A synchronicity of burgeoning occurs for those willing to look: Spring’s coloration and the pandemic’s menace. Both entail energy—one vibrates within jewel-tones of Beauty and the other shivers within denizens of Death. One exalts spirit; the other implodes terror.

Yet, even seeds of dismemberment blemish Spring’s unfolding as subsequent seasons evolve upon the demise of previous ones and address our mortality. Winter’s grieving can be intense, but it does not end there. Spring’s greening arrives with gusto. Such is experienced in Antonio Vivaldi’s Four Seasons (1717), a group of four violin concertos that quicken imaginations, that enfold spirits within Beauty’s kiss, that enrich sensibilities, that loosen rigidity, and catapult into deeper Life.

True, the pandemic and Winter snuff out life as we know it, but death in its myriad forms has always lurked behind our blind spots, just waiting. I used to say, “Since our mother lived to be ninety-nine years old, I don’t have to hurry to finish my book. It’ll get done.” But it didn’t work out that way.

Perhaps such burgeoning of energy begs a revision of our concept of God. In the prophet Isaiah we find an astounding revelation: I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the LORD, do all these things. 45:7

Certainly not that God wants our misery, given the miracle of birth and subsequent development. Joy does abound within the fabric of our humanness.

Contemplating such truth orients us to the deepest of mysteries where we experience ultimate Life and rejoice, far beyond our imagining.