In Scotland the wild goose is an image that goes back to early Christian days. The Iona Community has almost made the metaphor its brand name. Migration as the search for food and home, the costly but lifegiving freedom of flight, the forward lunge of the wings, the honking in unison of a long skein, the collaborative use of the slipstream, the lead goose giving direction and creating impetus - it isn't hard to see the spiritual implications of wild geese in flight.
The photo is of Loch Skene - at this time of year a major stop-off point for migrating geese. Long noisy skeins of them fly over our house. A field a mile away was brown with grazing geese and must present a headache and dilemma for farmers who see young grass being eaten with frightening thoroughness.
Mary Oliver's poem about Wild Geese is one of her best, and she is one of the best North American poets writing today. You can have your own go at working out the significance of the migrating goose for our understadning of the human journey, the spiritual quest, the hunger for home, for community and for what lies ahead. For now, here's Mary Oliver's take on those chevrons of fellow pilgrims and travellers on this beautiful fragile planet
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You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about your despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again. Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting --
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
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