Persimmons glow against the sky out in the orchard.  A few days ago I picked some that were ready in a strong windstorm and streaming wintry rain.  The persimmons seemed to laugh joyfully as the cold rivulets of water ran from branches and leaped from their lambent orange flesh.  Content with their own inner fires they welcome the cold.  They become soft and yielding in the frost of winter.  Sweetness becomes their voice and my wife and I partake of that in appreciation, marveling at the wonder of it as it arises so gradually, subtly in the brown tangles of winter-battered trees, in the midst of the dormant orchard.

The wonder of a lunar eclipse occurred during solstice this year.  For us, it was hidden behind clouds and the promise of more rain, or possibly snow.  Yet, I was aware it was occurring.  When you consider that somewhere in space there is always an eclipse transpiring (because there is always some vantage from which the sun is behind the earth), you ask what is the real significance of an eclipse of the moon.  It reminds one that the universe winds and spirals like a clock, its gears and flywheels whirring and clicking away, carrying us in these temporary bodies along its way, all caught up in its mighty momentum towards ends and realizations yet to be. It reminds one that a majestic, ruthless force is pushing all things along relentlessly, but it also affirms that there is a harmony, a logos, and a mystical whispering presence within its movement and stillness.

The lunar eclipse is a miracle in consciousness for those who allow themselves to see it.  Like so many things.  Not unlike tiny suns of persimmons emerging from behind a frigid cloud in a forest of dark, barren fruit trees, over a landscape of rotting tattered leaves and black, withered wind-fall. They loom miraculously aloft, like true tree ornaments but so subtly, quietly affirming the ineffable being that unselfconsciously unfolds, hides, and is rebirthed through humble cycles of earthly life.