Oh! Everything is bursting and growing and celebrating together, even in the midst of the suffering - such a blessing...
The Cure
Albert Huffstickler
We think we get over things.
We don’t get over things.
Or say, we get over the measles
but not a broken heart.
We need to make that distinction.
The things that become part of our experience
never become less a part of our experience.
How can I say it?
The way to “get over” a life is to die.
Short of that, you move with it,
let the pain be pain,
not in the hope that it will vanish
but in the faith that it will fit in,
find its place in the shape of things
and be then not any less pain but true to form.
Because anything natural has an inherent shape
and will flow towards it.
And a life is as natural as a leaf.
That’s what we’re looking for:
not the end of a thing but the shape of it.
Wisdom is seeing the shape of your life
without obliterating (getting over) a single
instant of it.
About Healing
What can I teach you
that isn’t better said
by the still knowing of your body?
Here, I’ll hush
and we can wait together.
In the silence
it can seem as if
the truth is running late.
Trust her anyway.
She’s taking the shortest path
she knows
Winding her way
through the ropes in your belly and
navigating the lightning storms
of your heart
takes care
and it takes time.
Tell me about
the first tree you ever loved –
the one who
when you smiled
smiled
back.
When the truth arrives,
she’ll meet you
where your roots
are strongest –
she knows you’ll need them
to anchor you to
your grief.
Our friend, Marshall Lyles, has muscular dystrophy. He suffers, he cares for others, and experiences what it is to walk in this world in this condition. He's doing something about it, about the language of it. I am so grateful. (You can scroll through slowly with the help of the arrows.)
Ancient Language
Hannah Stephenson
If you stand at the edge of the forest
and stare into it
every tree at the edge will blow a little extra oxygen toward you
It has been proven
Leaves have admitted it
The pines I have known
have been especially candid
One said
that all breath in this world
is roped together
that breathing is
the most ancient language
