Leaving It All Behind

(and what stretches in front)

Photo - Marcin Ryczek

And I will see you think back to the days

and smile at the good things and

try hard to both remember and forget

of what didn’t go well. And I would say -

let it all flow through you, because

the most precious gifts often come

in packages both torn and tired.

.

But the sun will now rise into a new promise,

for there is nothing which can’t be beautiful.

And the paths will wait for you,

just the way a temple waits for its pilgrims,

and surrounds them with permission

for beginnings made from nothing,

and a wish for the most exquisite  wildness.

.

And the paths will wait for you,

just the way a temple waits for its pilgrims,

and surrounds them with permission

for beginnings made from nothing,

and a wish for the most exquisite  wildness.

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Essay

Photo - Marcin Ryczek

As 2023 turns its back with a sigh, we walk into a brand new year.

Hope - with all its bewitching deceptions - will make us wish for our best selves, to slough off the undesirable and ugly, and emerge fresh and wet, with unfazed optimism to conquer the world. But soon enough, we will know that, as always, all we need to do is to conquer ourselves.

And I sit down and make a list of what I want to leave behind in the old year and another list of what I want of the new year. And then I realise - the new year wants nothing of me.

It’s a sobering thought.

And forces me to think of everyone in my life who loves me unquestionably, and expects nothing but an ear to listen as we sip our tea together, and a hand to hold as we go out into the world.

Hence my only wish for myself - and for everyone in this world - is that we honour time and we create space. For we have to both hurry in this life and not forget to savour the moment. Because we need to both honour our ambition and be beside those who need us beside them.

May we all be unafraid to do what we love, and find peace in the torn and tattered bounty of what we are.

Hear the poem here!

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