The way we practice

The earth spins on its axis drifting through the dark, seeming to go nowhere as it inches its way around the sun. What if this is the way of things? What if every heart spins on its story? What if every mind spins on its best guess of how this all goes together? What if the very cells—in stone, bird, fish or camel—spin on their little nodes of life force inching things to heal and grow? What if history circles our constant possibility, always there within us though untouchable? What if our particular lives spin on the axis we call spirit, each of us inching our way through the dark around God? What if love is the way we practice spinning about each other until the holiness of things appears?

It’s the middle of the day and you come running. Seeing the light on your face softens me. I realize that while I spin around all that can’t be seen, you feed everything living. You take me to the blue bird house where six of the smallest birds I’ve ever seen are quivering—their seed-like beaks gaping for food. Just below the surface, everything is threaded and true.