swimming,
pool of dawn
splashes of spark ignite me
hope fire chills my bones
Did I dive in?
I don’t remember
I swim in dawn de cologne
it stings a little bit
too alive too now
everything dead is gasping
stranded if it will not
give it self up to life
being dawn-summoned it shrinks
enfeebled, inert,
dissipating in one hiss
warm radiance consoles
consoles the weary
fear not, fear not
wherever hope was not
it was
it is
it will have been
splash spray spray
love
double summit
Yes, I am existing in the thrill of yesterday’s summit triumph.
It is rare in life to be able to revel in the joy of a coming victory without doubts as to whether it may occur, but I had the most luminous day preparing my work to be shown. Then, as it turns out, many many visitors came to see the summer’s work in the open studio; the first time this has ever happened to me. I was dazzled and dizzy with the sheer wondrousness of the warmth, joy and interest of the visitors, a delight it had never even occured to me to dream of in my old existence.
Yet the day held a slight surprise: a double summit.
It was like this: the day was scheduled with a friend also visiting, during which visit I was planning a daring act. But the friend came impossibly late for such a conversation. While I might have expected to be disappointed, it turned out that I had needed the whole day to prepare for the evening event and it would have been terribly compromising to it to curtail the getting ready work. While I might have expected to feel bereft, it turned out that the friend would be able to visit for the act of great daring on Monday.
All in all the dynamics felt like those of grace, but it does mean that the work of this weekend is not entirely completed. One summit has been surmounted, but what I had not grasped is that there were two summits all along, and the second is spaced from the first by two days of travel.
So although today is a moment of respite, it is not a moment of descent. Attention and focus need to be retained, along with the dynamics of trust, hope and grace.
It is bravery of another kind, and another call to patience. But I have the delight of the first triumph to sustain me along the way, what joy.
summit day
I am so close to the summit now that I see it all the time, it’s not a glimpse anymore.
I’m working with each step towards something immense. It is my destiny.
Last night I messaged my friends for support. Today I feel it and the extra measure of power, love and reassurance I need for being brave.
I let go of some last things that needed to be left behind. Towards a summit you must not carry anything unnecessary, as you are weaker and energy reserves are depleted. No personal idols can be taken to the summit, nor any false responsibilities nor undue lament.
There are a few final practical things to be done. I will do them steadily, trying to make sure to prioritise them correctly, although my mind is affected by the thin air and intensity.
Thank you for what your own silent watching has meant to this moment.
a glimpse of the summit – quiet
I am getting nearer.
I have been through the exhilation of glimpsing arrival, ferocious discipline, the last reserves of patience, and now a quiet has fallen into me.
There is still quite a long list, but I can only work my way through it steadily. Some things might not get done. None may assume the right to cause panic.
Yesterday my disintegration met a friends disappointments. It was painful. I needing a bolstering of hope and instead I felt dropped. Forgive, forgive. This work is tiring to one’s friends; all summits bring up unresolved desolations. Continuing on with love is how we touch them with grace, how we heal each other.
If I work gently and steadily, I will arrive.
an act of daring
What has it all been about, this summer, this piano playing, this renewing of an inner studio?
At the end of a summer holiday in my home country, which contained an inner adventure, I found myself absolutely renewed, expanded, with the kind of glistening clarity I could barely have imagined possible. Derisory concerns and pettinesses of worry had cleared completely away, as if a whirlwind had gone through my life and left only the most beautiful things, hope.
I was effervescing with the delight of it and wild with the power of myself that had been as if launched within the exhilaration. I was ready for projects, expansions, longings, dreams…
And I returned home to endless, continuous difficulty, disruption, demand, discouragement and dread.
Hmmm.
The last few weeks have consisted of repeated attempts to rediscover, retrieve, establish, rediscover, retrieve this substance of myself. I am accustomed to such dynamics but rarely have they been so ferocious. The other day I was despairing with my friend about the endlessness of it and when I saw her yesterday she had had a thought.
There is a situation I had not quite been addressing, something where the difficulty of the dynamics were risking inner collapse, compromise instead of conviction. It was easy to argue the validity of succumbing to the pressure. Any reasonable acquaintance would have commiserated with me and left it, disconsolate but rational.
My friend is not entirely convinced of the life-deciding legitimacy of what currently passes for reason.
This is what you need to do, she declared, and then outlined what felt like, in the circumstances, the most preposterous, vulnerable and socially unconventional way of relating to the circumstances.
And I knew she was right.
Suddenly I knew, this was what my summer was about: And this is how I will complete the work of it.
Now, alongside the sheer endlessness of the weariness, I feel a glimmer of excitement.
(And fear).
extraplorer 