A Thin Place

this is a thin place

where only the most transparent membrane separates us

into the living and the dead

the breathing and the spirit

the waiting, the fulfilled

tired eyes and limbs strain to cross the boundary

to see beyond

to touch beyond

to walk in the place beyond

this thin place where we meet and where we live

as we touch the edge, pressing into the elastic division

our reaching shapes the contours of the end of where we are

and the beginning of what we hope for

as naked as we can be

as desperate as we ever were

we soak up divine attention

oozing through the pores

of a thin place such as this

A Thin Place by Julie Prey is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Open

i would like very much to know

just exactly how it is

that we are supposed to live

with our hearts open to it all

just exactly how we are to

bare ourselves

to mess after mess

and let the joy live with the despair

the clear with the confused

the wrecked with warrior strength

you got me into this, g-d,

i'm not asking you to get me out

but let me learn how to

carry and be carried

be a soft place for hard things

and a rock for whatever flows

courageously, unflinchingly open

to your world and all it offers

as it curls up under my heart

and is.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Now

Let this be the time when I befriended myself.

The time when I pulled myself aside,

out of the path of a thousand mistakes

and too many indignities

threatening to sweep me away.

The time when I whispered into my own ear

when I took my own hand

and looking at it all squarely

knowing that I know 

walked myself back to life.