This Silent Vow

With no thought to what I ought

I do just what’s required

The absence of rules, observances and resolutions

Brings a deeper resolve,

A wordless commitment:

To meet whatever calls

No longer abandoning abandonment, fearing fear,

Rejecting rejection or leaving loneliness on its own

To dwell in abandoning, fearing, rejecting and leaving

Until their time is done

This silent vow

Is to be here for it all

To consecrate all that’s been held mundane

To see the worldly in the divine

To move my allegiance from those false idols  

(What wasn’t and what may yet be)

To worship at the altar of what is

To stand, naked and vulnerable, as I am

No longer sheltering in the shade

Of beliefs, conditions, ideas or excuses

To emerge into the light of now, blinking

And a little timidly, at first.

Making Something Of It

The story, barely begun, meets silence today

A change from the customary making something of it

No momentum forward, no pull back

Bemused by the lack of movement

I sit, and do nothing

The aliveness of my senses wholly apparent

Then a question comes: what is here?

I sit and wait, the answer beyond comprehension

Yet known nonetheless

Next, words come: I’ll take up all the space I want

Really? And how much space is that?

A pause. Then an aah. 

Space does not take up space

It requires no special allocation

It now becomes clear that there’s something precious here

Which needs looking after

We can’t begin to know what it wants

Until we know that it’s not

What if I object to nothing, and things are as they are?

(Laughter.)

When The Times Comes

1.      Self or not self:

The heart knows no such boundary

To all things a season

Indivisible fragments of the undivided whole

No thing without its other

2.      It is time to step out now

You’re not quite ready

So I’ll take your hand

(We’re never quite ready when the time comes)

When you decide to stop dallying, you’ll see:

The gold you thought so elusive

Is not at the end of the rainbow you imagined