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I read this post past 2 weeks late. Just a few minutes ago in fact. I still haven’t read all of it. Got to the poem of “For one who is exhausted “ and thought of my nephew. It prompted the text below to him. I discovered Jamie about 5 years ago and spoke to him for the first time within the last month. He is going through a hard spell. A break up with a woman he’s been with for 8 years. They share a child and he still cares for the young teen that she came with. His tattoo business is struggling and he just about lost his apartment.

The first parts of the text are quoting O’Donohue from Brinn’s post. The poetry that it evoked from me begins with “Jamie.” Nothing terribly original or well-crafted. It is a spontaneous un-edited one-off. But hopefully it will be helpful for him. Line breaks are mostly random from copying and pasting.

Text to Jamie:

Just came upon this thought by John O’Donohue, the Irish poet.

“When we arrive into the world, we enter this ancient sequence. All our beginnings happen within this continuity. Beginnings often frighten us because they seem like lonely voyages into the unknown. Yet, in truth, no beginning is empty or isolated. We seem to think that beginning is setting out from a lonely point along some line of direction into the unknown. This is not the case. Shelter and energy come alive when a beginning is embraced. We are never as alone in our beginnings as it might seem at the time. A beginning is ultimately an invitation to open toward the gifts and growth that are stored up for us. To refuse to begin can be an act of great self-neglect.

Our very life here depends directly on continuous acts of beginning.” ²

And this poem by him will resonate with you:

“For One Who Is Exhausted, a Blessing When the rhythm of the heart becomes hectic,

Time takes on the strain until it breaks; Then all the unattended stress falls in

On the mind like an endless, increasing weight

The light in the mind becomes dim. Things you could take in your stride before

Now become laborsome events of will.

Weariness invades your spirit. Gravity begins falling inside you,

Dragging down every bone.

The tide you never valued has gone out.

And you are marooned on unsure ground.

Something within you has closed down;

And you cannot push yourself back to life.

You have been forced to enter empty time.

The desire that drove you has relinquished. There is nothing else to do now but rest And patiently learn to receive the self

You have forsaken in the race of days.

At first your thinking will darken

And sadness take over like listless weather.

The flow of unwept tears will frighten you.

You have traveled too fast over false ground;

Now your soul has come to take you back. Take refuge in your senses, open up

To all the small miracles you rushed through.

Become inclined to watch the way of rain

When it falls slow and free.

Imitate the habit of twilight, Taking time to open the well of color

That fostered the brightness of day.

Draw alongside the silence of stone

Until its calmness can claim you.

Be excessively gentle with yourself. Gradually, you will return to yourself, Having learned a new respect for your heart

And the joy that dwells far within slow time.”

Jamie. You know this. You’ve likely seen this. After the horrific forest fire leaves lonely blackness it its wake. The scent of burned carbon having replaced that of the conifers and tall evergreen. No more whisperings in the wind between them. Green grass gone. The pollen and its gathers gone. Evaporated in the furnace of death.

But there will be a resurrection. Always. Below your charred and weeping soul is movement. A molecular indestructible grace that is Healing wounds that arose from this conflagration. This desolation.

A redeemed life-force within yourself that you thought was irredeemable. A beauty to enrich all the senses that you had distractedly missed before. Childhood memories of such presence spouting, emerging from a richer soil than before.

And all that is required is your breath. Your presence to the breath of life. Your patience with it. Your attention to that same Grace that connects you in millions of ways to every molecule of the universe. Your past, present, and future. All held within your in-breath and out-breath.

The fireweed will bloom soon enough. The lichen will recover.

Jaime, the above poem I wrote just came out of me in this moment while peddling on my bike trainer. Inspired by John O’Donohue’s poem prior, which was in an email from a friend from weeks ago that I hadn’t read yet.

Our world is a magical place. Write yourself into it. Run or walk in nature or sit on a skinny seat and peddle in a dim room—the combination of movement and creativity is proven.

Much love to you.

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