writing

To Save or Savor

8-31-25

Rev. Douglas Taylor

Sermon Video: https://youtu.be/OEj-ifcUj5I

I know E.B. White as the author of beloved children’s books like Stuart Little and Charlotte’s Web. Perhaps you know him for that definitive book about English writing – Strunk and White’s Element’s of Style. Then there is a vast collection of pieces he wrote of the course of years he spent as a regular essayist for The New Yorker. One of his pithy pieces is the starting point for my reflection today. E. B. White once wrote, “I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. This makes it hard to plan the day.”

In my description of today’s worship service, I suggested that in the full quote White decides that savoring is more important. This is not true. The full quote only heightens the tension revealed in the shortened version.

The full quote was from a piece he did for the New Yorker in 1969 – after he’d won awards like the Newbury, so he had people’s attention.

“If the world were merely seductive, that would be easy. If it were merely challenging, that would be no problem. But I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. This makes it hard to plan the day.” The New York Times (11 July 1969)

Do you improve or enjoy the world? Do we save or savor the world? E. B. White is not remembered as an activist, exactly. His name is on the list of amazing writers, but not really on the list of social reformers or change agents who tried save the world. He certainly spoke about the issues of the day, advocating for justice and civil rights, for democracy and virtuous principles. But he said his desire was to improve the world and one can easily argue that he did.

He lived and wrote during challenging times. But they were not only challenging, they were also, as he says, seductive. His books and his pieces in The New Yorker had an impact on our lives – but the character of his writing leads me to believe he was able to enjoy the world splendidly. E. B. White seems to have been able to both improve and enjoy the world.

How do you plan to spend your day?

White said the times in which he lived were challenging. We also live in challenging times. It  has become numbingly normal to get news about the erosion of our democracy or attacks on the rule of law perpetrated by the executive branch of our federal government. Meanwhile thugs in masks are kidnapping people on the streets under the protection of our government. Meanwhile our trans siblings are losing protections and seeing society encouraged to fear them. Meanwhile our health care system is being run by conspiracy theorists instead of scientists, our Homeland Security is run by white nationalists, and our federal intelligence agencies are actively colluding to cover up the Epstein Files in plain sight. Plus we have a war in the Ukraine and a genocide unfolding in Gaza, and ridiculous international trade wars we are paying for here from our own pocketbooks. Billionaires keep getting richer and AI companies are stealing our data and identities for their own profit.

So, yes. I do arise each morning with the desire to improve the world. Do you want to save the world too? I want to protect the immigrants and refugees, I want to fight for better healthcare and vaccines, I want to defend the rights and protections of LGBTQ people. I see our unhoused and hungry people right here in Broome County and want to do something about it.

I have this desire to improve the world, and thankfully I’m part of groups that are doing exactly that. Our congregation just co-hosted a huge community barbeque that served over 400 meals. The UUA launched a campaign around Abolition with a focus on prison – and our congregation is going to tap into that this year. Our Systemic Housing Crisis social action team is working to raise funds and awareness of local legislative changes we can make and have partnered with a community land trust to create more sustainable housing to people. The Interfaith group that I am a part of is rebuilding itself after the pandemic – we are reestablishing local interfaith relationships. And our first official action was a Peace Walk at which we talked with and listened to each other – especially about Gaza.  And so much more – we’re in the middle of this, in the thick of it together. We are acting on that desire to improve the world, responding to the challenging times in which we live.

And it can be a lot. And is anyone here feeling overwhelmed by it all? Are you feeling scattered, frustrated, and numb? Sometimes I need to check out, escape, just drop everything and stare at some patch of earth or a quiet stream for a bit – or play keepy-uppy with my granddaughter for a while.

How about you? I am reminded that the better world we are building does not need me exhausted and burned out. This is more than just a conversation about self-care or justice-fatigue. You’ve heard the argument that we need to do our justice work like a choir singing a prolonged note together – different choir members take their breath at different times so the experience of the note is sustained while the individual singers each get to breath and no one person is carrying the whole prolonged note alone. You’ve heard that metaphor perhaps?  That’s not what I’m talking about.

E. B. White said the world is seductive. And he arises with a desire to enjoy the world. To savor it. This part is not just about taking a break. It’s about pouring some of your good energy into loving the world powerfully – savoring the beauty of it, enjoying life. Do you enjoy life?

This is not simply a matter of scheduling your day to do some improving in the morning and wrap that up to have time for savoring by 3:15. There is a way in which the desire to improve the world is borne from a critical dissatisfaction with the way things are. Things could be better, let’s get to work on that. But the desire to enjoy the world is borne from a recognition that the world is beautiful right now, just as it is.

Look at that amazing sunset! Listen to this elegant piece of music. Can I describe to you this cool game I found that I’m loving? Check out my new shoes – they look great and are soooo comfortable. If all my energy is on improving what’s wrong, how much energy do I have for enjoying what’s right?

Ah! But if I am so invested in savoring what’s right – am I blocking out or in denial about what’s wrong in the world around me? How might we both save and savor? Enjoy and improve?

Here’s a trick that works against us: we live in a late-stage capitalist society that pushes us to be dissatisfied with trivialities – Does your body smell wrong? Are you performing masculinity wrong? Is your dry skin keeping you from dating the right people? What if you are embarrassing your children because you drive the wrong car or buy the wrong food!

We certainly need to step back from this manufactured dissatisfaction and instead simply love the world as it is. The world is already amazing and so are you! You don’t need to be perfect to be loved.

And if you still feel compelled to be dissatisfied, let me gently tell you: no one cares about your ear hair – but brown-skinned people are being profiled by ICE, the CDC has stopped promoting vaccines, and the Epstein Files are still being covered up.  

E. B. White did not resolve the dilemma. White intentionally kept the tension of this dual yearning to both enjoy and improve the world. He did not want us to have the solution; he wanted us to experience the tension. I was wrong when I suggested that E. B. White’s full quote revealed his conclusion that savoring is more important than saving. He didn’t say that. It was a farm and garden blog I read that said that.

Katie Spring is a health-conscious, modern young blogger who writes about tomatoes and cabbages, about women-owned seed catalogues and ‘5 ways to stay grounded and avoid burnout when while starting a farm.’ In one of her posts, she raises E. B. White’s dilemma about saving and savoring the world https://katiespring.com/save-savor-world/ and says:

“It resonated so fully within me: the pull between wanting to protect, defend, and fight for the world and wanting to laugh, explore, and sink into the world’s beauty.  The two acts appeared so separate.”

She eventually realized that the two are not separate, but intwined – and indeed they begin with savoring. “Savoring leads to saving,” she writes, “because savoring leads to love.” It’s that simple.

I found her reasoning quite sound. “Savoring leads to saving because savoring leads to love.” That reminds me of a quote I had on a t-shirt when I was a teenager in the ‘80’s. The quote is by Senegalese conservationist Baba Dioum, who wrote: “In the end we will conserve only what we love; we will love only what we understand; and we will understand only what we are taught.” 

We will only save what we love. So my goal is to encourage you to love the world, to love you neighbors, to love those who live at the edges. To love the beauty you see in the world. “Savoring leads to saving because savoring leads to love.”

E. B. White loved the English language. He enjoyed the creation of an elegant English sentence. That one he wrote about enjoying world or improving the world was a product of his love. And it has spurred generations so far to grapple with the concept. Just in that one small example, he has improved the world.

Go read that cozy romance, play your lute, take a dance class, hug your people, make pithy protest signs, take someone on a hike to your favorite view, savor that fine meal, love your neighbor, and enjoy this world. We will only save what we love. Savor life, that you remember why it is so worth saving.

In a world without end,

May it be so.

Poems of Joy and Laughter

Rev. Douglas Taylor

4-27-25

Sermon Video: https://youtu.be/IOskXW4Zg9E

Part I

Poetry helps us understand the meanings of things. Poetry, through metaphor and the turn of phrase, opens us to grasping reality in a way that regular talking does not. All art, really, allows for this, but poetry is particularly fun.

When considering the topic of joy, it is valuable to ask the dictionary to take a seat and tell the philosophers to wait outside. Set the spotlight on the poets instead and learn wisdom from a sideways glance.

John Keats wrote, “A thing of beauty is a joy forever.” Mother Theresa explained “Joy is a net of love by which you catch souls.” While Rumi reminds us “An eye is meant to see things. The soul is here for its own joy.”

What does any of that mean? I will smile slyly and ask, what do you all think it means? Billy Collins, in his poem “Introduction to Poetry” explains it like this.

I ask them to take a poem

and hold it up to the light

like a color slide

or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poem

and watch him probe his way out,

or walk inside the poem’s room

and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterski

across the surface of a poem

waving at the author’s name on the shore.

But all they want to do

is tie the poem to a chair with rope

and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose

to find out what it really means.

—

So, instead of interrogating, let’s explore, let’s have some fun. Perhaps we’ll learn something along the way; perhaps not what we intended to learn. Yet the journey will be worth it all the same.

Poems of Joy and Laughter. We begin with advice from Mary Oliver who warns us with her title – Don’t Hesitate.

If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy,
don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty
of lives and whole towns destroyed or about
to be. We are not wise, and not very often
kind. And much can never be redeemed.
Still, life has some possibility left. Perhaps this
is its way of fighting back, that sometimes
something happens better than all the riches
or power in the world. It could be anything,
but very likely you notice it in the instant
when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the
case. Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid
of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb.

—

Joy was not made to be a crumb, she says. Yes, there is pain and cruelty, and, Mary Oliver admits, we are “not very often kind.” And yet, life continues. “Perhaps,” she continues, “this is its way of fighting back.” Joy remains plentiful. Certainly our laughter is often borne of a moment of frivolity and lightness. And other times it bursts out of a depth despite its surroundings. Joy is not merely a happy prank or playful joke. Joy is a reclaiming of life in the face of death. Some note that happiness is transient, reflective of circumstance. While joy is a container for both happiness and sorrow. In this way, joy is a response to life. Listen to the wisdom of African American poet, Lucille Clifton’s in her piece entitled “Homage to My Hips”

these hips are big hips

they need space to

move around in.

they don’t fit into little

petty places. these hips

are free hips.

they don’t like to be held back.

these hips have never been enslaved,  

they go where they want to go

they do what they want to do.

these hips are mighty hips.

these hips are magic hips.

i have known them

to put a spell on a man and

spin him like a top!

—

Joy is something we sometimes must claim for ourselves when the world would rather have us feeling shamed and small. Remembering Keats, we revel in beauty because “A thing of beauty is a joy forever.” So forget the world’s judgment, embrace your beauty, and live in your joy.

In scripture, joy is listed as one of the fruits of the spirit (Galatians 5:22) and in proverbs (17:22) we read “A joyful heart is good medicine.”

Joy arrives in the juxtaposition, the unexpected, the pairing of light and dark, the surprises large and small. And … joy most appears most often in the simple rounds of daily living. Consider the gift of socks. You may know I am partial to socks myself – odd socks, silly socks, colorful and fun socks – I delight in playful socks. Consider Pablo Neruda’s poem, “Ode to My Socks.”

Maru Mori brought me
a pair
of socks
which she knitted herself
with her sheepherder’s hands,
two socks as soft
as rabbits.
I slipped my feet
into them
as though into
two
cases
knitted
with threads of
twilight
and goatskin.
Violent socks,
my feet were
two fish made
of wool,
two long sharks
sea-blue, shot
through
by one golden thread,
two immense blackbirds,
two cannons:
my feet
were honored
in this way
by
these
heavenly
socks.
They were
so handsome
for the first time
my feet seemed to me
unacceptable
like two decrepit
firemen, firemen
unworthy
of that woven
fire,
of those glowing
socks.

Nevertheless
I resisted
the sharp temptation
to save them somewhere
as schoolboys
keep
fireflies,
as learned men
collect
sacred texts,
I resisted
the mad impulse
to put them
into a golden
cage
and each day give them
birdseed
and pieces of pink melon.
Like explorers
in the jungle who hand
over the very rare
green deer
to the spit
and eat it
with remorse,
I stretched out
my feet
and pulled on
the magnificent
socks
and then my shoes.

The moral
of my ode is this:
beauty is twice
beauty
and what is good is doubly
good
when it is a matter of two socks
made of wool
in winter.

—

Have you ever found joy in an ordinary moment? Ponder this question. Have you ever found joy in an ordinary moment. Consider this next poem, a captured glimpse of joy among horses and young children, written by our own Christine O’Donnell entitled “Old Logging Road.”

The old logging road

meandered through the forest,

like a slow, moving reptile,

plodding along, one mighty

step at a time.

General, the palomino, stepped,

lightly along the overgrown trail,

or leap over fallen tree trunks,

keeping his balance.

Topper, the sweet, gentle Morgan,

tiptoed, light as a feather,

gracefully maneuvering the trail,

He refused to be startled by the racoon,

that ran across the ancient road.

The children, Chrissie and Mavis,

laughed and giggled,

unaware of the power

of the old logging road.

—

I have so many poems to share this morning. And here is one more before we wrap up Part One of this poetry reading in the guise of a sermon, with a poem that feels to me like a beloved classic, although I don’t recall ever sharing it in worship before. It continues the theme of where we find joy. “Welcome Morning” by Anne Sexton.

There is joy

in all:

in the hair I brush each morning,

in the Cannon towel, newly washed,

that I rub my body with each morning,

in the chapel of eggs I cook

each morning,

in the outcry from the kettle

that heats my coffee

each morning,

in the spoon and the chair

that cry “hello there, Anne”

each morning,

in the godhead of the table

that I set my silver, plate, cup upon

each morning.

All this is God,

right here in my pea-green house

each morning

and I mean,

though often forget,

to give thanks,

to faint down by the kitchen table

in a prayer of rejoicing

as the holy birds at the kitchen window

peck into their marriage of seeds.

So while I think of it,

let me paint a thank-you on my palm

for this God, this laughter of the morning,

lest it go unspoken.

The Joy that isn’t shared, I’ve heard,

dies young.

—

Part II

When I was researching – looking for poetry and more, looking for how poetry leads us into understanding – I found an article in a magazine called “Rethinking Schools” focused on promoting equity and racial justice in the classroom.

Celebrating Joy and Laughter

The article was about how a teacher was using poetry to empower the learners and bring more joy into the learning process. The teacher uses the work of poets such as Langston Hughes and Maya Angelou, encouraging the kids to write their own poetry in response to and in conversation with their great works. Lucille Clifton’s poem about her hips is included in the curriculum. They read Pablo Neruda’s Ode about the socks in English as well as in the original Spanish. They discussed his descriptive imagery and how he offers praise for an ordinary object.

I want to share one of the student’s poems this morning. Sarah Scofield, found particular joy in reading Neruda’s poetry in Spanish and sparked her write about the linguistic pleasure she had found. “Ode to Spanish” by Sarah Scofield

A language

As beautiful as music:

Melodious verbs

Harmonious adjectives

Rhythmic nouns

Intertwine as I speak.

An orchestra of words

Conducted by my tongue.

I compose

A new song

As those around me listen.

Musical sentences

Rich with the notes

Of culture.

A romance language stirring the hearts

of its listeners.

The music plays on

As I watch with wonder how

My untrained yet experienced tongue

conducts the orchestra,

and the music pleases me.

—

For some, the joy of poetry is in the rhythms and cadence, the rhymes and phrasing. For others, it is the subtle twist revealing a message. If we were talking about music, I would be talking about how some like the beat while others like the lyrics. Carol Finch sent me a poem someone had given to her many years back that has continued to feel bright and enlightening to her after all this time. It is called “Bugs in a Bowl” by Han-shan

We’re just like bugs in a bowl.

All day going around

never leaving their bowl.

I say: That’s right! Every day

climbing up the steep sides,

sliding back. Over and over again.

Around and around.

Up and back down.

Sit in the bottom of the bowl,

head in your hands, cry, moan,

feel sorry for yourself.

Or.

Look around.

See your fellow bugs.

Walk around. Say,

Hey, how you doing?

Say, Nice Bowl!

—

A wisdom poem, inviting us to enjoy the delivery of the message and to uncover the content of the message as well – there are riches all around us awaiting our discovery. “Hey, nice bowl!”

Here is a silly one from children’s author and poet Judith Viorst. Karen Manzer submitted this for us this morning. “Mother Doesn’t Want a Dog” by Judith Viorst

Mother doesn’t want a dog.
Mother says they smell,
And never sit when you say sit,
Or even when you yell.
And when you come home late at night
And there is ice and snow,
You have to go back out because
The dumb dog has to go.

Mother doesn’t want a dog.
Mother says they shed,
And always let the strangers in
And bark at friends instead,
And do disgraceful things on rugs,
And track mud on the floor,
And flop upon your bed at night
And snore their doggy snore.

Mother doesn’t want a dog.
She’s making a mistake.
Because, more than a dog, I think
She will not want this snake.

—

A lot of joy is found in relationship. The love of a good animal companion is a source of joy indeed. I know I already brought you a Mary Oliver poem and I’m straining our Mary Oliver Quota to bring you a second one, yet that is exactly what I about going to do. Mary Oliver does not limit her poetry to moss and bugs and birds – she was a small set of poems about her little white dog Percy. The third one in the set is “Little Dog’s Rhapsody in the Night (Percy Three)”

He puts his cheek against mine
and makes small, expressive sounds.
And when I am awake, or awake enough

He turns upside down, his four paws
     in the air
and his eyes dark and fervent.

Tell me you love me, he says.

Tel me again.

Could there be a sweeter arrangement? Over and over
he gets to ask it.
I get to tell.

—

I had the great pleasure to hear Mary Oliver recite poetry back in 2006. Almost 20 years later, when thinking about this service, I remembered hearing her recite the Percy poems – they still make me smile. I’m not a dog person, I confess. But I do understand the draw and appreciate the love and joy. The second Percy poem was written back in the early 2000’s – an important point of context for the poem, although many of the references remain recognizable and relevant today.

Percy (two)

I have a little dog who likes to nap with me.
He climbs on my body and puts his face in my neck.
He is sweeter than soap.
He is more wonderful than a diamond necklace,
     which can’t even back.
I would like to take him to Kashmir and the Ukraine,
     and Jerusalem and Palestine and Iraq and Darfur,
that the sorrowing thousands might see his laughing mouth.
I would like to take him to Washington, right into
     the oval office
where Donald Rumsfeld would crawl out  of the president’s
     armpit
and kneel down on the carpet, and romp like boy.

For once, for a moment, a rational man.

—

Might we all need reminders from time to time that joy is not just a break, an escape, a small bit of fun when everything else is so serious. Might we all need reminders now and then that joy is one way we stay human. Experiencing joy is a way we keep our spirits alive when we live in soul-deadening times. When we say joy is a form of resistance, we mean that joy helps us stay connected to ourselves and others.

And poetry is a form of communication that is revelatory; poetry lifts us beyond the ordinary and reveals to us insights we might otherwise miss. Our final poem is by my elder colleague Mark Morrison-Reed, entitled “Let Me Die Laughing.”

We are all dying,
our lives always moving toward completion.

We need to learn to live with death,
and to understand that death is not the worst of all events.

We need to fear not death, but life—empty lives, loveless lives

lives that do not build
upon the gifts that each of us has been given, lives that are like living deaths,
lives which we never take the time
to savor and appreciate,
lives in which we never pause to breathe deeply.

What we need to fear is not death,
but squandering the lives we have been miraculously given.

So let me die laughing, savoring one of life’s crazy moments. Let me die holding the hand of one I love, and recalling that I tried to love and was loved in return. Let me die remembering that life has been good, and that I did what I could.

But today, just remind me that I am dying so that I can live, savor, and love with all my heart.

—

Let me die laughing, that I may better love with all my heart.

In a world without end,

May it be so.