meaning
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My Moment
What if my moment comes,and I miss it?What if the moment has passed,and I was clueless? This could be the moment now,or this one. How many moments are begun, abandoned, forgotten? I so often feelI'm right there on the verge,but… Continue reading
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All Fish Could Sing
"All fish could sing," the old one saidas she scraped the scales and severed the head."They sang to each other their songs of dread,of silt, of sunlight, of someone to bed,or why the fisherman's lures of leadwere dragged through the… Continue reading
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I Steer Clear
"I steer clear of poetry," she said,"because it insists the universeis held together by moral coherence." She brushed the crumbs of her croissantoff the linen tableclothand into her napkin,then glanced around for some acceptable place to shake it out. "I… Continue reading
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You Have a Purpose
Todayyou have a purpose,a calling.Someone you will meet todaygropes toward hope,stumbles, fumbles toward the light,light radiating solely from you,solely from you. Thus you are sacred. Text and image © 2011 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved. Continue reading
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Between
Between your current exhalationand the inhalation to followis a brief momentwhen your breathing stops. (There, it just happened.Were you aware?) Imagine that moment of no breathas the pause of possibility. (It just happened again.) Your life began with an inhalationand… Continue reading
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Remembering and Discovering at the Same Time
I am an admirer of the poet David Whyte. Even when David speaks about poetry, it is poetry. Listen to some of the ways he describes the art of the poem: remembering and discovering at the same time a conversation… Continue reading
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The Purpose of Poetry
The purpose of poetry? To awaken compassion, unseat the ego, encapsulate experience, startle the heart, reconcile our disparate selves, focus attention, grapple with God, heal, open windows, further the journey, surrender, embrace the other, sidestep convention, engage the senses, break open the heart. The purpose of spirituality? All of the above. Text and image… Continue reading
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The Role of Words
If what you seek is truth,give up on words. All writing–all speech–is fiction,a combination of symbols arranged in arbitrary order,pointing (depending on the speaker and receiver)in any of several dozen directions. Your words are a bucket of ping-pong ballssealed in… Continue reading
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An Unfinished Life
"Each of us leaves an unfinished life," says poet Mary Oliver. It is possible not to? Is it possible to live so fully, so richly, so completely that you exit exhaling, "That's it, then, once this mug goes back in… Continue reading