Waking up earlier than usual this morning, I decided to take Rumi's advice and chose not to go back to sleep. It proved to be a good decision.
After lying in bed reading for about an hour, I decided to go for a walk around my new town of Hampyeong. With Jack Kornfield's words in my earbuds, I began the 2-mile loop around my cozy little hamlet. As I approached the waterfront, it began to snow. I'm not sure if it was the quiet of the morning, the sleep still in my eyes, Jack's words in my ears, or the combination of the three, but I was immediately struck by how pristine and perfect each flake was as it landed on me before quickly melting away.
Over the years I've become practiced and proficient at recognizing impermanence, reminding myself that "this too shall pass," and letting go. But in the stillness this morning, I was strangely saddened to watch the snowflakes melt away. These immaculate mirrors of eternity alighting on my arm for but an instant as if to challenge my comfort with how ephemeral life is. And then Jack read a poem from Mary Oliver and I was struck a second time.
"To live in this world you must be able to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes, to let it go, to let it go."
It struck me that the reason I've become so good at letting go is because I've forgotten how to hold on. Surely, there is a peace and a power in the breathe that learns to release attachments, appetites, and aversions, but there is a richness in the lives we hold dear and a meaningfulness to life that can only be found when we dare to name someone 'precious'. What a silly thing to forget; what a wonderful thing to remember.
Said the Girl to the Snowflake
Said the girl to the snowflake,
"Oh, little mirror of eternity
How magnificent you are!
Awaken in me your nobility
That this hush might last
More than a moment."
Said the snowflake to the girl,
"Oh, little mirror of eternity
How magnificent you are!
It is your own nobility that will awaken
When you realize
This hush is all we have."
