Darkness and Light

If taking a moment to ponder a poem looks like bliss, this post is for you. If it looks like torture, this post is also for you as a possible mindfulness exercise.

Approach the words from a point of present moment awareness, let this be an invitation to read them and let them go without attempting to process or understand them, and be present with only the word held in your mind at that moment. If you could hover a light over only one word at the time, pausing with each one as a momentary discovery, what would your take away be?

Would there be any coherence? Would that matter?

Darkness and Light

By Stephen Spender

To break out of the chaos of my darkness

Into a lucid day is all my will.

My words like eyes in night, stare to reach

A centre for their light: and my acts thrown

To distant places by impatient violence

Yet lock together to mould a path of stone

Out of my darkness into a lucid day.

Yet, equally, to avoid that lucid day

And to preserve my darkness, is all my will.

My words like eyes that flinch from light, refuse

And shut upon obscurity; my acts

Cast to their opposites by impatient violence

Break up the sequent path; they fly

On a circumference to avoid the centre.

To break out of my darkness towards the centre

Illumines my own weakness, when I fail;

The iron arc of the avoiding journey

Curves back upon my weakness at the end;

Whether the faint light spark against my face

Or in the dark my sight hide from my sight,

Centre and circumference are both my weakness.

O strange identity of my will and weakness!

Terrible wave white with the seething word!

Terrible flight through the revolving darkness!

Dreaded light that hunts my profile!

Dreaded night covering me in fears!

My will behind my weakness silhouettes

My territories of fear, with a great sun.

I grow towards the acceptance of that sun

Which hews the day from night. The light

Runs from the dark, the dark from light

Towards a black or white of total emptiness.

The world, my body, binds the dark and light

Together, reconciles and separates

In lucid day the chaos of my darkness.

✨

Granted

“Watch nature, because it is your greatest teacher. It moves and flows and moves on again. There is an incredible beauty out there in the mountains, in the forests, to teach you it’s silence, it’s beauty, it’s humility. Stay aligned to that.”

— Stuart Wilde

More than a decade ago, I wished to not operate from the various components associated with the personality but to function from spirit within the body; I believed this would allow room for pure spiritual growth. Moving in the world without a pesky personality would allow a free flow of connection to every living thing — so I thought — and I was so wrong. The personality is far too complex for such a wish! However, that wish was then and I am writing this years and years down the road.

What did I learn? When you wish for something from the heart, my experience has repeatedly shown me that heaven and earth will move for you to experience that thing as long as you’re willing to receive it without dictating the how, what, when, where, and who of the wish. Having lived through what followed (which was repeated experiences in various shapes sizes and scenes to release “Valerie”) I would wish you never ask for such a thing and that instead you spend each day embracing yourself as much as possible. You need your ego to function in the world with a grounded view of reality. It may be important that aspects of your personality change, but change is not elimination.

In conversing with one of my daughter’s art teachers in the last few years, I learned she had ventured down a similar rabbit hole at one point. She wanted spirit flow to art without restraint. With the chance you’ve ever gone down or are tempted to a similar path, I’d say to not wish aspects of yourself away. If you must make change – wish for peaceful change that highlights your strengths. We grow with and through our humanness. Spirit works through the expression of personality as an intended stroke on the large canvas of life. So show up with your quirks and your humor, loving every aspect unconditionally for your best possible outcomes.

The current expression of you in this moment is your incredible beauty. You showing up every day as you is a mountain and it is a forest of sorts. You hold a wealth of wisdom within and there’s nothing external that can teach you what’s inside or allow it to flow into the world better than it will naturally. The external can only reflect, reveal, and maybe polish. Your healthy ego directing that glorious personality is the key to your ideal life experience. With pure intention, stay aligned to that.

Filled with Light

When I am Among the Trees

by Mary Oliver

When I am among the trees, 
especially the willows and the honey locust, 
equally the beech, the oaks and the pines, 
they give off such hints of gladness. 
I would almost say that they save me, and daily. 

I am so distant from the hope of myself, 
in which I have goodness, and discernment, 
and never hurry through the world 
but walk slowly, and bow often. 

Around me the trees stir in their leaves 
and call out, ”Stay awhile.” 
The light flows from their branches. 

And they call again, ”It's simple,” they say, 
”and you too have come 
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled 
with light, and to shine.”

Letter 1

Thich Nhat Hanh wrote a series of love letters to the earth. In honor of his beautiful connection to all life, we would like to share each letter with you one by one for pause and reflection between each. If you don’t know them, we hope they become favorites and if you do know them, we hope something fresh comes your wise way in rereading.

Ten Love Letters to the Earth

by Thich Nhat Hahn

I

Beloved Mother of All Things

Dear Mother Earth,

I bow my head before you as I look deeply and recognize that you are present in me and that I’m a part of you. I was born from you and you are always present, offering me everything I need for my nourishment and growth. My mother, my father, and all my ancestors are also your children. We breathe your fresh air. We drink your clear water. We eat your nourishing food. Your herbs heal us when we’re sick.

You are the mother of all beings. I call you by the human name Mother and yet I know your mothering nature is more vast and ancient than humankind. We are just one young species of your many children. All the millions of other species who live—or have lived—on Earth are also your children. You aren’t a person, but I know you are not less than a person either. You are a living breathing being in the form of a planet.

Each species has its own language, yet as our Mother you can understand us all. That is why you can hear me today as I open my heart to you and offer you my prayer.

Dear Mother, wherever there is soil, water, rock or air, you are there, nourishing me and giving me life. You are present in every cell of my body. My physical body is your physical body, and just as the sun and stars are present in you, they are also present in me. You are not outside of me and I am not outside of you. You are more than just my environment. You are nothing less than myself.

I promise to keep the awareness alive that you are always in me, and I am always in you. I promise to be aware that your health and well-being is my own health and well-being. I know I need to keep this awareness alive in me for us both to be peaceful, happy, healthy, and strong.

Sometimes I forget. Lost in the confusions and worries of daily life, I forget that my body is your body, and sometimes even forget that I have a body at all. Unaware of the presence of my body and the beautiful planet around me and within me, I’m unable to cherish and celebrate the precious gift of life you have given me. Dear Mother, my deep wish is to wake up to the miracle of life. I promise to train myself to be present for myself, my life, and for you in every moment. I know that my true presence is the best gift I can offer to you, the one I love.

Worth Words

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o’er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle on the milky way,

They stretched in never-ending line

Along the margin of a bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:

A poet could not but be gay,

In such a jocund company:

I gazed—and gazed—but little thought

What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

Spring of Love

The spring of love arrives
to transform the dust into a garden.

The call is heard from the heavens
to bid the wings of soul to fly.

The sea becomes filled with pearls.
The dry land receives the water of life.
The stone becomes a ruby,
and the body becomes all soul.

-RUMI

What is wishing to be transformed in your life? How can love lift the dust and guide you to the areas that are ready to be tended for growth and blossoming?