The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice -
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations -
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice,
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do -
determined to save
the only life you could save.

*(Mary Oliver – Dream Work)

As we spin with the world
Rotating among
The stars and particles
Swirling around us
Tides ebbing and flowing
The moon and the sun rising
We must command
Ourselves
To simply stop.
To simply be.

(Breathe in the air
Not polluted by hurry
And breathe out the spirit
Of mercy and peace)

_____

_____

When I was younger,
nineteen or so
and needed to be rescued
I stopped by the liquor store on Green Oaks
and bought a small bottle of vodka.

they never carded me.

I’d continue down the curvy road
down to the place where people parked their boats
and I’d hide my car, and walk down to the dock.

Like a buoy, the dock would raise up, raise down
with each roll of the lake from the night to the shore
and I’d walk to the end, where I’d lay flat on my back
in the silence and with the stars
letting the vodka warm me
as I continued to bob up and down
with the lake and the dock.

I suppose I hoped that my rescuer would find me
and hear the quiet screaming of my heart:
alone! afraid! lost!
and he would simply sit next to me
his hand on my knee or my arm or my face
and with his presence I’d know that
in the end, when I’d sober up and leave
that everything would at least be a little bit okay.

For a couple years I did this
even when I moved two hours away
I found my way to the dock several times
waiting to be rescued
and looking to the stars for hope.

A decade past, there are still moments
when I want to lay on my back on the dock
a thousand miles away
although now, I know my rescuer is
and was and has always been
Yet the stars still bring me hope
and with them I’m reminded
I am not alone, even in times
when the loneliness is loud

Because we all seek out the star
that guides us to our rescue;
captivating us with a holy
gravitational force.

___

___

Holy, Restless Anticipation by Anne Jackson

—

Stay right here a little while

Stay right here my dear

Hear me whisper to your heart

And take away your fear

For you soon will see

An unlikely king

And you soon will feel

A flesh that will heal

Oh, Divine, my Word on your lips

Find refuge in a holy kiss

Stay right here a little while

Stay right here my dear

Hear me whisper to your heart

And take away your fear

I’ve said it a million times myself.

“I want to give a voice to the people that don’t have one.”

But after going to India a few months ago, it began to occur to me that my philosophy is completely off track.

Everyone has a voice. Even the people who are the most overlooked.

They have beautiful voices.

Broken voices.

Voices pleading for help.

Voices singing with hope.

Even their silence says something…

The phrase “I want to give a voice to the people that don’t have one” has to go.

It’s dehumanizing.

THEY have a voice.

The problem is WE don’t listen.

Sometimes I wonder what I’m going to be like as an old woman.

When I was eighteen, I wondered what I would be like when I was thirty and my imagination then and the current reality are very far apart from each other.

I think I would like to be the kind of old woman who wears chunky necklaces and has bright white hair and that could tell tales of when I was thirty and forty and people would lean in and be mesmerized by my whimsical stories and the way I uncover timeless truth.

But then I wonder if I’ll just end up alone in my bed with hairy legs and maybe a slight mustache. And I’d be laying in a sea of cookie crumbs watching marathons of Law & Order (and all the while my cat is licking the back of my hand).

Patient Trust

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient in everything to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way to something unknown, something new.
And yet it is the law of all progress that it is made by passing through some stages of instability—and that it may take a very long time.

And so I think it is with you.
Your ideas mature gradually–let them grow,
Let them shape themselves, without undue haste.
Don’t try to force them on, as though you could be today what time
(that is to say, grace and circumstances acting on your own good will)
will make of you tomorrow.

Only God could say what this new spirit gradually forming within you will be.
Give our Lord the benefit of believing that his hand is leading you,
and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (via Ian Cron)

There are six billion people in the world.

Give or take.

Each with a purpose.

A dream.

A fear.

A place.

And I’m learning that there is an increasing need for love and hope and faith in each of these six billion people.

And as someone once said…

“I can’t change the world…but I can change the world in me.”

In fact, by doing it the other way around, I’m actually quite hypocritical.

Plain and simple.

Serving the world while serving myself?

Heal the broken while I hide my own brokenness?

Impossible.

Inconsistent.

Action without personal transformation is empty.

And transformation without action is impossible.

===

it’s okay to slow down.

don’t check your email tonight.

leave your computer at work.

turn the TV off and read a book.

go for a walk.

go for a drive.

go for a beer.

go with your friends.

go with your wife.

go with your husband.

go with your kids.

tell your wife she’s beautiful.

tell your husband he’s all you need.

tell your kids they make you proud.

step away from the addiction.

whatever it is.

even if it’s just for a night.

and look up into the stars.

into the clouds.

into the sky.

into the eyes.

of someone you love.

and love.

sometimes

i just want to turn the comments off.

i wonder if

this space becomes a boxing ring

instead of a place where truth and love

(and truth in love)

is spoken.

where grace is demonstrated.

i love a healthy discussion,

but the unhealthy ones

break

my

heart.

and i just want to hit

[delete]

but backspacing isn’t always enough.