no accounting for happiness...

During our bi-annual retreats, I find myself peculiarly open to poems old and new. This morning, after a cold snap last night, this gem from Jane Kenyon called to me. As someone far wiser than I noted: "Kenyon was a master at exploring the heights and depths of everyday life, focusing on what she called 'the luminous particular.'"

There’s just no accounting for happiness,
or the way it turns up like a prodigal
who comes back to the dust at your feet
having squandered a fortune far away.

And how can you not forgive?
You make a feast in honor of what
was lost, and take from its place the finest
garment, which you saved for an occasion
you could not imagine, and you weep night and day
to know that you were not abandoned,
that happiness saved its most extreme form
for you alone.

No, happiness is the uncle you never
knew about, who flies a single-engine plane
onto the grassy landing strip, hitchhikes
into town, and inquires at every door
until he finds you asleep midafternoon,
as you so often are during the unmerciful
hours of your despair.

It comes to the monk in his cell.
It comes to the woman sweeping the street
with a birch broom, to the child
whose mother has passed out from drink.
It comes to the lover, to the dog chewing
a sock, to the pusher, to the basket maker,
and to the clerk stacking cans of carrots
in the night.

It even comes to the boulder
in the perpetual shade of pine barrens,
to rain falling on the open sea,
to the wineglass, weary of holding wine.

After last night's near frost, this morning's sunshine feels like a gift. It's not quite warm outside, barely 45F, but clear, crisp, and delicious. Soon we'll hike by a local waterfall so I can soak up my second-favorite sound in all creation (the first being my grandchildren's laughter). Perhaps I'll get to practice a few guitar changes before cogitating on this Sunday's gospel text. Or take another nap. Nothing too challenging for either of us this week.  Serendipitously, while reflecting quietly this morning, I stumbled upon these words from the late John O'Donaghue:

When the rhythm of the heart becomes hectic,
time takes on the strain until it breaks;
all the unattended stress falls in on the mind like an endless,

increasing weight.
Weariness invades your spirit.
Gravity begins falling inside you,
dragging down every bone.
The tide you never valued has gone out...
you are marooned on unsure ground.
Something within you has closed down;
and you cannot push yourself back to life.

You have been forced to enter empty time.
There is nothing else to do now but rest
and patiently learn to receive the self
you have forsaken for the race of days..
The flow of unwept tears will frighten you.
You have travelled too fast over false ground.

Stay clear of those vexed in spirit.
Learn to linger around someone at ease
who feels they have all the time in the world.
Gradually, you will return to yourself,
having learned a new respect for your heart
and the joy that dwells far within slow time.

Now your soul has come to take you back.
Take refuge in your senses, open up
to all the small miracles you rushed through.
Become inclined to watch the way of rain
when it falls slow and free.
Imitate the habit of twilight,
taking time to open the well of colour
that fostered the brightness of day.
Draw alongside the silence of stone
until its calmness can claim you.
Be excessively gentle with yourself.

And so we will...