The soul awakens

Once the soul awakens, the search begins and you can never go back.

                               John O'Donohue, Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom

 

“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few”

                               Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind:

                               Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice

_____________________________

 

Life's a bitch!

In our fragility we often get broken.

and, like bottles tossed carelessly to the side of the road.

we lie shattered, in pieces,

jagged fragments glistening in the sun

raw edges, sharp and tortured.

 

There are pieces of us scattered

along the roads we have traveled

 

In our brokeness we are empty.

Joy comes

but cannot be contained.

It seeps through the cracks to disappear.

Love comes

only to go,

and hope  --  there is no hope

for one so broken.

 

And yet,

and yet hope comes

 

for from our stumbling

and our mistakes

out of the awkward parts of our pasts

 

come gifts

 

humility (for sure)

flexibility

knowledge

 

some of the most difficult times in our lives

contain within them a subversive joy

 

for when we move on

and we must always move on

 

we leave some things behind

and we carry a few precious things with us

 

knowing that down the road

perhaps only a few steps

perhaps further

 

we will once again

and again and again

 

stumble, perhaps fall

 

but will also

be born again and again

 

each rough place, each struggle

being an occasion for newness

 

the Sacred gathering us

Piece by piece

And re-creating

Until out of the jagged jumble

the first faint glimmerings of wholeness grow.

a thing of beauty....

 

until for all the seams and cracks,

the wonder of what one was, and is, and still might be,

shines through.

and deep in the murky depths love comes

and stays