Shrouds
Reflections from a Smoke-Covered Morning
Shrouds
A smoky haze shrouds lake and land
as fires burn to the north and west;
air thick and still, breathing heavy and shallow;
the shapes and forms of the world around me
appearing and disappearing without notice.
An apt metaphor for my current inner state
where nothing is wrong and nothing is right—
it all just is in the fleeting realms
of eternal time and space.
Past, present, future dance together
in seeming unawareness
that those people and places
and events and circumstances
who keep showing up
don’t belong together in a linear world.
Yet apparently they are intimately familiar with one another
in the eternity that lies beneath the shroud,
beyond the veil, in some far-distant land where
everything exists together. Where there is
no separation. Where realities co-exist and
nothing is fixed and everything is fluid
and it’s all confusing
yet not.
So still and silent as I look out over
where I know the lake to be;
so still and silent in my inner world.
Everything moving and changing almost imperceptibly
yet constantly. People and stories drifting in and out,
one moment here, another moment gone.
One could wonder if insanity was taking up residence.
Except that there is a quiet sanity in all of it—
a strange coherent stirring within that is
beyond interpretation yet feels like something
important is happening
or shifting or healing.
Or maybe transitioning
in ways I can’t yet know.
Maybe not just “something”—
maybe everything.
In the smoky shroud, the world all around me
feels unrecognizable. Yet somehow,
I find my way.
I could say the same about the bigger world—
my country, the planet.
And my inner eternity as well.
All oddly familiar,
anciently new,
releasing the strictures of time and space,
ushering in a fluidity in life that feels
unknown yet necessary.
Possibilities hidden just beneath the surface,
waiting for their time to emerge, waiting to find their
next partners for creating a new world,
imaginary and real, inner and outer,
fluid yet steady, unbelievable yet visceral.
The sun appears momentarily through the shroud—
just long enough to recognize that the
rhythms of earth and
cyclical time
remain.
On one hand,
everything is lost,
nothing is as it was.
Yet I am still here.
We are still here.
Life endures.
Resilience is.
And a new chapter is emerging
whether I recognize it or not.
For me, for my country, for the world.
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Beautiful Alan!
“Possibilities hidden just beneath the surface,
waiting for their time to emerge….”
Thank you for reminding that presence isn’t just for calm moments, it’s most needed exactly when the shroud is thickest.
What a beautiful perspective this creates for all that is happening in the physical world, the global dynamics of power and its affects on our world, and the reflections of all this in our interior worlds. Thank you, Alan. So beautiful and helpful!