most this amazing day

i thank You God for most this amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday; this is the birth
day of life and love and wings: and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)
e.e. cummings

If we were assembling the Bible today, we would have to include some e.e. cummings. It is as sacred as anything ever written. The poem has an Easter theme, and it is probably intended for springtime rather than fall. But today is a most amazing day.

Faith begins with wonder. And cummings was a master at expressing wonder.

Today in Georgetown, Maine, we may have had the best October 8 in the history of the universe. The marsh grass was golden in the sunlight. The sky is deep blue. The ocean was blue green. The sun was bright. There was a gentle breeze and it was 75 degrees.

As they used to say on “Magnum P.I.”, “Just another day in paradise.”

It was almost too wonderful. Too amazing. It was a day to savor.

It was a day, on which we might ask, as cummings does,

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?


As Paul Tillich articulated so brilliantly half a century ago, God is not “a supreme being,” God is Being Itself. This is not a new thought. When Moses demanded to know the name of the One who called him to lead Israel out of slavery, the response was, “I Am who I Am.”

The Bible begins with the story of Creation. It's not a scientific explanation of how the world began. The question is not, "How did this happen?" but "What does it mean?" What does it mean that there is something rather than nothing? When we say that Creation speaks of the Creator, we do not necessarily mean that we believe in a supernatural being outside of the universe, who created everything (although some may hold that belief). We mean that there is a Creative Spirit within the universe, in it and through it, that has created and is creating. We mean that there is purpose and meaning.

We who are “lifted from the no of all nothing,” are surprised and amazed by the gift of life. Especially on those “most amazing” days of “leaping greenly spirits of trees, and a blue true dream of sky.” And we are thankful “for everything which is natural which is infinite which is yes.”