Being Human

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In November, Sounds True will publish a new, expanded edition of Inside the Miracle: Enduring Suffering, Approaching Wholeness, which gathers twenty-eight years of my writing and teaching about suffering, healing, and wholeness, including thirty-nine new poems and prose pieces not yet published.

One of the great transforming passages in my life was having cancer in my mid-thirties. This experience unraveled the way I see the world and made me a student of all spiritual paths. With a steadfast belief in our aliveness, I hope what’s in this book will help you meet the transformation that waits in however you’re being forged.

The following piece is an excerpt from the book.

BEING HUMAN

We’re born with an aftertaste of Oneness

and a thirst for weeds and earth, as the angel

deep within us needs our hands, to make a

dance of all this hurt. It has us reach beyond

our limits, till we love like a planet though

we’re constantly confused. We carry lightning

in a thimble of skin and bones and dreams.

We carry everything that matters in a plan

that doesn’t last, while the stars pulse

to fill us, the way a candle fills a room.

A Question to Walk With: Describe a time when you experienced the light of a person filling an entire room.