September 2014 | Read a Friend’s Heart
As I write this, four South African women will be killed by their partners. Along the interstate in Anywhere, USA, cars will pull over and release bewildered dogs in fields, then drive off. Untold incidents of elder abuse will occur. In Turkey’s refugee camps, thousands will struggle through the day, wondering if and when they’ll ever see home … or find new ones. In America’s disposable culture, women and men will exit the relationships they’re in, believing the grass is always greener somewhere else.
What can one do in a world like this?
Abide. Persevere. Meditate. Go on.
“What is there to do?” asks the spiritual supplicant. Perhaps embrace Lord Buddha’s teaching that every moment of our lives we are loved and accepted by beings seen and unseen.
Trust your purpose, that you are here for a reason, that it includes making your mark with integrity and compassion. Do your inner and outer work, then rest in stillness.
When doubt wells up in your chattering mind, lean into a tree and listen. Speak your truth to it, your dreams, your aspirations. The tree will listen and speak to you. Resume. Bring love and gratitude to everything you do, especially to those areas of your life that require forgiveness. Enter surefooted the dream of your sacred life and live.
Where is my daughter? Where is my love?
Can I ever again enter the ruin of my house?
What do the trees know? More than you.
Lean into and be lost in the psithurism
Of their language of branches, wind and leaves.
Go back to your labors. Your answers are in you.
Answer the predator with love.
Examine your heart with precision
And make right that which you’ve done wrong.
Step up. Encounter the world. Love.
Book Recommendation
Washing the Bones: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Transformation, by Katherine Ingram
Participate
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—Robert
Read & Share
Please consider reading these books. If you like them, perhaps you can share with friends and loved ones. They make appropriate gifts.
Poetry as Spiritual Practice, The More We Get Together: The Sexual and Spiritual Language of Love, and other collections are available at my website, IndieBound, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and by request at your local bookstore.