The Decision for Therapy
Sounds True recently published a new, expanded edition of Inside the Miracle: Enduring Suffering, Approaching Wholeness, which gathers twenty-eight years of my writing and teaching about suffering, healing, and wholeness, including thirty-nine new poems and prose pieces not yet published. One of the great transforming passages in my life was having cancer in my mid-thirties. This experience unraveled the way I see the world and made me a student of all spiritual paths. With a steadfast belief in our aliveness, I hope what’s in this book will help you meet the transformation that waits in however you’re being forged. The following piece is an excerpt from the book.
The Decision for Therapy
As we gamble on the future,
let’s stay clear: this moment
with all its presence is intact.
It is not up for grabs.
This moment for which I’ve
lived all others, for which
I’ve withstood the breakage
of all I know repeatedly,
this moment is germ-free
and not on trial.
You are welcome here
by permission only
and the alarm you cast
like a blind fisherman
will only snag my want
for tomorrow, only hook
what I do not have.
I know you mean to help
and I cannot deny
you are a bridge
I have to cross.
But where I live
cannot be staged
or stained or seen
as gross evidence.
Where I live
is impervious
to histology.
It is the one site
in the city that
will not burn.
And if you guide me
to tomorrow, I’ll
show you, as you
shake your head,
how I still glow
in this unbreachable
clearing I carry within
like a sun or rising star
protected by its rays.
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