Bodies of Joy

When you meditate,
stop all this reaching
for the sun.
Bodies of joy don't fly.
They are weighted down
with jewels of emptiness,
pearls of compassion.
Gravity is the prayer
of the fallen,
who rise through surrender,
sinking deeper than the ripples
where small fish feed
and thoughts nibble
your toes.
I mean to say, you must drown
in groundless silence
swelling with waves of solitude,
all names swallowed up
in the ocean of Unknowing.
Don't count your breaths.
Here, one inhalation
lasts forever, one sigh
brings you Om.
When you emerge from
these waters, dripping starlight,
waders on the shore will whisper,
"Who is that
glistening leviathan
of unalloyed night?"
Then you must sing to them
about the treasures
of the deep.


Image by Stephanie Laird