On forgetting the Love of shadows

A poem for you

When you forget the love 
of your true nature,
and believe yourself to be 
unaccompanied along life’s
lonely path…

find the ground.

Let the tight bud
of your shadow
unfurl itself upon 
this wild earth

and watch how it blends with
the fluttering fingers of ferns, 
and through the translucent whisps 
of passing clouds, and inside 
hot spindles of heat that 
slither horizontally 
across the soil.

Watch how your shadow moves
through dog's body and climbs 
the cotton tree to touch
bullfinch’s wing as it 
skitters across 
sky dust…

In the truth of ground, 
all matter of 
distance and difference
diminish into 
a thin slate
of blue 
hue. 

Now tell me the difference
between you and 
the world…

tell me of your aloneness
in a land full of kin -
tell me there is a greater, 
more inclusive Love 
than that of a shadow, 

whose single note hushes
the din of identity
into one quiet 
and loving 
symphony. 

Everything on this earth
shares the color of its shadow, 

and you cannot be alone

just as you cannot 
separate yourself 
from Love’s 
all-encompassing 
embrace.

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