let your soul birth light

It is not possible to complete yourself without sorrow

Sorrow is a vital ingredient that shapes the heart and enriches it

So endure the sadness the best you can, when its season comes.

The fain that can fall from your eye brings life to a field

and on other days when you laugh, a sun takes birth

in a sky you will someday know.

See how all the elements are inside of you.

See how your soul births light.

                                         Hafiz

__________________________________________

it is a necessary sorrow

that sorrow that comes into our souls

we need to learn to grieve

we need to learn to sit with the grief

to let it sink into our bones

and become woven into our being

if we do not learn to grieve

if we cannot sit with sorrow

then were are incomplete

and must always be fighting

denying

not just the sorrow

and its cause

but our very self

how true is it

that we are always sorrow denying

and in our intense protests

also denying joy

for our protests are fermented

in anger

and the places we travel

as we scurry away

like the nocturnal beasts we sometimes are

are dark and often fetid

and we do not hide

merely from the sorrow, but also the joy

not merely from the darkness but the light

this is a time to embrace the sorrow

of lives disrupted

of dreams thwarted

of businesses closed

this is a time to embrace, above all

the sorrow of distancing

and the pain of death

let the tears flow

let us enter into this sorrow fully

watering our souls

growing empathy and compassion

patience and selflessness

so that when the tears stop

and the joy comes,

when the season of joy once again arrives,

we dance in the sunlight

lighter, brighter

we emerge kinder

more aware

more open

more generous

better

birthing light