Take This Dance

I met joy, yesterday, in the soft feel of my cotton pillowcase, as I welcomed a moment’s rest.

Contentment reared its head as I stirred my wooden spoon through a pot of rice, soon to be served and eaten warm.

Wonder visited me as I picked my child up from school, and she miraculously hugged me.

Satisfaction winked at me as I typed out the poem I’d written last week, and clicked ‘publish’.

I shook hands with the Divine as I filled up my bathtub halfway and sank into it; my day’s troubles soothed and rocked by the gentle water.

Relief flooded through me as I cried for a movie character I’d just met an hour earlier.

Panic caught my throat as I realised I’d forgotten to list the team meeting on my calendar. Had I missed it?

I hadn’t. Self-blame knocked and entered twice, as I reprimanded myself, first for neglecting my calendar, then again for panicking about it.

I sang with anger’s fiery tune, as feelings of helplessness gripped me and reminded me of violent injuries I thought were healed long, long ago.

Worry coursed through my being as I wondered whether I’m a good parent, a good friend, any good at adult life at all.

Belonging embraced me as I sat round my best friend’s kitchen table and laughed so hard, the neighbours thought we were drunk.

Love held me as I swam, sometimes gracefully, other times gasping for breath, through the seven hundred seas of my daily experience on this green and grey earth.

Grace showered me with her beaming light and invited me into her castle – not walled and gilded, but open to receive all that I am and all that I’ve encountered.

And so we danced, together,
through another week,
another month,
another tune,
another poem,
another meltdown,
another song…
Through another simple, complex, joyous, heart-wrenching life,
We danced. 

Photo by Ardian Lumi on Unsplash