A weary soul kneels by the river, plunging his hands in despair. Miles away, another kneels to wash her sorrows. Without ever knowing, they give to each other, the way electricity illumines two bulbs that think they are the only light. Love works this way: a river that helps each other rise, a charge that makes each other glow. The web of kinship is as vast as the cries of constellations across the dark. And the dreams... Read more
My good friend, Rich Frankel, is a pioneer in relationship-centered care who works with medical students at Indiana University Medical School, and with physicians and clinicians at the Cleveland Clinic. Rich told me this story: “Reza is a Lebanese youth who came to America. He is now becoming a doctor. I met him after a long night of tending patients in an emergency room. As a resident, his face was tired but his eyes were burning strong. We fell into... Read more
Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945) was a German pastor and theologian caught in the maelstrom that was Nazi Germany. After receiving his doctor of theology degree from Berlin University in 1927, Bonhoeffer served as a Protestant minister to two German-speaking congregations in London. Upon his return to Berlin, he was troubled by what he saw happening in Germany, and said in a public talk in 1933, “We are not to simply bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice, we... Read more
If your voice breaks, I’ll be a cup. If your heart sweats, I’ll be a pillow on which you’ll chance to dream that weeping is singing through an instrument that’s hard to reach, though it lands us like lightning in the grasp of each other where giving is a mirror of all we cannot teach. —MN Facing what is difficult is one thing, but living with the wound, in ourselves and in others, means tending to someone you love... Read more
In the lonely canyon of night, the owl makes such a human cry. Who knows what it grieves. Like seeing a stranger break down in the street as we rush by. We each become the owl when something dear is taken. This is how the Greeks defined the Netherworld: that darkness between life and death where we want to be heard but never found. A Question to Walk With: Tell the story of an absence... Read more
Everything in nature erodes gracefully. The tree leans and cracks. The mountain rounds for decades in the wind. The banks of the river bow to where the river wants to But we, so aware of being here, fear the slightest change. My elbow is sore. Your heart is slowing down. And just yesterday, an old friend flew away like a bird with a broken wing. Still, for all I have learned, for all I am learning, I don’t want to... Read more
I dreamt that you gave me a gem hidden in your heart. When I woke, I felt your love move through me the way sun parts a cloud. I have looked for the gem in the folds of the world, and thought I saw it in the young woman helping the old man off the bus, and in the jogger rushing to lift the girl who fell off her bike. I’m certain I felt it in the morning... Read more
Like a meteor hurtling toward the Earth, each of us hurtles through the years being worn of all that doesn’t matter. Like a meteor that shines brighter the more it casts off, each soul shines brighter as the body that carries it is slowly cast off over a lifetime. This is the same process our deepest feelings and understandings are subject to as we try to express them. Each truth shines brighter as the story that carries it is cast... Read more
There is a small corridor of aliveness, unadorned and painfully bare, that weaves life and death. Sometimes, it appears like a halo of consciousness between our heart and what we lose. Sometimes, it shimmers, drawing us through the rain toward all that we love that is still here. There is no choosing between the shimmer and the weight, only to take each other by the hand and enter. The aliveness is there between the appearance of light and the absorbing... Read more
In the bathroom mirror, I saw the snow begin. When I turned, the birds were hovering near the feeder and the world started to soften. I quickly understood why the legendary printmakers tried to capture snow. There’s something about the sudden covering of the earth that makes truth obvious. When I can see through all the mirrors, it starts to snow in my mind. A Question to Walk With: Describe your struggle with the mirrors that follow you and the... Read more
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