Silencio

I am practising being silent. Taking in rather than giving out. Being still rather than screaming over the crowd. I'm tired, and a month of the flu has drained me more than I thought possible. But both those things are good in that they have brought me again to the place where I need to be still and know, rather than try to accomplish through a flurry of activity.

I know that I sound particularly scary and esoteric tonight so let me try to break it down: I'm attempting to spend a lot more time in quiet spaces, reading, thinking, praying, writing, than I do on the computer, watching TV, eating, DOING ... because I keep distracting myself from myself with doing. How did I run my resistance down so low that I've spent the last month coughing and blowing my nose? Not listening to my body. Why do i take so long to write/edit poems after i have one good piece? I'm afraid that I have no more good poems left in me, so I shut down my creativity before it abandons me. But silence forces me to confront my uncomfortable feelings, my vulnerability and fear, and struggle through it to find God's peace.

No pat endings this time. Just silence.