I have found and continue to find so much solace and comfort in poems and nature. Here are a few of my favourite poems and photos to share with you. All the photos i took during my sojourns through nature and hope that they evoke something in you, as they do for me.
THE JOURNEY
One day you finally knew what you had to do, and began, though the voices around you kept shouting their bad advice— though the whole house began to tremble and you felt the old tug at your ankles. "Mend my life!" each voice cried. But you didn't stop. You knew what you had to do, though the wind pried with its stiff fingers at the very foundations, though their melancholy was terrible. It was already late enough, and a wild night, and the road full of fallen branches and stones. But little by little, as you left their voices behind, the stars began to burn through the sheets of clouds, and there was a new voice which you slowly recognized as your own, that kept you company as you strode deeper and deeper into the world, determined to do the only thing you could do— determined to save the only life you could save
(Mary Oliver)
WILD GEESE
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting–
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
(Mary Oliver)
TROUBLED
Troubled? Then stay with me, for I'm not.
Lonely? A thousand naked amorous ones dwell in ancient caves beneath my eyelids.
Riches? Here's a pick, my whole body is an emerald that begs "take me".
Write all that worries you on a piece of parchment, offer it to God.
Even from the distance of millennium
I can lean the flame of my heart into your life
And turn all that frightens you into holy incense ash
(Hafiz)
THE GUEST HOUSE
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 honourably.
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.
(Rumi)
FOR GRIEF
When you lose someone you love,
Your life becomes strange,
The ground beneath you gets fragile,
Your thoughts make your eyes unsure;
And some dead echo drags your voice down
Where words have no confidence.
Your heart has grown heavy with loss;
And though this loss has wounded others too,
No one knows what has been taken from you
When the silence of absence deepens.
Flickers of guilt kindle regret
For all that was left unsaid or undone.
There are days when you wake up happy;
Again inside the fullness of life,
Until the moment breaks
And you are thrown back
Onto the black tide of loss.
Days when you have your heart back,
You are able to function well
Until in the middle of work or encounter,
Suddenly with no warning,
You are ambushed by grief.
It becomes hard to trust yourself.
All you can depend on now is that
Sorrow will remain faithful to itself.
More than you, it knows its way
And will find the right time
To pull and pull the rope of grief
Until that coiled hill of tears
Has reduced to its last drop.
Gradually, you will learn acquaintance
With the invisible form of your departed;
And, when the work of grief is done,
The wound of loss will heal
And you will have learned
To wean your eyes
From that gap in the air
And be able to enter the hearth
In your soul where your loved one
Has awaited your return
All the time.
(John O’Donohue)
I HEAR THE SONG
My sweet melody singing out calling to be heard
Each note holds itself elegantly
I am the orchestra and the conductor, the composer and the audience
I dance to the harmonies, the flat the major and minor chords
At times I struggle with the composition
other times I surrender to the mystery
Each key holding its own beauty
Its own special cacophony of sound
Your song, my song, each individual song
And gently I realise I am that fullness,
that ripe voice enticing me to sing with clarity
I sit my fingers lightly caressing the strings of my heart,
playing my own unique life song as you play yours.
(Deb Manoy)
