#Light and #Peace

Light and Peace

Dim

at first.

It flickers

at intervals.

We think,

or agonise,

that

it has gone

Out!

But

we each have

a light.

It shines in us

and

out of us.

When we embrace

the light,

hold it,

its rays

shimmer

and refract

through the dark

recesses

of our being.

Because we see

that light,

and our darkness,

we bear

an illumining

wisdom

to sense

the light

and darkness

in each other.

And so

the light

in me

sees the light

in you,

and through

the marvellous

interchange,

we then renew.

That light looks:

Like coins cascading

in a tip tray

on a barista’s bad day.

Like the firm arm

around the flailing swimmer

writhing in a rip,

while the other arm

cuts the breakers

towards the steady shore.

Like the college mate

sitting on a step,

to read the essay

of his neighbour,

Who’d come abroad

only six months

before that day.

Like the devoted spouse

visiting daily

the love of their life,

who no longer

recognises the face

before their own eyes.

We see

the light

the dark,

in each other’s heart,

and,

in that light,

together

we find peace.

 

 

Simon C.J. Falk 4 February 2017

Advertisement

‘What If’? – We Looked Closer and Listened Harder

‘What If’? – We Looked Closer and Listened Harder

Today I attended the first half of a day-long workshop by a crowd called ‘WhatIf?’ .  It is a team of two colleagues working in the welfare sector.  They try to develope better empathy skills in as many people as is humanly possible.  It is to aid our family, friends and colleagues who have burdens in their mental health.  It is to help us see the person and not just the pathology.  To ask what if?  And to follow where that question leads us.

‘What If’? – We Looked Closer and Listened Harder

What if?

I looked –

really looked –

closer

at the lines

on the brow,

beyond the tracks

in the eyes,

to the weary

pain within?

What if?

I saw

in the faraway look

not just the shadows

but

a flicker

of stunning strobes

of light

striking

like technicolour

vivid visions?

What if?

I heard

in the gravely voice –

from too many smokes –

the struggle

to

articulate

the dream,

the clawing

for confidence

in that awkward pause

between words,

that is further stifled

by the voices

jibing and gibbering

in

the inner ear?

What if?

I heard

the heaving

behind the hero

in their

great Ulyssian Journey

of one day

in their life?

What if?

In my own

struggles to come

to grips with life,

I see

in others

my brothers

and sisters

together

one

and all

longing

to be seen

for who we really are?

PS:  Thanks to Emily J (and her fab blogspace here)  for pointing out Dr Brene Brown’s TED talk on empathy here

Simon C.J. Falk                      26 March 2015