Wisdom Inside

 Waterfall photo by Richard Hayes.  Sometimes we have to live with inner waterfalls, of pain, worries, fear, or love, bounty, good fortune.  Any of these can throw us off track.  The poem below written seven years ago comforts me now, but I don't feel very wise at the moment.  I hope to be like that fishing heron, live with my inner waterfalls and keep my eye out for fish.

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GOLD INSIDE 15

September 17, 2006

I used to think of myself as resting on a pivot.

When something disturbed me, I leaned away

from my center; when I made peace, I returned

to resting easily on this inside pivot.  I also

described this experience of inner certainty

and balance as like standing on a shelf of rock.

From that deep place inside me any turmoil in

my inner world settled.  I could see what I felt

and knew what I needed to do.  But I don’t

remember having, until recently, this feeling of

repose, of my whole self being at rest, yes, on

a pivot, but less inclined to motion than what

rests on a pivot is.  Closer may be Plato’s metaphor

for justice in the state.  He compared it to the body

where every part is carrying out its work and is in

harmony with all the other parts.  It’s like that

but quieter.  All that I am–body, soul, feelings, mind–

rests like the natural world outside the window rests.  

I am inside the peace I feel; the harmony of my 

parts is what I’m living.  I do struggle, I have, I will.

This state comes as a reward for the struggle, for

the living out of what I know I need to do.  What

I do each day–and often it is hard for me to do–

makes possible this enjoyment, so quiet I can barely

feel it, so without motion, that it’s hard to say it’s

an emotion.  It is serenity, as in the prayer about

asking for the courage to change what can be

changed, the strength to accept what can’t, and

the wisdom to know the difference.  I am not that

wise yet, but something in me holds this wisdom

in its heart of hearts and sends me moments like

this, when I, as a being, am still, clear, peaceful,

at rest, serene at that level where a fountain rises,

illogical, miraculous, to water every parched place

in my soul, quiet every doubt, calm every worry.

The unrest will return, the striving to change

what can be changed.  I will lean far to one side

on the pivot, and have to take the shelf of rock

for an assumption I can’t prove.  But when an hour

arrives to give me rest like this, I’ll know that I now 

am who I need to be, the person my growing pains 

urged me to become, the full-fledged woman:

human, loving, wise.  

Judy Hogan