LOOKING STRAIGHT UP

I am lying on my back in the sun staring straight up into a pure Tiepolo Blue sky. It must be nearly 12:00 noon because the sun is directly overhead.

When I lift my cap up off my head and cover the sun with it, suddenly I see an amazing sight. The sky is filled with white cotton-like particles—fluffy bits of pollen carried on the wind. each one sparkling like a star against a white-blue background. The sun’s rays spill over the edge of the brim of the hat giving me a view as if I’m inside a funnel made of pure light, growing narrower and brighter closer to the sun.

The light pours down to Earth in a swirl.

The white particles fly around randomly. "This is extraordinary. "The thought is so strong, I think it almost out loud. "It’s some sort of Godlike vision—something like I’ve heard people say they’ve seen when they die and come back to life. Or something Aldous Huxley might have described after eating psychedelic mushrooms.

But I’m seeing this right in front of me, right above me and I don’t drink or take drugs. The vision transports me towards infinity—almost frightening in its beauty.

Then I see a line—a single, flowing, floating white line, moving across the light blue canvas from right to left. I recognize the line as a piece of a spiders web—light enough to fly with the pollen—a fitting stroke in God’s painting.

Then, as if to ground myself, to be able to make certain what I am seeing is no vision, I turn to look at a rose on the bush beside me. Strangely—or maybe not so strangely—this earth-bound beauty is equally striking.