Orchard Songs

Recently I spent a few days stepping back into my orchards, especially the one I've come to know as my deer sanctuary. Named for the apples that remain there on the ground after frost and harvest time and for the deer who find them, but mostly for how content my heart feels in that shared space.

So for that and no other reason, I decided to share an older post on this blog. A time remembered in my thoughts or a reminder to you, the reader, to from time to time, take a step back. Read an older post on this trail...for maybe that time, like this time is heart shared and only separated by this abstract concept called, time.


The beginning….
Songs of the orchard played in my mind as words appeared on paper.
I thought of Daisy and her home with Jim…

Nearing the ending…
At the depth of my heart I knew the Truth of my singing the folk songs in the orchards with the wind…

As I wrote…
Songs of days long ago lived then gone, never outgrown, continued to play in my head and I hummed along as words appeared on paper…



Songs of the orchard…closest I’ve ever found to poetry; truly, the inspiration for such…
words playing on canvas.

Winds blow then fade. One moment of time changes the world, or at least our perception.

There standing, sitting, being, holding her space-filling her space; Daisy.
Learned lesson, the one that came to me just watching Daisy, no words; she needed none:
Just hold your space-fill your space. Her message, so clear to me now.


So truth told, I learned about blank space in writing from her, and from holding my space while the winds did their own game. Filled in the space between with orchard songs. Daisy by nature didn’t use many words. The gaps between allowed me to just be, there with her.

So I learned most about words by time spent in listening and waiting. Let them be. Give them space and respect. Honor the life rhythm of each and every. Together, they find their own place and share.

Blank space in writing is where you, the reader comes…to sit and be.

Blank space, that’s where all the “what ifs” live.





From somewhere deep within, there was a voice calling me home. I had to listen. When a child of any age hears that voice, there’s no denying it, least not to yourself, especially when the call becomes a whisper.
Jane Marla Ver Dow
Dear Daisy, 2004



Let your heart guide you. It whispers, so listen closely.
~ The Land Before Time

I remember and heal 10-28

As individuals and as churches, we have need to determine if our mission is to light candles and to keep candles lit, or to blow candles out. I still believe that one candle and that candles united in purpose create the World’s path of creation and life, or can be used to ignite the fire of destruction. If we seek Peace, whether the War is between Nations or the War is between peoples, our own stone and our own flame is really all that any of us have control over.

- Jane Marla VerDow




Dear Daisy, 2004

As the story begins, the author caught in a personal struggle of survival under conditions felt oppressive, writes to Daisy. As the reflective search for self and path unfolds, the 9-11-01 story strikes as a Holy War between extremists of Nations. Before the dust settles, 10-28-01 brings world chaos personal. Living the aftermath, the author struggles to forgive and declares through writing an Epistle as part of her emancipation pathway that violence as a rightful expression and worship of God is not the God of her faith.

http://www.risingsparrowpress.com/announce.htm