THE WAKING HOURS

a poem

THE WAKING HOURS

by Michael D. Warden

To know your true path
you must listen
all the way through
to the other side of everything
that is trying to speak to you.

You must listen
as you would to the call
of a single bird
in a forest of machinery,

as you would to a river
when it captures you,
and no one else
is there to hear it,

as you would to the rhythm
of your lover's quiet breathing
as they lie sleeping next to you
in the dark.

When you find it,
if you find it,
if you can pluck it
out of the madness
of your ordinary days...

Fall, then, to your knees.
Weep.
And give it everything,

everything you've carried
everything you've pretended
everyone you've loved
or been loved by.
Lay it all down
in gentle surrender
to the Beckoning Call.

Then, tomorrow, do it again.
And the next day, again.
And the next,
believing, believing
all the way to the horizon,
until you become
that Song
that River 
that Breath of Life
you already were all along.

You'll see, then,
in those waking hours
what all true mystics know.

This is how we heal the world.