nourished
by touch, reaching out in need,
receiving the goodness of 
ordinary beauty
seeping through the cracks.

Celebrate the sun shining on your face, 
water wetting your lips,
gravity hugging you close to the earth,
air filling your lungs,
honey sweetening your tongue,
birds cheering your spirit,
nighttime welcoming your rest,
friends and family surrounding you,
the Divine Presence renewing
and enlivening your spirit.

​-Wendy Janzen
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April Ephemerals

4/14/2024

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Ephemeral
Noun: Something that lasts for a very short time. Something ephemeral. Specifically, a plant that grows, flowers,
​and dies in a few days.


Psalm 103:15-17
As for mortals, their days are like grass; they flourish like a flower of the field;
for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place knows it no more.
But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting.


April Ephemerals
My eyes scan the dead
brown forest floor,
searching for early
emerging ephemerals,
joyous sentinals of spring.
Something about these 
fleeting flowers
calls me back each year
to witness their being.

I recite their names
like a seasonal litany
or an annual reunion 
with old friends:
Hepatica
Cut-Leaved Toothwort 
Dutchman's Breeches
Trout Lily
Bloodroot
Virginia Waterleaf
Blue Cohosh
Rue Anemone
Spring Beauty
Trillium
Thanks be to God!

Yes, I see you,
and I see myself.
Our lives, too, are short.
You show us how to live 
with abandon and to
to let our beauty shine,
trusting the Eternal One,
Beginning and Ending,
to provide purpose 
and grounding,
whatever the length
of our days.

- Wendy Janzen
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Who are You?

2/9/2024

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I am a girl made of stars.

Of water cycled through creeks and rivers,
great lakes, snow, and mud.

Of air exchanged with maples and spruce,
crocuses and goldenrod.

Of soil molecules, microbles, bacteria
and trillions of cells; a community.

Of sun light and wind,
energizing and animating
my every move and thought.

Companion of family and friends,
clouds, cats, crows, and cedars.

Receiving and giving
renewing and aging.

​Who are you?

​- Wendy Janzen
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Murmuration Blessing

12/2/2023

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Oh! What wonder
that I should be graced
to witness a small 
flock of singing starlings
suddenly fall silent,
and as if one body
lift from the branches.
A singularity
floating, swooping, soaring 
to music I cannot hear, but see.
An orchestra with wings.
A drab grey canvas brought to life
with poetic movement.
A performance of the ages, 
with an accidental audience of one
star-struck human awed
by the glory of it all.

Bless you, Starlings, for the 
exquisite wonder and delight
you bring to the world.
Bless you for honouring 
your calling and praising
with your bodies.
Bless you for showing us
the beauty of community
and being part of something
bigger than ourselves.

​- Wendy Janzen
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This Moment

8/6/2023

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Look: See how
the morning sun
touches this 
one patch of 
leaves, just so.
Light, bringing
colour, illuminating
space, drawing
my attention
to this moment.
Now it's shifted,
diffused, 
sun climbs higher,
slipping behind 
clouds.

Had I missed 
this moment,
would anything 
have changed?
So many similar 
fleeting moments,
like the squirrel 
dancing in the 
supple branches 
atop a willow
or the bumblebee
buzzing by on
her way to
breakfast.

This morning,
I pay attention, 
notice the light,
the life, the
intersection of
the universe
and my existence
here in this moment,
in this ordinary place.
I find myself in
sacred space,
and am 
changed.

​- Wendy Janzen
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So Good

7/23/2023

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-Have you ever heard 
the evening song 
of a hermit thrush 
drifting across a still lake?

Their whimsical trills
weave and bounce
through the treetops
and reverberate joy
for living this moment.

I imagine God 
must have been 
so delighted when She 
heard it the first time
that She closed her eyes 
and whispered: so good!

​- Wendy Janzen
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    Author

    Reflections, poetry, prayers, photos, and resources  written by Wendy Janzen unless otherwise noted.
    ​
    This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

    If you are an established church or institution, please consider making a donation when using these resources in addition to attribution. Thanks!

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