Two Years

In two years, where will I stand? My oldest will be off in college and youngest just starting HS. Life will certainly roll on with bills to pay, laundry and such. But what about the real? What about the dreams? What about the love? What will be moving through my veins to help me create? What instrument will entice me to learn a pretty melody and sing a new song? In two years, will I be stronger in spirit and mind and body? These winter stars are seemingly more bright and clear. With persistence, they pull to tell a story. I find myself, under them, in the cold early morning quiet, as I walk to start the fire in the cottage. I can’t help but stop, gaze up and breathe. Breathe deeply. In goes the cold, winter’s air full of the beauty of every early morning sky. Many mornings I have stood and gleened and wondered. I hope in two years there is more time to take in these precious, fleeting moments of time that work my roots and reveal my place. A place of vastness and unknown, of opening and understanding, of passage and movement…of love. The birds are sounding their morning calls. Today it is more a disgruntled bird song to accompany the sudden cold and icy rain. Yesterday’s melodies had been sung as they would in early Spring. The robins had come yesterday only to go today, somewhere, to wait out the storm. Sort of a false start to Spring and new beginnings. Wanting to initiate but needing to wait until all is aligned. Two years, seems like a long time but the way the last one flew by, it will here before we know it. And me? I want to pray and work with an open heart, mind with intent to give-to find my place in the world. Happy New Year everyone! (Inspiration from writing prompt-Peggy Tabor Millin and reading a Mary Oliver poem-Journey -read on)

The Journey by Mary Oliver

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice–
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles,
“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop
You knew what you had to do
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do–
determined to save
the only life you could save.