An
unassimilated remnant. The words carry a singularity and strength but
Arabia is much more than a remnant
for me. In the spring, patches of crimson diamorpha catch water and light, and
after a few weeks they go brown. They seem to melt into the pocks of granite
then, tousles of smallness where little fiery moss-meadows of bright rarity were
before. Some of the pocks hold water from rain, and the water shines when the
sun hits it in late afternoon, so that the lunar crumplesheet of granite seems almost
to lift itself away from the earth around it. Trees, mostly conifers, dot the
landscape, and there are islands of little forest all about. The people in
charge of the
National Heritage Area that includes
Arabia built cairns all across its face at points
where hikers could find their way back to the road. The cairns aren’t very big, and
there is an organic rightness to them that is not invasive. The spirit of
Arabia, such as I have encountered
it in spring and summer, is one of paradox. It is both generous and fierce,
rich and sere. It held me gently that Holy Saturday I first walked across it
with my friend Phil, and then it called my lonesome spirit out and tossed it
around like a plaything the next time I was there, some weeks later, on my own.
I like that the granite of
Arabia is akin to the granite of
Mount Sinai.
Arabia is not a desert, but it carries
that same liminal edge that I felt in the desert just outside the Hopi
reservation many years ago. It gets hot fast on
Arabia. The air can feel charged
with electricity even when there’s no storm coming. I feel both solitary and
watched by God on
Arabia. The two things come together in a dialectic of grace
that is much different from the lush greenness of the Appalachian foothills
where I live. The energy of
Arabia insists on emptiness. It is not empty itself,
exactly, but it seems to want me to be. Not long ago, at the start of the
summer, I went to
Arabia on a Sunday afternoon after having been at a weekend
retreat at the
Trappist monastery just a few miles down the road. The retreat
was entitled “prayer and the image of God.” I’d gone to it last year, too, and
I had been excited about it on Friday going in. Parts of the retreat were
challenging and profound but other parts were a little disappointing. The final
“conference” was to have been presented by one of the monks Sunday morning, but
it was cancelled due to the Eucharistic Congress taking place in Atlanta. I was
surprised and slightly disappointed, but not hugely so, and I certainly wasn’t
angry. As I left the monastery grounds I contemplated stopping at the beautiful
Abbey Church to pray with the people
there, but I decided against it. Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament felt oddly
disingenuous and even passive to me, a stark contrast to my usual sense of reverent eagerness. Then, too, I just did not want to be indoors with
wooden choir stalls, stained glass, and blue light. I needed to be outside. So
I went to
Arabia. It was, I think, about the fourth time I had visited. It was a hot day,
and as I got out of my car and put on my old blue cap I very briefly
reconsidered the visit. But it felt right to be there, so, camera in hand, I
walked on. The bright red diamorpha had long since faded into earthy brown. The
sky was a relentless blue. The air smelled feral and sharp. I tried to identify
that smell but could not. I don’t think I’ve ever smelled it anywhere else. There
is something of patchouli, there, almost, and something of citrus, and a bit of
evergreen, and something almost of the way asphalt smells after a rain. I have
wondered if the place smells that way to anyone else. At any rate, I had been
meaning to pray on
Arabia, but words wouldn’t come. I wasn’t angry. Just
empty. And as I noted the almost palpable fountain of emptiness the mountain
was showing me I realized I was deeply, quietly happy. I felt at peace with
the world, not in any visionary or supernatural way, but in a very ordinary,
modest way that I did not really recognize at first. It felt like the air around
me, the air in between pine needles and boulders, the air I was breathing, was
charged with the blankness of God. No image. No sound. No taste. No thought. My
mind did not try to grab on to much while I walked. I did not try to identify
any birdsong or wildflowers. I watched where I stepped and I took a few
photographs of noonday sun through clouds. At one point I lay down on the granite
on my stomach to take a picture of a puddle, layered and shining. After I took a couple of pictures I put away my camera and rested my head on my
forearms, just lying there still in the heat. The air seemed cupped and held,
then sent along its way. It was not moving much, but it seemed to be. I had the
thought that I was glad I had chosen to be there on the granite rather than
indoors with dark wood and stone walls. And I thought about the image of God,
or really the absence of an image. I thought about another time I had sat and felt
something akin to this empty freedom, this nameless blankness, this love I had
to work for to understand as such. It had been in the desert of northern
Arizona, near
Wupatki, a blowhole in
the earth, right beside an ancient Anasazi ruin. I watched the sun set over
the
San
Francisco peaks that summer day and felt included in its color. Being on
Arabia that Sunday afternoon was
something like that. As if I had asked a question and been totally refused a
coherent, rational answer. Instead there was the invisible cup of emptiness all
around and within me. The breath of grace. The spirit of something like a
desert there, far away from where any desert really is. No image, no teacher,
no ritual, no words. Just a silent God who knew I needed far, far less than I
had ever believed possible, and who was delivering that deficit both fiercely
and ineffably. My retreat was complete. It was time to go home.
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