Passion, Courage

I seek
each day the path of courage
and passion.
I fail, often.

I don’t
say this with bravado;
I do not feel brave.
If I could choose something
easier, I would.
But it never gets easier.

But to make the choice each day,
Each minute, to turn and
face the sadness and suffering,
of the world; the pain and joy,
Each on it’s own terms
and not be defeated by it—
That is something that
Must be chosen again,
and again.
And again.
It is the job of poetry.
No compromises.

It is not a choice of pleasant fictions,
A diversion of entertaining nothingness;
Nor like the fog of opium that
Leaves us still breathing,
But dead.

Each night, darkness does not fall.
That is the wrong image.
Rather, when the earth spins away
From the sun it rises up from deep places
From the earth and the oceans, from
Caverns and the bottoms of rivers and lakes and seas.
A deep exhalation.
A time for alternatives.

A different reality,
As the day is ruled by light,
The night has it’s
Own rhythms ,
It’s own spirit realms.

Fear returns
As though never vanquished,
Contends for mastery again.
Eternally.
Doing that which frightens me,
When every fibre screams “Stop!”
Is the only path to courage, and opens
The window into passion, and meaning and love.

Anything less is death.