I suddenly find myself on this strange bus, memories and old connections blinking through like lights through moving windows, phantom reflections easily plowing into the opposite lane, and though I mostly parse these images with no concern, I also notice their entraining lap, kaleidoscope of worlds in orderly collision, ways we see our lives along this ride.
I revel, I luxuriate in never needing to be good anymore
No need to put it by in furtive storage, strategic hoarding for future credit
No need to ferret out how my accumulation compares with others'
No need to run my banners up a mast at chosen times, no need to cast for accolades, or falling short, put on a braver face, console myself with plans of being better
So I can smile into the offer of the moment, perfection given, bountiful, for everyone together, this being how it feels to know there's none good but One, and it is ours, and we belong within.
I was walking outside in that grace-touched moment when the warming sun suddenly brings out all the scents - new grass and dried flowers, blossom and resin, and the air is still fresh enough to carry each scent and deliver it like a caress, eliciting joy like birdsong, high and acrobatic, everything I'm learning reprised in the sweet awareness of presence and the priceless importance of everything here.
Consider who you are, the strength and grace comprising you, your power and tenacity, your will to live
Then you can know for sure you have no obligation to settle any scores, to have reactions - don't need to fix things before you have the freedom to stretch out, confident, into your being
Your integrity is your imperative and it doesn't wait for vectors to align, for others to act first. You're free to be completely true to what you are. You're free to learn and do it every day.
It's not that we stop spinning, curling in the currents, spiraling along their lines unseen, by us unknown
Nor that we gain the viewpoint to see the movement from above, predict, or orchestrate, or even sing along
This peace, instead, comes from the inner balance, the focus of the moment and the joy of presence, so instead of being swept, we ride the swirls, and own the place we are and what we give.
Maybe I've used up all my words, except the ones that will describe the thoughts that haven't fully proved themselves
The thoughts are eager. They want to save the world. They are sure they can, sure their lens, with dedicated focus, can burn through every lie
The words are watching. They'll choose and arrange themselves, once they've seen something certain. Meanwhile they think there's nothing new and true enough for them to say.
Not teapots and sofas, but estimates of cause and effect, anticipation of results, calculations of triumph and regret
I'm asked to give up thinking my feeling reflects what someone else has said or done, give up believing that my well-being is something to be given or withheld
I'm asked to grasp the solidness of Spirit, the all inclusive scope of comprehensive Mind, how my well-being rests on everpresent Soul alone, how this All-seeing graciously calls me its own.
The color is yellow with red at the center, the sound is clear water in echoing caves, the feeling is peace, the feeling is strength, the taste is thirst quench and promise
This is a truth I grasped in a moment, something discovered within, challenge and touchstone to use for my practice, place to return to begin.
Signs of a day well spent rest on my eyes and cheekbones - more than the gift of warming sun and cooling wind, and work outside, this sense of symphony (haunting sweetness of the oboe, deft arpeggiation branching through the strings) surrounds us in a hallowed circle
All is well, and all is held safe in the hand of harmony - we live our lives as prayer and art and work and joy and play.
I find myself connected as paths fan out dendritic like breath within, like hyphae, like the T in Boston
I find myself suffused with such affection as this life moves through me, filling and sustaining me, the lines of generations deepening connection, the web of shared perception annulling time.
I come upon this here, my life, it would seem, a bend of road, all these things placed for some purported purpose, and rain that's fallen here - how it has puddled
A road with mud and gravel, a road with evening sky, the path I travel, a way to sometimes fly.
We, too, stand and let the light glow through us, we, too, are formed in this communion, we, too, reach out and grow, nourished by what shines on us, what shines us
And that compelling brilliance you may see for just a moment is really what we are, all of the time. We stay attuned to this, for this is all we need, all we need and all we really know.
In spring there is no thought of being trapped in winter's guarding case - attention, rather, focuses on rising sap, where energy can stretch, on what was promised in the fall, and put to sleep, and now awakens, discovering its form, its destiny, its place in time, the season of its place, and what was sheathed unfurls in unencumbered grace.
These are fluid things, silver, eager, bright - they move quickly into any shape suggested.
When you observe their shape, they take that image in, use it to reinforce the picture, make it seem more true
When you assign a cause, a reason, a history, they weave that in, too, till you might think they had existence independent of your thought, might find them to comprise a solid obstacle
They mean no harm - they live to serve - they don't intend to trap you - give them the guidance to shape your truest hopes - they'll shine them forth in beauty and delight.
Various choruses are not surprised at my thought coming round to you - the time of year, they say, the necessary reckoning ... I don't know. Could be ...
I could choose to be an old woman, sitting among my shards, flickers of memories, glints of past light,
Or I could join you here in heart warmth - what you have always given me, what you give me still, helping my ground to new, abundant, life.
Tucked between the spans of rain and the subtle give of spring, where morning's chill yields sooner and evening's chill comes later, I find I can imagine ease, where needed tasks make room for each other, and we can grow abundance, and manage it, and bring the blessings in and share them fully - seeds can bring forth a hundredfold, and as we learn their rhythms, maybe we can, too.
Every day has its moment of gold, perhaps in the sky, perhaps in the land, perhaps in a true smile reflected back or in the core warmth of knowing who I am
This gold is not traded but it is multiplied, every time it is fully felt, every time it is shared.
I took a moment to receive the companionship of softly dripping skies, and clouds illumined by some moon through them - the quietness of being outside as night rolls through the land
Inside, we have the light, the fire, the music, and the same equilibrium smoothing everything, filling the crags with smiles.
