Stillness

Stillness

I need days like today

Quiet

Dark

Raining

Cool

Pain surging through my lower back

With every little move

So stillness is the order of the day

No frenetic activity

No urgent motion

Just quiet sitting listening to the waters flow

Just listening to the heartbeat grow

Toward a restful anticipation of good

I sense these things amongst the woods

The forests of soul and spirit 

I hear the beckons, I might be near it

I might be far away

Yet I would know nothing of anything this rainy day

Without the colors of the quiet

Autumn leaves outside my window

Bright reminders of brighter days

Shorter, still

I gaze out from the windowsill

There is always a spring after the winter

My soul for so long broken, splintered

Now the humus is ready for growth

Up into that never seen, never known

Up into all that has been known by the ancients

Up into all that is made to be me

I see the stately redwood trees

Are still with steadfast smiles

They’ve never moved an inch, a mile

Yet they know the vastness of the oceans

Because they understand the life of stillness

Quiet

Dark

Raining 

Cool

I have a day in wisdom’s school 

I have a day in the stillness

And I am so grateful for it

11/27/18

The Choosing

The Choosing

I’m at a place of mental exhaustion

And that’s a very humiliating thing for me to say

I’ve always been proud of my ability to handle adversity

Chaos, struggle were great unknowns

Now I find myself hardly able to remember my name

Is this the way it must be when all is the same

When all is a frenzied rendition?

Maybe so

Maybe not

I refuse to enter the world of dry rot

The place where all is a beggar

The place where all one seeks is pleasure

Where all one finds is pain

I am not going there

I rather decide to see what is before me

A rising sun, a setting moon

A simple lunch I take at noon

These things brings a spark of the grateful into my soul

This is a step toward me being whole

Simply being thankful for the good around me

I understand there is frantic and frenetic maelstrom

But I also know there is dancing and music

So I choose to imbibe in the latter

Relishing a glass of California wine

Listening to the weavings of the Ponderosa pine

Allowing beauty to alter my course

I can feel the breezes from the oceans