​​Having loved enough and lost enough,
I am no longer searching,
just opening,

no longer trying to make sense of pain,
but trying to be a soft and sturdy home
in which real things can land.

These are the irritations
that rub into a pearl.

So we can talk awhile
but then we must listen,
the way rocks listen to the sea.

And we can churn at all that goes wrong
but then we must lay all distractions
down, and water every living seed.

And yes, on nights like tonight
I too feel alone, but seldom do I
face it squarely enough
to see that it's a door
into the endless breath
that has no breather,
into the surf that human shells
call god.

​    - Mark Nepo

If not now
when? Who will sing
the praises of this place
if not you?
Can you make love
with limp excuses?
Just one word
in your own voice
would cock the heads of robins,
but today they listen only to worms.
Every morning
a thousand birds
give the world a chorus of themselves
without hesitation or regret.
All through the day
the trees and sky
speak in the hushed voices of lovers,
and in the night
the grasses sigh in the warm hands
of the evening breeze
while fireflies flash their honest love
to the distant stars passing overhead.
When you are ready, 
join the conversation--
It still needs the strong and delicate
sound of your voice.

    - Thomas Griffin

​Dawn has never broken.
She is very much in one piece,
and what a piece!
If you're lucky, you'll catch her where she lives,
Between black and white.
But you'd better pay attention.
She's a tease and won't suffer fools
So keep your eyes open.

And watch her slip on that gentle orange dress with the pink sash.
And watch her slip out night's window, no one the wiser.
And watch her do her exotic dance between heaven and earth
Heating
Heating
Heating to the burning point
Until she's got you so dizzy you close your eyes for 20 seconds.

When you open them
She's gone.

And all that remains is gentle laughter
Just beyond the horizon.

​    - Lee Brewster

​"Innocence sees that this is it, and finds it world enough."
                                                                                         - Annie Dillard
 
At some point you make peace with it
Your life as it is, with all it offers you

Like an early evening walk, half moon
Hung in the tiger lily sky

Black cows heading to the barn
Bemoaning the end of day

Hundreds of blackbirds screeching
Live as the wire they perch upon

My long-time friend zipping by in her van
Waving. It’s after all the whining

And stomping of feet, of course. After dreams
Blur with real life. After the pin-pricked

Pop of the inflated ego. What joy
Mysterious. What humble innocence.

​    - Julie L. Moore

​        - In gratitude to K & G
​
Stop moving. Stand in
one place – this place.
Breathe slowly; in, then out. Repeat.

Repeat again. Let your
shoulders sink and relax. Unclench
your jaw; slowly close your eyes.

Listen for your heartbeat; really
listen. Feel it pulse in
your fingertips.

Lessen expectations. Under-do all your
efforts. Requisition the time
for your soul

to catch up. Lean
into the wind; feel it
like a tree and test the ground.

Learn to trust the resilience.
It would be treason
to move quickly – left or right –

from this place. It is alright to be exactly
what you are, who you are, where you are.
Right here, right now.

     - Dane Anthony

​I’m listening
But I don’t know
If what I hear is silence
Or God.

I’m listening
But I can’t tell
If I hear the plane of emptiness echoing
Or a keen consciousness
That at the bounds of the universe
Deciphers and watches me.

I only know that I walk like someone
Beheld,
Beloved,
And known.

And because of this
I put into my every movement

Solemnity and risk.

    - Sophia de Mello-Breyner, trans. by Lisa Sapinkopf

A gentler world begins
in the way you touch your heart.
Be soft with the light inside you.
Caress your body with this breath.
God is nothing else
but the place where the sun comes up
in your chest.
You are the glimmering destination.
You are the golden honey daubed
on the bread of the ordinary.
Whatever is perfect,
whatever is heavenly,
begins here.

​    - Alfred LaMotte

​Because one must be naked to get clean,
my dad shrugs out of his pajama shirt,
steps from his boxers and into the tub
as I brace him, whose long illness
has made him shed modesty too.
Seated on the plastic bench, he holds
the soap like a caught fish in his lap,
waiting for me to test the water’s heat
on my wrist before turning the nozzle
toward his pale skin. He leans over
to be doused, then hands me the soap
so I might scrub his shoulders and neck,
suds sluicing from spine to buttock cleft.
Like a child he wants a washcloth
to cover his eyes while I lather
a palmful of pearlescent shampoo
into his craniotomy-scarred scalp
and then rinse clear whatever soft hair
is left. Our voices echo in the spray
and steam of this room where once,
long ago, he knelt at the tub’s edge
to pour cups of bathwater over my head.
He reminds me to wash behind his ears,
and when he judges himself to be clean,
I turn off the tap. He grips the safety bar,
steadies himself, and stands. Turning to me,
his body is dripping and frail and pink.
And although I am nearly forty,
he has this one last thing to teach me.
I hold open the towel to receive him.

​    - Amy Fleury

The gentleness of the slant October light
cancels whatever else we might have thought.
It is a hard world, empty and cruel;
but this light, oh Jesus Christ!  This light!

The maple leaves, passive in front of the house,
are laved in it, abandoned, green gone.
That nothing else should matter but this light.
Gentleness, gentleness, the light.

​    - William Bronk