A Ray of Darkness

I recently read this and really like it.  It’s hard to explain what it means to me but the poem itself causes me to think that this is where I must be in this stage of my life.

A ray of darkness has entered my life.
Not knowing has finally brought the perpetual motion
of reaching for what comes next
to a standstill.

Is this how a tree lives?
No planning for possible floods or fires that may or may not come
next week or next month or next year.
No preoccupation with the past.
No contemplation of the hidden meaning or higher purpose
in one small pine cone coming to rest and germinate
in this particular place and time.

Just this:
The sound of wind rushing
through the uppermost branches,
like a long sigh.
The sound of one branch
rubbing against the rough bark of a nearby trunk,
a rhythmic creaking like the un-oiled hinge of a door
opening and opening and opening.

The silence of moisture rising from the earth,
fine hairs of new roots pushing through a yielding darkness
searching for sustenance.
The smell of sap softening in the warmth of the mid-day sun,
and beneath this sweetness the sharp damp scent
of beetles’ bodies and broken branches, leaves and lichen;
letting go of what they have been to be soil once again
on the forest floor.

I am living like a tree.
Everything happening within and around me
just weather sweeping across the landscape
coloring the shape of all that is living and dying in this moment.
Letting go I become soil for the seed of faith.

– Oriah Mountain Dreamer