Migrations

I woke at dawn this morning,
thirsty from the long
hours of darkness
through which I breathed
entangled in dreams.
The lines of my face
were etched hard with exhaustion,
and I spoke a faithless prayer
to claim the otherness of my life.

For too many days now
I have sculpted from the dark
a presence in the light –
a glimpse of myself,
a shadow
beneath mud and grief.

Now the light pierces
the morning curtains of my heart,
and for the first time since I took up
the flame-edged sword of my mind,
the dark corners of the world
peel back to unfold the light.

After years of dreaming and sitting
with my back turned to the fire,
I am ready to stand and face the dark ocean of the night.
The night never leaves us; it enfolds within
to make a place where we can claim
all the fires branching in our hearts.
I have sat too long
with the world spread out at my feet
searching the endless interior
for the word that breathed me into being,
sure that in its syllables and speaking
I would find the center of a question:
the quiet beat of an unspoken heart.

When you are exhausted
you must surrender to the ground;
the world was waiting only
for this falling toward the dust.
There is only one horizon
that stretches on,
receding into the distance,
concealing itself beyond the waves.

I have asked the same impossible questions
hoping to find an answer I could live with,
but finding only silence at the center –
a silence that would shape us into
everything that we are worthy of
and write our names in wind
made of breath, made of light,
made of cloud, of wood and stone,
a wind that could carry
a migration of wings pounding on air,
moving worlds though invisible.

The way is a map in the heart;
the horizon, the lip of a well
full of gravity and longing;
it pulls me inward
like the geese are pulled on
their winter migrations.
These questions are the wind,
so I will cease asking the questions
so they might blow through me
and live.