Poems for the New Year

Sixteen beautiful yogis came to share in a heartfelt and heart opening practices this New Year's Day at Aditi Yoga. We spent two hours together letting go of this past year and welcoming in all that 2017 has to offer. Over the cours of the workshop I offered several poems by one of my favorite poets, Dana Fualds. Here there are to insprire you for the coming year:

---

The Weaver & The Loom
Sit here for a bit. Place yourself
​outside the frenzied pace of life.
Slow down long enough to
appreciate birds in flight, water
drops like prisms in the grass and
countless shades of green. Step
off the fast track and listen to the
sound of breath and birdsong. Take
a moment to just be, and in the being,
know the whole of this creation,
mystery and madness, passion and
profanity, know it all as one, stunning
tapestry. Sit still and the thin line
between sacred and profane simply
fades away. There is nothing then
to reconcile. All the disparate threads
are woven on the loom of life. Sit here
for a bit and your unique place in the
pattern becomes clear. Take the still
point with you when it’s time to walk
away. Make the choice to see affinity,
to watch the picture taking shape as
thread joins thread. Dare to be the
weaver and the loom, creator and
creation, the sower and the sown.
In a moment of stillness, all that
came before is seen as one.

Let It Go
Let go of the ways you thought life would unfold, the holding of plans or dreams or expectations – Let it all go.
Save your strength to swim with the tide.
The choice to fight what is here before you now will only result in struggle, fear, and desperate attempts to flee from the very energy you long for.
Let go. Let it all go and flow with the grace that washes through your days whether you received it gently or with all your quills raised to defend against invaders.
Take this on faith; the mind may never find the explanations that it seeks, but you will move forward nonetheless.
Let go, and the wave’s crest will carry you to unknown shores, beyond your wildest dreams or destinations.
Let it all go and find the place of rest and peace, and certain transformation.

Life Here at the Edge
​When love lights a fire in the heart,
don’t be so quick to quell the flames.
To be fully alive is to welcome the
Beloved in countless names and guises,
not turn away the wild with the tame.
.
Drink your fill of longing. Let
love wash through in waves that
lift you up and carry both your
daring and your fear straight
to unknown places. Yes, there
is danger in not staying safely
cloaked in morality and labels –
.
But there is life here at the edge,
and a choice to be made between
thoughtful abandon and passionate
restraint. The plaintive cry of the
heart can be ignored only at the
price of a fully realized life.
.
Throw arms wide to possibilities
that move and call you to come
forth in freedom and in fullness.
Trust the seed of grace within to
blossom without sin or sorrow,
for you are surely big enough to
hold the truth as it unfolds.

Setting Forth
Something will be born from
this goodbye. In the pain of
setting forth, something will die.
With the release of the old
comes a moment when nothing
is firmly held, and the unknown
burns the bridges of the past.

When the smoke clears, my eyes
seek out the new horizon.
Nothing is known here, but
the air is sweet and breathing
deeply I see long dormant
seeds send up their shoots
from the fertile ground of change.
As leaves unfurl to meet the sun,
the circle is complete.
I will not forget a single
step of this journey, nor will I
let comfort lock me
in its warm embrace.

I do not know what fruit these
seeds will bear, but I have faith
that what is taking root today
will surprise me with its vigor.
In birth and death,
in breath and the final exhalation,
there is pain and the movement
into truth. I take the step
that I am called to even if
I do not know the final destination.

And the final poem from the morning was untitled...

I return to where I never
left, reconnect with that
from which I was never
seperate, remember what 
has alway sbeen true.

When I stop the struggle,
I expand into unbearable
awareness.

There is nothing to say,
no "You" to thank, nor 
"Me" to be grateful, no
altar or supplicant, sinner
or confessional. When
one of us sings, we all
recall the music.