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Go in grace

Though the god I know
is not felt or found
in monuments of stone
or wood, with an altar
or a spire reaching high
towards an unseen heaven,
still, I see it here before me,
each and every day,
in the rising sun of morning,
in the blooming of night.

I smell it in the flowers,
and lingering scent of rain,
fresh and newly fallen;
I hear it in the birds,
singing, calling out at dawn;
in the pounding of the surf
on an empty beach,
and in the busy, quiet hum
of a lone bumblebee
drinking from a rose.

I feel it in the dirt
sinking beneath my fingers,
the breeze that cools my skin
and ushers in a storm;
I taste it in my voice,
running like a river,
mingling with others-
happy, sad, fearful, joyous-
flowing in and out,
filling up the endless sky.

Sometimes I think it speaks
when I stop to listen,
when I think of others,
and not myself alone;
when I stay, though it hurts,
and do some work in this world,
instead of running far away;
when I try to love 
with an open heart,
all things that come before me.

And then so often,
when I least expect it
to answer questions
or steer me along the path,
it comes in with the quiet,
wisdom whispers in my ear,
or brushes by me, 
like a breath of snow–
go in grace, it says,
and so, in my own way, I try.

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Listen to this poem read aloud here: