Lifescape

Make a shadow

Want a shadow?
Take five breaths and make a shadow.
Conjure it, speak of it, make of it a dedication:
I knew my soul would live like this! -
A realisation, a revelation!

Give something of yourself to yourself,
Then give yourself to someone else, and
In the space that will emerge, talk of love,
And touch another, gently too;
Remember these are shadows you are talking of.

Long shades fall as a bright day ends,
Yet if we are at peace, they seem
Like ancient, dark, remembered friends.
Want a shadow?
Take this life and make a shadow (ref)

 This is not, writes Alice Walker, “a time to live without a practice. It is a time when all of us will need the most faithful self-generated enthusiasm (enthusiasm: to be filled with god) in order to survive in human fashion”.(ref)

My practices are poetry, conversation and a sense of meditative presence. My ‘enthusiasm’ is based on a rational, materialist knowledge (not belief) in what we now know through science (as opposed to what was known and believed in centuries past). The ‘god’ I am filled with is a flow of spirit into the words I write. In future decades and centuries, more will be known (and therefore science will evolve) but the poetic voice that emerges from the human soul will still be seeking ways of practising.

 For me, it is practice that is important, rather than any belief – in fact belief often gets in the way of a sense of fulfilment in our lives. Knowledge is good – albeit a necessarily incomplete portion of our human experience – and comes from evidence that is accumulated and adjusted over time. Continue Reading »