Yesterday’s poem.  I wrote it in response to a photo I saw on my Facebook feed of a person standing in the doorway between two trees at the edge of a wood.

Every step you take is a doorway to somewhere new,
a choice between what was and what will be.
Do not fear the darkness behind you
nor the mists that rise in your path.

Pause on the threshold a moment.
Take a deep and aching breath,and straighten your shoulders.

Release the past with gratitude
for all that it has taught you,
and step forward in strength and beauty.

 

Gratitude List:
1.  Waking up late and lounging in bed.  After that last six-week string of insomniac nights, to finally be able to sleep long again, and then to wake up in the morning and just curl up under the feather quilt listening to the quiet sounds of man and boy talking downstairs–that was a joy.  I feel like Bilbo at Rivendell, rejuvenating to the sound of elves.
2.  Always in autumn,that slant of light.  The way it slips over the ridge to the southeast and hits the trees at the edge of the bosque in the western deep of the hollow.  The way it glows on the last of the golden walnut leaves.
3.  Breakfast.
4.  Rachel Carson.
5.  Water.

May the waters all run free and clean and clear.