SEEKER
by David Whyte
See with every turning day,
how each season wants to make
a child of you again, wants you to become
a seeker after rainfall and birdsong,
watch how it weathers you to a testing
in the tried and true, tells you
with each falling leaf, to leave and slip away,
even from the branch that held you,
to go when you need to, to be courageous,
to be like that last word you’d want to say
before you leave the world.
Above all, be alone with it all,
a hiving off, a corner of silence
amidst the noise, refuse to talk
even to yourself, and stay in this place
until the current of the story
is strong enough to float you out.
Excerpt from ‘Coleman’s Bed’ in ‘River Flow:
New and Selected Poems’
©David Whyte and Many Rivers Press
by David Whyte
See with every turning day,
how each season wants to make
a child of you again, wants you to become
a seeker after rainfall and birdsong,
watch how it weathers you to a testing
in the tried and true, tells you
with each falling leaf, to leave and slip away,
even from the branch that held you,
to go when you need to, to be courageous,
to be like that last word you’d want to say
before you leave the world.
Above all, be alone with it all,
a hiving off, a corner of silence
amidst the noise, refuse to talk
even to yourself, and stay in this place
until the current of the story
is strong enough to float you out.
Excerpt from ‘Coleman’s Bed’ in ‘River Flow:
New and Selected Poems’
©David Whyte and Many Rivers Press
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