The Blessed Uncertain (A Poem of Social Distance)

In the time of the blessed uncertain,
we become a communion of ones,
the fellowship we always needed.
Our solitudes entwine.
We widen the weave of compassion
to heal with ease our dis-ease
and quench our thirst at the well of grieving.

Trust in your tears,
they will never betray you.
Know this: though far apart,
we share one breath. I am the wind.
I breathe you, stranger, as you breathe me.
From across great waters of darkness
I come to dwell in your body,
as you dwell in mine.
Distance has been swallowed up
in Being.

You grow weary on your journey?
Rest with me.
Your hearthstone far away?
Stay here.
If you feel something break inside you,
pass it through the flame in my chest
until it is whole again.

Let time move inward, slowing
to the silence of the heart,
the passage between beats
where no thought arises,
the way an animal knows
it must curl in the circle of its fur
for curing, rain-drenched under ferns.

We must all discover this Self-need.
I won’t come too near.
From the majesty of my aloneness,
I bow to your aloneness.
Namaste!

 


Mary Magdalene by Domenico Fetti