Yesterday, we concluded the final session for the 2022 cohort of the Genesis School for Contemplative Living. The weekend was beautiful, deep, and touching and I will miss gathering with the circle of participants. Many emotions stirred in me, I am still integrating the experience.
The teaching team has decided to take a pause. We are tired and in the midst of various transitions. We feel called to evaluating the program and discerning what comes next, and when and where.
As I awakened Sunday morning, the closing day, thoughts and feelings were stirring in my head and heart. I felt myself in liminal space, between communities and in both communities simultaneously. Such grace!! And, with community comes the cross, always, as Phil Berrigan used to say (presenté!).
This poem reflects wisdom from my teachers-- Bud Knight, Liz McAlister, James Finley, and the sisters and brothers I've lived and worked alongside these past several years and months: Beloved Community.
The smile on my face masks
The gaping hole in my chest
Right where my heart should be
Sometimes the ache seems unbearable
A wise man once told me
That hole in your chest is the portal to a world vaster than the cosmos
I know it’s true because I fell in
Arms and legs flailing, I panicked
Grasping at a passing tree branch, it slipped through my fingers
I fell, and fell
After three days, I realized there was no end to it
No jagged rocks at the bottom, no yawning surf
There was just the falling
And my body relaxed a little
Then my body relaxed a lot
I fell past a dewdrop on a blade of grass
Oh! I gasped
Meaning, “You are beautiful.”
A scrap of bread falls alongside me
I take it in, it is sweet.
Oh, I whisper
Meaning, “Thank you.”
I tumble by thorns, lies, and scars
O-oh, I stutter
Meaning, “I am sorry.”
I fall past smiles and meadows
Past tears and oceans
Past the breath, stars, and galaxies
New babies, war, infirmity, and the dying
I fall past kind words and benevolent gazes
Each a fleeting grace, beyond my grasp to hold
A wise woman once told me
Don’t be afraid of the abyss
I didn’t understand then
This lacuna in my chest
Is the doorway to infinite belonging
I am falling
endlessly
In Love.
Oct 9, 2022
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