Getting Closer

Read Mark’s weekly reflections on The Huffington Post.

This week’s poem explores the cloudlike veils that come between us and our direct living of life. Sometimes, we have to part the veil with our mind. Sometimes, we have to let the wind of our heart blow it open. Sometimes, we need the love of others to part the veil for us.

Getting Closer

Go on, the voices say, part the veil.

Not with your hands. Hands will only

tangle the hours like a net. Get closer.

So you can part the veil with your breath.

The world keeps moving in on itself. It’s

what it does. Cobwebs. Opinions. Moss.

Worries. Dirt. Leaves. History. Go on. Put

them down and get real close. Open your

mouth and inhale all the way to the begin-

ning, which lives within us, not behind us.

Then wait. When something ordinary starts

to glow, life is opening. When the light off

the river paints the roots of an old willow

just as you pass, the world is telling you to

stop running. Forget what it means, just

stop running. When the moon makes you

finger the wet grass, the veil is parting.

When the knot you carry is loosened,

the veil is parting. When you can’t help

but say yes to all that is waiting, the veil

is parting.

A Question to Walk With: Describe a veil that you experience between you and life? What do you imagine would happen, if you could part the veil? What might you stop or quiet in your life that might part this veil? What small thing can you do today to begin this effort?