On September Spaces

Does space surround us, or is it through us? Not only universal space, worlds exploding, fragmenting, flaming, but local space as well. The spirit of the person meets the spirit of place, the genius loci. Sometimes it’s not who you are but where you are.

September spaces may be places of safety, places of sense. True spaces appointing the seasons, not truth as an arm of power. Not space as a stage for violence.  Breathing spaces, breathing as a privilege. Sacred spaces, cathedrals and landscapes, seas and skies. Holy spirits.

But the past is not past, fragments are everywhere.

Haunted spaces, that hosted scenes of desperation, inspiration, adoration, abuse, conflict, obliteration, loss. Inhabited by people you knew, now at their eternal rest, spaces negligent and void. New inhabitants. New stories, new conversions, new myths. Space for the crimes of this age.

The genius walks with you; we call her the guardian angel. Given by your ancestors, whatever you think of them now. Ask yourself, anywhere, what is my role in this space? Building, interpreting, extending, imploding, ascending. Find out where you are. Who am I in this place? Here as a witness, here to engage, here in God’s liminal space.