Sharing

Do I bore you with my poetry? Haha. Sorry, but over the past several years I've become a fan. Can't say I've always been one, but for some reason it happened. The following poem a dear friend sent to me. I love that. Thank you, E! 

I've been feeling multitudes lately. I don't understand why I waver between utter confusion and knowing at the same time. The month of June has brought with it an abundance of light. I've been taking pictures again! Yay! Then again, I've been feeling this weight bearing down on me, not sure what or why it is there. Since being busy I've abandoned my stream of conscious writing. Feel the need to pick it up again. Haven't been sleeping well. Strange that it is light when I go to bed and light again when I wake up. I don't know if I will ever get used to this! However, surviving winter in Sweden comes with its reward, the Spring and Summer. Absolutely beautiful, really. 

My mind has been more active than normal. A bit unsettling. With that, I feel better equipped. Observing the rise and fall of my thought patterns. Even in the mist of news that pulls the rug from under me I am able to reside into some type of inner calmness. Amazing how that happens. Then again, I can say that now, but who knows what tomorrow will bring. I just might flip out, haha. Anyway, more later. Enjoy the poem. 

The Faces at Braga

In monastery darkness

by the light of one flashlight

the old shrine room waits in silence

While above the door

we see the terrible figure,

fierce eyes demanding, "Will you step through?"

And the old monk leads us,

bent back nudging blackness

prayer beads in the hand that beckons.

We light the butter lamps

and bow, eyes blinking in the

pungent smoke, look up without a word,

see faces in meditation,

a hundred faces carved above,

eye lines wrinkled in the hand held light.

Such love in solid wood!

Taken from the hillsides and carved in silence

they have the vibrant stillness of those who made them.

Engulfed by the past

they have been neglected, but through

smoke and darkness they are like the flowers

we have seen growing

through the dust of eroded slopes,

then slowly opening faces turned toward the mountain.

Carved in devotion

their eyes have softened through age

and their mouths curve through delight of the carver's hand.

If only our own faces

would allow the invisible carver's hand

to bring the deep grain of love to the surface.

If only we knew

as the carver knew, how the flaws

in the wood led his searching chisel to the very core,

we would smile, too

and not need faces immobilized

by fear and the weight of things undone.

When we fight with our failing

we ignore the entrance to the shrine itself

and wrestle with the guardian, fierce figure on the side of good.

And as we fight

our eyes are hooded with grief

and our mouths are dry with pain.

If only we could give ourselves

to the blows of the carver's hands,

the lines in our faces would be the trace lines of rivers

feeding the sea

where voices meet, praising the features

of the mountain and the cloud and the sky.

Our faces would fall away

until we, growing younger toward death

every day, would gather all our flaws in celebration

to merge with them perfectly,

impossibly, wedded to our essence,

full of silence from the carver's hands.

(David Whyte, Where Many Rivers Meet)