19 Comments

The contemplative pause at the end is very moving, Brian.

until.....(silence).......I find a glade

To me, it speaks with honesty of the inner landscape we're all wandering.

Finding the courage to enter that silence is not easy.

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Thanks. I was crafting an honest ending. Who know where each of us “lands” at a stage of life we’ve never reached.

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A slow ripening process like this poem. A work of patience.

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Meister Eckhart, “There is nothing in the world that resembles God so much as silence.”

Seek out the silence inside your deepest self. Make space for the silence and it will speak to you and you will discover your true heart.

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I need to read more from Meister Eckhart. Whenever I come across statements/short writings, they almost always resonate with me. Thank you for sharing this Paul!

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For me, all I find is layers and layers and layers of silence. But I think that’s the whole point. I never arrive. There is no secret message delivered. Just the peace and loveliness of losing my “self” into something vast and oceanic. Pure Love.

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That’s community in such a deep level…

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100%

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How each step of this felt both wondrous and familiar at the same time I can’t say.

Looking over my shoulder I know there is no other direction but forward (though how can you not see the circular path?)

Beautifully done. Powerful.

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Thanks Patris!

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Such a beautiful meditation on the ways we affect each other as we wander our own paths in life. Great poem, Brian!

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Thank you 🙂

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A very thought-provoking poem, one to come back to and think about some more

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Excellent. I’d love to hear more about how it lands with you…

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Wonderful, Brian, and even more so that you had a draft of this from 2022 and this has been shaped into final form by this shared process with the two of you.

"Or perhaps just wander

And reveal my own."

This is really beautiful.

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Thank you. Similar to what you posted in Slake a few days ago, it always feels funny to go back and read something that hasn’t been touched for 2 years!

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For me, the poem is an exercise in metacognition in verse about how our thinking evolves from youth to maturity. I think I've gotten to the place of the last stanza in my thinking. I hope!

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Thanks for sharing Liz. I would call it a maturing too, with a critique that maturing doesn’t always have much to do with age.

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You're welcome, Brian. I agree that age doesn't necessarily bring maturity.

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