Here Comes Treble: Meditation On A Wasp
Meditation can take many forms, sometimes expressing itself in a poem, as Isabel Bradley reveals.
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Meditation needs to be practised. It is a form of relaxation, a way of re-charging one’s personal batteries. The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines: ‘to meditate’ as to ‘exercise the mind in … contemplation; … (to) focus on a subject …’
Many years ago, I acquired an audio tape which contained a choice of four meditations, each guiding me to an imagined peaceful country scene and focussing my mind on past times when I felt loved and secure.
There are other ways of meditating:
Focussing the mind, to the exclusion of all else, on almost any subject has a calming effect on the entire body. Often, I can achieve a state of complete mental focus while practising my flute, or writing.
One summer morning I was busy with the housework, when I noticed a wasp fly into the music room through the wide-open picture windows. As South African wasps can administer a nasty sting, I quickly closed the intervening sliding door. The wasp landed on the glass, then proceeded to ‘preen’ itself, rather in the way a cat will. I watched, moving closer to the window until my nose almost touched the glass. I focussed so intently on its activities that I became unaware of my body and my surroundings; that small creature became my universe.
The Wasp
Have you ever watched a wasp?
Window-sitting,
Peaceful in the sun?
Cat-like, it preens,
With forelegs first,
Feelers fondled from head to curly tip,
Over and over again –
A “bad-feeler-day” today? I wonder…
I wonder.
It cleans its feet in whiskered maw;
And preens those feelers again, and again –
And again.
Then –
It cleans its feet again,
And washes its triangled,
Space-man’s face –
Feet rubbing over staring, glaring,
Open eyes.
Fierce.
Its feet go to its mouth again,
Then move to deal with outstretched wings,
One at a time.
Thorough.
Methodical.
Middle legs now – busy,
so busy
With the body.
Then on, with back feet,
Masturbating its sting,
Stroking, loving, gentling
The dark, foul-fluid-filled,
pulsing, darkening,
translucent Source of Pain.
Have you ever
Watched a wasp?
Since that day, I’ve had no fear of wasps. They leave me alone.
Meditation, whether sought after and worked towards or totally involuntary, definitely has many, and sometimes surprising, benefits!
Until next week…’here comes Treble’!
By Isabel Bradley
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