Anam Cara

And the wheel of repetition,

Deep into the call of all

The unfinished and unsolved

Until the veil of the unknown yields

And something original begins

To stir toward your senses

And grow stronger in your heart

In order to come to birth

In a clean line of form,

That claims from time

A rhythm not yet heard,

That calls space to

A different shape.

May it be its own force field

And dwell uniquely

Between the heart and the light

To surprise the hungry eye

By how deftly it fits

About its secret loss.

FOR A NEW HOME

May this house shelter your life.

When you come in home here,

May all the weight of the world

Fall from your shoulders.

May your heart be tranquil here,

Blessed by peace the world cannot give.

May this home be a lucky place,

Where the graces your life desires

Always find the pathway to your door.

May nothing destructive

Ever cross your threshold.

May this be a safe place

Full of understanding and acceptance,

Where you can be as you are,

Without the need of any mask

Of pretense or image.

May this home be a place of discovery,

Where the possibilities that sleep

In the clay of your soul can emerge

To deepen and refine your vision

For all that is yet to come to birth.

May it be a house of courage,

Where healing and growth are loved,

Where dignity and forgiveness prevail;

A home where patience of spirit is prized,

And the sight of the destination is never lost

Though the journey be difficult and slow.

May there be great delight around this hearth.

May it be a house of welcome

For the broken and diminished.

May you have the eyes to see

That no visitor arrives without a gift

And no guest leaves without a blessing.

FOR A NEW POSITION

May your new work excite your heart,

Kindle in your mind a creativity

To journey beyond the old limits

Of all that has become wearisome.

May this work challenge you toward

New frontiers that will emerge

As you begin to approach them,

Calling forth from you the full force

And depth of your undiscovered gifts.

May the work fit the rhythms of your soul,

Enabling you to draw from the invisible

New ideas and a vision that will inspire.

Remember to be kind

To those who work for you,

Endeavor to remain aware

Of the quiet world

That lives behind each face.

Be fair in your expectations,

Compassionate in your criticism.

May you have the grace of encouragement

To awaken the gift in the other’s heart,

Building in them the confidence

To follow the call of the gift.

May you come to know that work

Which emerges from the mind of love

Will have beauty and form.

May this new work be worthy

Of the energy of your heart

And the light of your thought.

May your work assume

A proper space in your life;

Instead of owning or using you,

May it challenge and refine you,

Bringing you every day further

Into the wonder of your heart.

2                   Desires

         There is great beauty in the notion of desire. Each of us is a child of the desire of our parents for each other. We are creatures of desire because we are creations of desire. The human heart discovers its most touching music when desire and love inform each other. When we love, we leave our separate solitudes and come toward union, where we complement each other. It is this ancient desire in every heart to discover and come home to its lost other half that awakens and activates its capacity for love and belonging. There are certain things that can happen to us only in solitude, and every life needs a rhythm of solitude in order to experience this. However, the experience of self-discovery, psychological integration, and spiritual growth can happen to us only when our desire draws us out of our shells and toward the precarious and life-giving sanctuary of another heart.

Desire is also at the heart of creativity. When we engage creatively, we depart from the fixed world of daily routine and grounded facts. We enter into a kind of “genesis foyer,” where something that not yet is might begin to edge its way from silence into word, from the invisible into form. This is the excitement that fuels the writing life: the desire for what might emerge when the imagination begins to trawl the crowded seas of the white page. There is some pure desire in us to know what is original, to take leave of all the expected scripted perceptions that manipulate our experience. We long for an experience that is unfiltered, where the unknown could reach toward us without being filtered by us. For this reason the artistic life is vulnerable; it is often a chaotic and overwhelming place to attend. Yet when something true begins to emerge, it becomes the golden moment that redeems months of splintered time.