My form leans against the waves and rises up like some kind of rogue Neptune.

   As a lifelong photographer I am so fascinated by these images I am posting two more – not because I am in them but for how they portray an aspect of our relationship with the elements into which we are born. 

   We are conceived into water. We are sent involuntarily into a foreign environment and must immediately struggle for balance.

   Our swim through this world has begun.

  I grew up near the Pacific and almost drowned in it. At age four I was caught in one of those giant waves and pulled under. It was just before I learned how to swim. I struggled with every bit of myself.

   Suddenly, I remember thinking, "Why am I fighting this giant wave. I cannot win."

   At that moment, I relaxed. The wave held me and I felt an enormous sense of serenity and safety.

   My father fished me out and shouted, "You're okay." 

   But, I already knew that.

   Over the last sixty years I have thought every so often of that mysterious experience. There is no use fighting with God. When we surrender, we touch the hem of peace.

   Rabindranath Tagore caught this notion. "I dive down into the depth of the ocean of forms," he wrote, "hoping to gain the perfect pearl of the formless./ No more sailing from harbor to harbor with this my weather-beaten boat./…The days are long passed when my sport was to be tossed on waves."

   Since the world lacks perfection, the only "perfect pearl" is without form.

   On the day I swam alone amid a jumbled sea, the sky roiling, it didn't seem like sport. Instead, I felt myself merging with the elemental strength of a great body.

   It was a serious encounter fraught with memories of the travels of my "weather-beaten boat." 

   Later, I found this line from Victor Hugo: "And you…/ Who fear no shocks,/ Brave foam and lightning, hurricane and clamour."

   It's true that I am less afraid than I have ever been. The more I surrender the more  of Love's energy flows through my heart.

   The forest can be fearful – especially if we are lost in his night. The sea can be terrifying, acutely when we think of drowning or certain sea creatures.

   But, I think of nature as kind and I love the passionate energy of her storms. 

   Mostly, I am in love with the way Walt Whitman spoke of the sea one hundred fifty years ago: "Out of the rolling ocean, the crowd, came a drop…/ Whispering, I love you,…Return in peace to the ocean…I too am part of that ocean, my love – we are not so much separated."

-Reverend Erie Chapman

Photographs: "The Ocean & Me 2 & 3" copyright erie chapman 2012