The more I struggle for humility,
the more prideful I become.
The more I struggle for equanimity,
the more reactive I become.
The more I struggle to be content and at peace,
the more restless and melancholy I become.
Yet I cannot stop struggling.
Month: September 2016
“It Is Time To Open, My Reluctant One”
It is time to open, my reluctant one.
When you close the door to be alone with your sorrow,
you close the door also on your joy.
Leave that door open, my despairing one,
let the plaintive cries of the others reach you,
touch you, bring you to your knees,
and let them bring you up again,
to the surface where a child smiles
at you in line at the supermarket,
as you take the change from the cashier
with her eyes so sorrowful, so beautiful,
so full of a hidden mystery
she yearns to express.
Express her yearning, my searching one,
as she tells you, in a voice so melancholy
and weary, so soft and precious,
to have a good day. If only you could
somehow make her day great, somehow point
to the greatness she has in herself,
then you could say truly
today was good.
Feel the wind on your skin, my inward one,
let this power touch you continually,
feel it even in the protected stillness of your room.
You are never so estranged from the world
that the wind cannot embrace you.
Open to it, and its’ touch
will not end at your skin.
“It Is Not Yet Time For Another”
It is not yet time for another.
It is time to be alone,
time to wait for grace
to pull me up muddied and waterlogged
from the turbid lake I chose to dive into.
Time to sit here, watch the world go by,
let my youth be taken from me,
take notes now and then as I am given
these resplendent moments, when I realize
that nothing needs to be changed.
Brian Leibold 