​Earth, isn’t this what you want? To arise in us, invisible?
Is it not your dream, to enter us so wholly
there’s nothing left outside us to see?
What, if not transformation
is your deepest purpose? Earth, my love,
I want it too. Believe me,
no more of your springtimes are needed
to win me over—even one flower
is more than enough. Before I was named
I belonged to you. I see no other law
but yours, and know I can trust
the death you will bring.
​
See, I live. On what?
Childhood and future are equally present.
Sheer abundance of being
floods my heart.
​
    - Rainer Maria Rilke, from The Ninth Duino Elegy
translation by Anita Burrows and Joanna Macy

******************************

Earth, isn't this what you want: invisibly
to arise in us? Is it not your dream
to be some day invisible? Earth! Invisible!
What, if not transformation, is your insistent commission?
Earth, dear one, I will! Oh, believe it needs
not one more of your springtimes to win me over.
One, just one, is already too much for my blood.
From afar I'm utterly determined to be yours.
You were always right and your sacred revelation is the intimate death.

Behold, I'm alive. On what? Neither childhood nor future
grows less...surplus of existence
is welling up in my heart.

    - Rainer Maria Rilke, from The Ninth Duino Elegy
translation by C. F. MacIntyre

******************************

Earth, isn’t this what you want: to arise within us,
invisible? Isn’t it your dream
to be wholly invisible someday? –O Earth: invisible
What, if not transformation, is your urgent command?
Earth, my dearest, I will. Oh believe me, you no longer
need your springtimes to win me over – one of them,
ah, even one, is already too much for my blood.
Unspeakably I have belonged to you, from the first.
You were always right, and your holiest inspiration
is our intimate companion, Death.  

Look, I am living. On what? Neither childhood nor future
grows any smaller… Superabundant being
wells up in my heart.

     - Rainer Maria Rilke, from The Ninth Duino Elegy
​translation by Stephen Mitchell

​"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

Let it be known—I worship the Goddess of Reality

The one with tangled hair where insects nest, 
the one with blood soaked thighs,
The one who crushes my concepts with her razor teeth
and spits my mind into the wind

​She shakes her belly to the beat of primordial passion 
and feasts on the meat of ignorance 

She wanders in the garden with a basket woven with the chaos of stars
She is savoring every petal and thorn
while casting the seeds of manifestation
without rhyme or reason

She is innocent and free
and her eyes are the sound of laughter
She can not be contained or rationalized 
and she will not conform to my ideas
of how reality should be 

She stomps to the beat and throws her hips 
She is the prowl of the panther
and the leaping deer of supreme delight
She is pure in heart and the darkness of thunder

Her ruthlessness is the compassion
that severs my arrogance
and undoes my separation
so that I may know her deeply
and drink in her wild radiance.

With all that I am 
I devote myself to her insane beauty.

​When I am humble and true
She comes to me: “Dance! Why aren’t you dancing?!”

She will not be tamed 
yet she is the Grace that opens up 
the blessed wound of living

Let it be known—I love Her
this feral beast Woman
the one who is drenched in the Nectar of Love.

​I dance with her
because there is  
nothing left 
to do.

    - Maya Luna

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

...Want only what is true.
This will lead you to the well of your deepest sorrows.
Follow that passageway, all the way down;
Become the dark emptiness of your absent core.
Be still. Don't measure the waiting.
Be still. Let the waiting become a fire.
Be still. Let the fire show you its secret heart;
a strand of clear light running through you.
Gather yourself there, and the luminous universe opens.
In the vast expanse, fathomless, infinite ocean of light,
Lose yourself, and find yourself, and become what you already are.

    - Jennifer Welwood