Empowered Through Compassion Blog
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In the evening’s orange and umber light,
There come vagrant ducks skidding on the pond.
Together they veer inward to the reeds.
The forest—aspen, oak, and pine—recedes,
And the sky is smudged on the ridge beyond.
There is more in my soul than in my sight.
I would move to the other side of sound;
I would be among the bears, keeping still,
Not watching, waiting instead. I would dream,
And in that old bewilderment would seem
Whole in a beyond of dreams, primal will
Drawn to the center of this dark surround.
The sacred here emerges and abides.
The day burns down, the hours dissolve in time;
The bears parade the deeper continent
As silences pervade the firmament,
And wind wavers on the radiant rime.
Here is the house where wilderness resides.
The fading moon
and the vanguard of the sunAlchemy
The immensity of mountains
rising black from the underworld
I behold CreationIn this mindless moment I am intensely alive
There is again the birth of my soul
I am who never wayIt is the first day
One Soul: More Poems from the Heart of Yoga
I used to be convinced
that if i could shrink
myself smaller than
a pin, smaller than a
mustard seed or comma,if I could crawl inside
my head like a microbic
coal miner, the canary
would be dead within a
minute. Doesn't it feellike that? Shine a flash-
light on this mess, and I'll
find out just how slimy,
worthless, and fundamentally
mistaken I really am.But just the opposite is true.
The more illumination I
bring in, the more I see, the
more caved-in passageways
I excavate -The more the canary sings
in ecstasy. And the
miner, light reflecting on
wide veins of diamonds -
the miner just stumbled
into paradise.This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.You do not have to win at a crisis.
You do not have to push yourself
to learn a new language or write a book
or take up an instrument.
Nothing will come of forcing yourself
to complete your way out of trauma.
Take this time to look at the stars.
Take this time to look at how the sky
still holds clouds that are the shape of hope.
How the dawn begins at the tips of dewy grass,
for this is where the horizon begins.
Somewhere the dappled fawn rises
her soft neck to watch the sun rise
over her meadow.
Somewhere else monarch butterflies begin
their long migration, knowing many of them
will not make it home.
Remember that you do not need to earn
your right to the precious minutes you have
on this planet. They are already yours,
like the fawn and the butterflies.
The universe beckons you to enjoy this life
it has given you through a heart
that beats to the rhythm of its very own cosmic song.If all a lifetime must be
is the noise between
two silences,
then there is no reason
we cannot turn existence
into the most beautiful
masterpiece we ever make.
Let the sky feel like a symphony
God composed just for you.
Let the crimson roses
paint awake their brightest colors
all for you.
Let the grief
that is telling you stories
remember it is not invited to stay.
Let the love
you do not know how to give anymore
dance out of you another way.
Let every person on this planet
rise one morning and think,
What good can I do to nourish the soul?
Let there be joy
when we commemorate
The end of all things.
Let there be songs
as we see the endings
are only beginnings.
One day, when you wake up,
you will find that you’ve become a forest.
You’ve grown roots and found strength in them
that no one thought you had.
You have become stronger
and full of life-giving qualities.
You have learned to take all the negativity around you
and turn it into oxygen for easy breathing.
A host of wild creatures live inside you
and you call them stories.
A variety of beautiful birds nest inside your mind
and you call them memories.
You have become an incredible
self-sustaining thing of epic proportions.
And you should be so proud of yourself,
of how far you have come from the seeds of who you used to be.
There are languages spoken with no verb
“To be.” Those who speak them say everything
A people needs to say to grow food to eat
To build a house and sleep; to make love or
Walk alone along a dry creek where stones
Ask for hands to warm them. If you travel
There and don’t speak the tongue that says neither
“Is” nor “Isn’t,” sones ask anyway and you know
They want your hands wrapped ‘round for just
A little while, then tossed to a new home
Where they wait again, cool their bodies, ready
To be themselves, to speak to anyone passing.
The things is, I still believe in it.
The sky during its thunder.
The sea during its storm.
The earth during its darkest hours.
You. Yes you, reading this.
I am tired of us abandoning the parts
Of ourselves we do not like
And calling ourselves lost things.
The sun does not abandon us
When a storm visits.
The sea does not abandon the cliffs because they are hardened to her touch.
I am asking you not to abandon the parts of yourself
That are in need of more love.
I am asking you to hold the parts of you that shatter,
That scare you,
Close.
I am asking you to become better at loving those portions of yourself
You wish to abandon—
To learn from them
As much as you learn from everything
About you that is beloved.
The salt as well as the sugar.
The gentle breeze as well as the coarse sand.
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