A new week. Lent has concluded. Easter is over – though chocolate remains…
The desert remains, as well – gratefully. But somehow today, my mind and heart feel watered, spacious, renewed. Deep breaths of clean air, emotion, thought. New terrain, new directions, deepened hope, and forward movement. A life of response, not reaction.
I’m not certain I would have lit on these words on my own: response, not reaction. Often, inspiration for my writing and much of my mind and heart’s meanderings are prompted by others’ voices – gratefully. Today is no exception: this poem in my inbox yesterday afternoon from a friend/former client – bearing Easter greetings and inviting me to far more than she could have imagined.
Ready Me to Respond
In the beginning, you sighed.
You spoke over chaos and made the original day.
This day, shines as that one must have done,
the sky a bright arc,
the earth a dark dynamic, everywhere,
beings you articulate in love.
When you speak,
life pulses in my limbs.
I run with wild energy you breathe into me.Your second word comes:
a summons,
curbing the frenzy,
guiding my feet.
Open the ear of my heart today.
Encourage me to do a harder thing
then mere hearing;
ready me to respond.
I’m fond of my internal monologue,
the sound of my mental soliloquy,
relevant to no one but me.Obedience.
The very word fences me in.
I chafe at the thought,
and then…find myself shaken
awake by some act of uncommon decency
or outrageous violation
that shouts me out
of my self-preoccupation
and back to the land of the living:
here, where you breathe
and name everything,
where my heart’s ear bends
and my life depends first
on obedient listening.(Rachel M. Srubas, Oblation: Meditations on St. Benedict’s Rule)
For now, I’m going to rest in these words – holding them close, pondering them, reflecting on their nuances, shades, and meaning.
Today: listening. Tomorrow: response.
Response, not reaction.
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