Light Psalm

The Initiation of Light Continues

Light Psalm

                               1

In the winter of white owls hunting in daylight,
drifting low over dried-up meadows,
I dreamed I survived a flood
that swallowed whole my island.

For years I had lived in earshot of the ocean.
Now my house behind the dunes
was gone, and I was looking down
on my peaked roof wondering
if the end of the world had finally arrived.

Was all my angst 
at last a prophecy I could let go?

Were the others I saw floating in the water
the ones I longed for? The ones 
who didn’t call me crazy
when I said the end was nigh?

I asked a wise friend what my dream meant.
Was the apocalypse really going to happen
on the outside? 

It could go either way, she said.
If enough of us go through
an internal apocalypse,
if we lift the veil,
we might avoid external catastrophe.
But there are no guarantees…
Listen to the river inside.

I did, and was carried to a mountainside
where I lost myself in a ceremony,
coming back to my body 
without words to describe what happened
because I had no memories,
but the fear before I disappeared
and the peace after I found myself
returned to the circle,
sitting up with my back against a wall
as if I hadn’t been removed from time.
Nobody knew that I’d gone,
and here I was back again,
a spirit in a body 
who could sing and tell stories.

So I did.
I walked out of the valley of the shadow of death 
and asked the words to find me.
I accepted gravity.



                      2

For years I lived in a house behind dunes
whose windows rattled when wind
bore down from the n’oreast.

I would lay myself down in deer beds
pressed by the herd into dune grass
until the shape of their shared sleep 
spiraled me into the herds', whose dream
began and ended with thirst.

We dreamed of water welling up
through rock and roots, 
pouring forth through ferns
and filigreed shadows, 
cool on our tongues
when we bent to drink. 

I could have drowned in that dream,
but I floated. Sometimes 
I spoke too much 
or too little, like most humans,
and sometimes I met the words
seeking me in the middle.

Those times, the space between words
gifted me back the beauty I made.
My soul was restored.



                       3

When the flood comes for you,
come find me by the still waters.

We’ll speak our stories off the precipice, 
become eight-limbed spiders spinning silk
from our own bodies
that will carry us to safety
in the canopy a thousand feet below.



                     4

If there is a salt meadow opening within you now
as you read these words, perhaps 
you’re in my dream. And my dream is 

entwined tail to neck with the herd,
who presses the dune grass down in spirals.

Lay yourself down in that dream
that smells of warm fur.
Let the silk of it smooth your worries.

We are born from a black hole.

Words can only describe what exists
in gravity.

Set your faith in that
and praise what you can
like winter stars and white owls.

Houses by the sea
and greening meadows,
and the gold-tipped dune grass
ruffled by the southwest breeze
that will become again the gale
come winter. 

Praise the windows
that rattle. Praise the flood.

Praise the peaked roof
of a house where you once lived
when you thought the world would end
next week. 

Maybe it will.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me 
all the days of my life, said a poet
long before our time.

And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

Find me by the still waters.

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The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.

He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.

Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.

Psalm 23, The King James Bible

Kō aloha lā ea

Concentrate on love by way of the light