rethinking darkness

“Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.”

                                                   Mary Oliver

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Hello darkness

my old friend

in the early morning hours

when my chattering brain will not be silent

I sit and look at windows that

do not reveal the world outside

with its mountains soaring

crisply laundered with new fallen snow

but merely stare back

black holes

reflecting

back only a blurred image

of my questing gaze

we have a conflicted relationship

with the dark

sometimes it is comforting

sometimes it is where we hide

unwilling to be seen

but we stumble in the dark

and in the dark we find it hard to escape

our fears

our dark thoughts

and so mostly we would rather

chase it away

we turn on the porch lights

and we spring forward

and fall back

when trapped by darkness we strive toward the light

but there value in the darkness

it can be a gift

in the darkness we are unwrapped

and revealed

in the darkness we are vulnerable

it is no accident that our very being is roiled in the dark

thoughts racing

hearts pounding

souls aching

things happen in the dark

things begin in the dark

in the dark we are vulnerable and open

in that hidden

safe

frightening place

it was no accident that Nicodemus

came stumbling to Jesus in the dark

furtively

hiding

perhaps from himself

perhaps from others

but also ready

in the darkness, to be exposed

transformed

born again

in that place

where nothing we normally rely on means anything

in that place

where we cannot see one step in front of us

in that place

where we are hiding but revealed

in that place

we can let everything go

all our wisdom

all our perceived expertise,

our tight control of our lives

our power

our worldly status

even our tightly defined and controlled

image of God

in that place we can learn to be led

learn to be comforted

learn to be loved

in that place we can be born again

for new life starts in the dark

“Whether it is a seed in the ground, a baby in the womb, or Jesus in the tomb, it starts in the dark.”  (Barbara Brown Taylor)