Manifesto of the Brave and Brokenhearted

There is no greater threat to the critics and cynics and fearmongers 

Than those of us who are willing to fall 

Because we have learned how to rise.

With skinned knees and bruised hearts; 

We choose owning our stories of struggle, 

Over hiding, over hustling, over pretending.

When we deny our stories, they define us.

When we run from struggle, we are never free. 

So we turn toward truth and look it in the eye.

We will not be characters in our stories. 

Not villains, not victims, not even heroes.

We are the authors of our lives. 

We write our own daring endings.

We craft love from heartbreak, 

Compassion from shame, 

Grace from disappointment, 

Courage from failure.

Showing up is our power. 

Story is our way home. 

Truth is our song. 

We are the brave and brokenhearted.

We are rising strong.

--Brené Brown

Lines Written in the Days of Growing Darkness

Every year we have been
witness to it: how the
world descends

into a rich mash, in order that
it may resume.
And therefore
who would cry out

to the petals on the ground
to stay,
knowing as we must,
how the vivacity of what was is married

to the vitality of what will be?
I don't say
it's easy, but
what else will do

if the love one claims to have for the world
be true?

So let us go on, cheerfully enough,
this and every crisping day,

though the sun be swinging east,
and the ponds be cold and black,
and the sweets of the year be doomed.

--Mary Oliver

Separation

Your absence has gone through me

Like thread through a needle.

Everything I do is stitched with its color.

--W. S. Merwin

The Journey

Above the mountains
the geese turn into
the light again,

painting their
black silhouettes
on an open sky.

Sometimes everything
has to be
inscribed across
the heavens

so you can find
the one line
already written
inside you.

Sometimes it takes
a great sky
to find that

first, bright
and indescribable
wedge of freedom
in your own heart.

Sometimes with
the bones of the black
sticks left when the fire
has gone out

someone has written
something new
in the ashes
of your life.

You are not leaving.
Even as the light
fades quickly now,
you are arriving.

--David Whyte

Enough

Enough.
These few words are enough.
If not these words, this breath.
If not this breath, this sitting here.
This opening to life
we have refused
again and again
until now.

Until now.

--David Whyte

[Photo taken at Petit Manan Wildlife Refuge in Steuben, ME]

Season

This hour along the valley this light at the end
     of summer lengthening as it begins to go
this whisper in the tawny grass this feather floating
     in the air this house of half a life or so
this blue door open to the lingering sun this stillness
     echoing from the rooms like an unfinished sound
this fraying of voices at the edge of the village
     beyond the dusty gardens this breath of knowing
without knowing anything this old branch from which
     years and faces go on falling this presence already
far away this restless alien in the cherished place
     this motion with no measure this moment peopled
with absences with everything that I remember here
     eyes the wheeze of the gate greetings birdsongs in winter
the heart dividing dividing and everything
     that has slipped my mind as I consider the shadow
all this has occurred to somebody else who has gone
     as I am told and indeed it has happened again
and again and I go on trying to understand
     how that could ever be and all I know of them
is what they felt in the light here in this late summer

— W.S. Merwin, from The Vixen.

[Photo of Wallingford, VT]

The Best Are Like Water

The best, like water,
Benefit all and do not compete.
They dwell in lowly spots that everyone else scorns.
Putting others before themselves,
They find themselves in the foremost place
And come very near to the Tao.
In their dwelling, they love the earth;
In their heart, they love what is deep;
In personal relationships, they love kindness;
In their words, they love truth.
In the world, they love peace.
In personal affairs, they love what is right.
In action, they love choosing the right time.
It is because they do not compete with others
That they are beyond the reproach of the world.

--Lao Tzu

[Photo of Big Branch River in Mt. Tabor, VT]