Image Curtesy of Nina Bisognani

We are all Immigrants

Barbara Kautz’s reflection about her mother, titled “MUM,” inspired me to think of other immigrants who, like her, suffered hard times. They survived by drawing on their inner strength to grow and help build this country we now call home. In the early 1900s, my maternal grandfather, Henry Tonnetti, sailed from Italy with his family and settled in York Harbor, where he found work as a stonemason. Like many other immigrants, he held several jobs. He also did carpentry, took care of wealthy summer people’s homes, and grew enough fruits and vegetables on his own land to feed his family comfortably. Henry loved gardening. The only photo I have of him is that of a small Italian man taking care of hi tomatoes. His green thumb helped him win contests for the lovely gladiolas he grew.Henry’s wife, Maria, didn’t speak English but she knit sweaters for all the children in their neighborhood. Maria acted as a midwife, helping the local doctor deliver a friend’s child. During the birth, she was cut by an unclean instrument, developed blood poisoning, and died within afew days. Her husband died months later, some say from a broken heart. By the time my mother was 15 years old, both of her parents had passed. Faith in God gave her the will to carry on. My mother was an outsider in a WASP community; an immigrant. When she was still in grade school, two boys teased her daily by trying to steal her lunch on her way to school. Instead of giving in to their bullying, she used her wits and courage to outsmart them while protecting herself. In spite of the hardships she faced, my mother worked at the post office after school and graduated valedictorian of the high school class. During her life she gave back to the community by planting public gardens, forming York’s first women’s golf league, working for the church, and volunteering to help other people in need. This isn’t just a story about the family I know best. As Governor Janet Mills said recently during a march protesting the work of ICE in Maine, “We are all immigrants.” Many of the immigrants who are allowed to enter the United States today work long, hard hours, just as our parents did. Many of their children become successful, caring people.During the Memorial Day season, we pay tribute with the highest respect to those who gave their lives to protect our families and our freedom. It is time for us to be grateful we are all
immigrants: living together and helping each other to share our own inner strengths in this
beautiful, yet damaged, world.

We are all Immigrants

Nina Bisognani

Image: Barbara Kautz

MUM

Growing up, my mother knew all about hardship. She was raised by an older sister after their mother died when she was 11. Her family struggled during the Depression because her father, a finish-carpenter, rarely found work. She and my dad married right before WWII and when he lay in a coma in an Army Hospital in India, she thought she would be a young widow. She could have thrown herself a pity party many times but didn’t. You just didn’t if you were the daughter of Swedish Immigrants.

Daddy survived and came home and the two started an interesting life together, raising four daughters, and sometimes four or more pigs! There were countless times when they had to pay one monthly bill but not the other, when she worried about one child over another. She could have felt sorry for herself many times, but she didn’t.  

Mum was unfailingly cheerful, graced with the extraordinary ability to look at life’s hardships as adventures rather than roadblocks.  

In 1964 I went to Denmark as an exchange student. When she wrote to Grethe, my host sister, and the only person in the family who read English, the first time, she didn’t describe herself as a woman who loved classical music or sewed all her daughters clothes. Rather, she quoted the entirety of Edgar Best’s 1917 poem It Couldn’t Be Done:

Somebody said that it couldn’t be done, but he with a chuckle replied, that maybe it couldn’t but he would be one that wouldn’t say no til he tried…Just start to sing as you tackle the thing that cannot be done and you’ll do it.

It was, I think, Mum’s battle cry. The way she looked at life. Yes, Mum was sympathetic to our teenage angst, like boys, clothes, and mean girls. Especially mean girls. Reading the poem now, I can see it was her guidebook to how best to teach her daughters how to cope with life’s unfairness and to never stop trying to be their best selves.

I remember sitting on the stool in the kitchen, while Mum listened to me wail about some injustice or that once again Bruce Gray picked on me on the bus ride home from junior high. Eventually she probably  said:  

It’ll be better before the cows come home. Or,

It’ll be better before you get married. Or, my favorite,

Nothing’s so bad that it couldn’t be worse from the day that you’re born til you ride in a hearse.

Barbara Kautz        

May 2026

Image: Barbara Ryther

Words fail me.

Well, not entirely fail, obviously. I still have words. But I can’t seem to make them do justice to what I see. Just months (weeks?) ago a wooden fence stood next to bare, scratchy branches, both covered in snow, the only thing differentiating them a total lack of symmetry in one, and the width and weight of the other.

And now spring is here. Width and weight are unchanged, while bare, scratchy branches overflow with color, softness, and scent. The wooden fence has emerged from a cold dark winter as…a wooden fence, while the lilac has transformed not only itself but also its surroundings. 

There’s poetry in this, probably even a parable.  And yet I can’t find it in me to search for the words, to try to articulate the meaning, to use language to illuminate the scene.

I can only look and marvel that such a thing is possible. That such a thing can happen out of coldness and darkness. That all through winter the lilac was preparing to do just this. And that I have done absolutely nothing to deserve such a gift.

So if you have a poem in you, feel free to write it.  If you feel a parable coming on, have at it.

For myself, I will content myself with being in the presence of a lilac. 

-Barbara Ryther

Image: Nina Bisognani

Signs of Spring

Lent was a stark season that challenged our weary souls. Did Jesus feel its bitter cold in his heart as He wandered in the wilderness? It was a time of deep reflection and sadness at the state of our world. I thought of wars and fighting among religious enemies from ancient times. And I realized they are still going on as I write. 

I felt closer to Jesus on his journey this winter than ever before. Lent drew me inside myself. I was reminded of creatures that curl up in warm burrows to survive on seeds they have saved until new life arrives in the spring. In my cold winter, I lived on glimmers of hope and wishes for better times. I wonder, what did Jesus think as he lived the life chosen for him? 

Now that Eastertide has arrived, I am searching for signs of spring in the new life God promised. Lately, robins have been searching for food in the back yard, recently covered with ice and snow. More birds are frequenting our porch feeder. Spring bulbs and perennial flowers are poking through the ground reaching for the sun (God’s light.) And this is just the beginning.

My prayers are for forgiveness of past and present injustices and new growth in the coming season.

I rejoice that our faith has carried us this far.

-Nina Bisognani

A Prayer During Lent

O Lord
I no longer know how
To pray
When the world
(Some of it literally)
Is burning.
Should I start with my neighbor
Suddenly without healthcare
And struggling to afford groceries?
Or with immigrants
Arrested for their complexions
Afraid to leave their homes?
Do I lament the defunding
Of education
Or the funding of war,
One whose purpose—
Eight days and eight billion dollars in—
Has yet to be determined?
It’s hard to pray
With so many competing atrocities.
How much time
Do you have, God?
This could take awhile,
And my senator is not available.
(My messages
Go straight to voicemail.)
When a response does come
There are reassurances instead of reform,
Platitudes in place of progression.
Sometimes I am gifted with “concern”
When no twist of words
Can adequately disguise our own implosion.
All the meanwhile
There is this matter of personal selfishness
When I find myself nostalgic
For stability, for security
For leadership with integrity.
(Privileges, as I am now acutely aware.)
I have run out of words for both anger and sorrow
And for a world on fire
Articulation without action seems inadequate.
So I will use my voice, my hands, my feet.
After all, Lord, didn’t you teach us
A prayer is something to be embodied?

Hear Our Prayer

Dear Lord, we need your presence now.

Be with those of us who doubt both our actions and our inaction

Who wonder if our small gestures still matter in a world of big problems

Who don’t know where to look for guidance

Lord, in your mercy,

Hear our prayer.

Be with those of us who search for where legality and morality meet

Who question allegiances and loyalties

Who seek to find truths to ground us

Lord, in your mercy,

Hear our prayer.

Be with those of us who fear losing what binds us together

Who feel our relationships breaking apart

Who lack a place where it’s safe to say what we think

Lord, in your mercy,

Hear our prayer.

Be with those of us trying to protect our children 

Who struggle to impart knowledge without overwhelming them with fear

Who have no place to rest from the worry

Lord, in your mercy,

Hear our prayer.

Be with those of us who see no way forward

Who find our anger turning into hatred

Who feel our impatience turning into intolerance

Lord, in your mercy,

Hear our prayer.

Comfort us, Lord.  Embrace us with your love and compassion, spread your wisdom and strength over and around us, and grant us your peace.  Amen.

Barbara Ryther

Image: Melanie Kyer

Spark

In her long life, my mother sewed a hundred fabric bags. .

When filled with oats and heated they stay warm for hours.

We still have several, treasured more than gold.

I used to keep one at my feet on winter nights. 

But now I hold it tight in my arms instead.

I sink into its warmth as if it were my mother’s heart.

Exuding protection from the storms of life.

My feet are cold, but in this moment, my heart needs it more.

Above all, friends, remember:  Guard your heart.

Be mindful when your spirit needs renewal.

Turn away from icy winds that reach to steal your joy.

Throughout the dark of Lent, be sure your inner flame stays lit. 

Shelter it fiercely, feed it tinder when you can: 

A chocolate kiss, a cuddle from a pet. 

Allow the Holy Spirit to breathe softly on the embers of your soul.

Only the nurtured spark survives to pass its warmth to others.

And others, oh so many, need your spark. 

Melanie Kyer

February 7, 2026

I look for leadership and see lies

I look for justice and see prejudice

I look for mercy and see mockery

Cruelty is not a strength

Fear is not a foundation

Hatred is not a virtue

Hatred has a face 

And a voice

And targets

Targets whose names I know

Even if I didn’t

I cannot be above the fray

There is no shelter above the fray

Above the boiling water

Is scalding steam

This is not a time for complacency

Or patience

Or a safe retreat

This is a time for radical love

Love wrenched out of our souls

Love that pierces through the noise

We must be the face of love

The voice of love

The prayer of love

Humanity cannot be divided into them and us

We are all in God’s image

Or none of us are

For the love of God…

Image: Barbara Ryther

The Gift of the Mage

The mage packed for the journey, sending his wife to pick out a present.

“Who is this for, anyway?”

“A baby.”

“So… a blanket? Tapestry?”

“He’s supposed to be the Messiah, maybe? A king? That’s what the prophecies say.”

“Better bring something fancy then. Here, some frankincense. My aromatherapist swears by it. 

Good for the joints, and brain health. Kings need to be nimble and smart.”

After a tiring journey with his fellow magi, the mage set down the gleaming bottle in front of the baby and his parents. If it weren’t for his precise calculations, he would have thought he was in the wrong place. A scruffy man and young girl here in a barn with a newborn wrapped in old scraps surrounded by animals and shepherds. This frankincense would surely be sold for food.  

The shepherds didn’t belong here either– weren’t they usually hermits? They told him about being visited by a host of angels and…well, it sure did sound crazy. But it was they who convinced him they were all in the right place. It takes a lot for shepherds to leave their sheep. 

So he sat, careful not to soil his fine robes. The other magi did the same, taking in the scene and slowly realizing that this baby wasn’t like any king they had visited before. In the hush of the spirit, they knew. This baby, this moment, was something bigger than all of them. 

The Prince of Peace. Finally.  After so many years of hatred and conflict.  If they could keep the despot Herod from harming the baby, all would be well.

He worshipped the little child, filled with awe and thankfulness that his own children would finally live in a world of peace.

Melanie Kyer

January 06, 2026

Image: Kathryn Yingst

GRACE

I sometimes joke that if I ever win Megabucks I am going to start a foundation called “The Undeserved Grace Foundation.” This always leads my sister Laura to remind me that Grace, the love of God, freely given to his children is always undeserved.

We grew up in the Lutheran church, where Grace is a concept central to Martin Luther’s teaching. When Luther nailed his 95 theses on the door of a church in Wittenberg, Germany, he was protesting against the idea that you can buy your way into heaven faster, or perhaps get a seat closer to Jesus at the big table. 

I don’t think that’s what Jesus taught either. When I try to understand the parables, I believe the meaning Jesus is trying to convey is that God loves the Samaritan, the sick, the people of different social status, and sent his son to freely do so—as well as heal the sick. At its most basic level I believe it means that I, in my comfortable home, am no better than someone who is a homeless drug addict. The old phrase “There but for the Grace of God go I” is not just a platitude, it has meaning and a message of importance.

Nor do I know, even if I want to believe that my ideas about the state of affairs in York, in Maine, in the United States, the Middle East or the rest of the world are what God wants. I don’t think my neighbor does either. I can do my best to interpret what Grace means when I lack for nothing. I look for guidance from those more schooled in Christian theology to help me understand what I don’t.

So, if God’s grace is given freely to all his children and Jesus told us that again and again, then it stands to reason we must love and respect others. In the current climate of unrest that’s difficult. Remember that the gift of Grace, showered upon my enemies as well as my loved ones, is worth remembering, especially this time of the year.   

Barbara Kautz, October 2025

CLIQUE

Sound bites

Snap shots

Snapchat

We summarize one another

Instantly

With laser precision

So graphic

To pin one another

On X

Life in caricature

Neighbors by category

Left

Right

White

(Is she my neighbor

After that visa oversight?)

“Who are you?”

We ask

Barely listening

For a reply—

We simply need

A label—

Membership applies

“You are not like us!”

We insist

Too liberal

Too CIS

So many colors

Can’t coexist

“Do you live by our creed?”

Assimilation is required 

If only, like a drug

To soothe our need—

A tribe

A band of brothers

Becomes our high

But is it brotherhood

Or is the bond

A brand

We seek to blaze

Regardless

Of the scar it makes?

Kathryn Yingst

10.04.25

Image: Melanie Kyer

“Behold the birds of the heaven, that they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; and your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not ye of much more value than they?  And which of you by being anxious can add one cubit unto the measure of his life?” –  Matthew 6: 26-27 

When you get older, you start paying more attention to the birds. You just do. But children love them too, why else would so many childhood crafts involve making birdhouses or little feeders out of pinecones? When I was little, I loved to watch the chickadees with my grandfather, who was crazy over them. He had a trough feeder right next to the window in his sunroom and they’d gather in droves there. An artist friend of his once offered him money to kill one for him so he could examine it in more detail for his paintings. Although my grandfather was a hunter, he refused. He could never kill one of his beloved chickadees. 

Chickadees are by far my favorite birds, too. Not bright and colorful like the bold cardinal, or elusive and cheery like the bluebird, nor boisterous and aggressive like the woodpecker, their ubiquitous monochrome is consistent and unassuming. They are not the bird you search longingly for on your birding bingo card, but I love them. They are the perfect bird for our home state of Maine, hardy and just a bit cheeky. They know the winter is coming, but they are unafraid and do not flee– they just persist.

There is a lot to be anxious about these days, but as I spend a quiet golden hour enjoying the beauty of the trees and the birds on my deck, I hope I can summon their peace, lose some anxiety and practice persistence. 

-Melanie Kyer

September 20, 2025

Wings

No one tells you

When you move your child to college

About the next day

When the house is quiet

And her room lies empty

But the door is closed

So you pretend

For a moment

She is still there

Laughing

Talking on the phone 

Leaving crumbs

How will they see her?

Will they see her beautiful wings

Glossy and new

How they love the light

Iridescent with promise?

Will they throw shadows

And break her heart?

Or will they become co-conspirators 

Of joy

Kindred journeyers

Seeking pizza and movies

And friendship?

Yes.

The day after

You feel it in your bones.

The beginning

Of the shift.

When the wind rises

Gathering her

To the nest’s edge

And she learns

For the first time

How it feels

To fly.

Kathryn Yingst

08.18.25

Image: Barbara Ryther

Moored

Image: Sudie Blanchard

Lord, you provide the strong warp threads of our lives–
Family, friends, love, trust…anchors that support us.
Each day, we weave the varied weft threads…
Rainbows of color and texture:
Shades of gold and red–bright colors of joy and gladness
Darker hues of gray and black for sorrows and sadnesses
Steady strands of blue and green for more ordinary times…
All woven together, day by day.
At the end of our days, our fabric finished,
May all our patterns please you.

Image:Barb Kautz

About Teenagers, With and Without Feathers

In the early spring a pair of birds built a nest in an old gray, bike helmet hanging on the wall of our garage. Next to it hangs another bike helmet, this one with a pink visor, too old, and too small for my 17 year old granddaughter to use.

A few days later the female bird lay four eggs. The pair took turns searching for meals  while the other bird sat on the eggs. About two weeks later three of the four eggs hatched. When the birds seemed to have flown the nest the mother laid a second foursome of eggs. Meanwhile, more birds—or was it the original pair?—built a second nest in the second helmet.

One afternoon, I sat in the garage waiting for Jim so we could go out to dinner. While I waited, I was entertained by a bird I thought was not yet fully grown hovering on the edge of the gray helmet. It jumped back and forth between the two helmets, flew out of the garage, back into it, then from one helmet to another. Over and over again. I wasn’t sure whether or not there were still babies in the gray helmet. It seemed as though the bird would not return to its nest.

The bird reminded me of teenagers. Testing  their wings then flying home, not quite ready or able to fly. Ready to leave school. Or not. I’d been living with a new high school graduate and raised her mother, aunt, and uncle. So whether or not I was correct about the bird’s age it made me laugh.

When I was a young parent I knew enough about growth and development not to be overly concerned by my teenagers’ testing of wings. I wonder, though, about Joseph and Mary. Luke’s Gospel describes Jesus chiding his parents for not understanding why they thought he was lost when they left Jerusalem. He wasn’t concerned. Accounts of Jerusalem under Roman rule rightfully give credence to Mary and Joseph’s fears. Jesus’s reply, asking them why they didn’t understand he was in his father’s house has always seemed a little cheeky to me. Just like that of a teenager.

And like most of us,  Joseph and Mary, forgive and forget their son. Or should it be, that we like Joseph and Mary, most of us forgive and forget our teenagers, hoping they’ll fly at the proper time. 

Barb Kautz

August, 2025

Image: Melanie Kyer

Moonlight Prayer

Never forget: 

There is light in the darkness.

There is sun after rain.

There is morning after night.

God will not let the darkness last.

God’s rainbow promises the rain will stop.

God’s hand spins dusk into the dawn.

But also know:

The God who numbers stars has made your hands

To hold a torch against the dark we see,

To bring a rainbow to the gray of pain,

To light a fire of hope to warm cold hearts.

God grant in us the courage and the strength

To rise with new resolve when morning dawns,

To feel your universe awake in us,

And through our hearts and hands your light be done.

Melanie Kyer

Image: Kathryn Yingst

A Prayer For Hunt, Texas 

Raise your voices

Through the trees

Around each curve

Of limbs

Of water

That every space

Is found

Is filled

With presence

Persistent

Until each Mystic child

Is reunited

Into the arms

Of her beloveds

Though mothers

Wear their grief

Like crowns of thorns

At least

At last

May they hold their daughters

Like a meadow

Holds flowers

Vastly

Deeply

And devastatingly beholden

To their fierce

And fragile

Glory. 

-Kathryn Yingst

July 2025

Image: Barbara Ryther

Waiting

Far below the canopy

beneath the understory

the fern waits

Liquid blue reflections

hint enigmatically at

the bright sky above

Hidden lakes of lily-of-the-valley

scent the heavy shadows

that weave around it

Until for a fraction of an hour

the sun breaks through

and pours down light

A halo of life giving energy

a blaze of bright green

deep within the forest

Then the sun moves on

but the fern remains

savoring the blessed feast

And far below the canopy

beneath the understory

the fern waits again

-Barbara Ryther