A WALK

My eyes already touch the sunny hill,
going far ahead of the road I have begun.
So we are grasped by what we cannot grasp;
it has its inner light, even from a distance-

and changes us, even if we do not reach it,
into something else, which, hardly sensing it, we already are;
a gesture waves us on, answering our own wave . . . .
but what we feel is the wind in our faces.

Muzot, March 1924.

RAINER MARIA RILKE (translated by R.B)

 

Coming to Our Senses

Have you ever had the experience of stopping so completely,
being in the body so completely,
of being in your life so completely,
that what you knew and what you didn’t know,
that what had been and what was yet to come,
and the way things are right now
no longer held even the slightest hint of anxiety or discord?
It would be a moment of complete presence,
beyond striving,
beyond mere acceptance,
beyond the desire to escape or fix anything or plunge ahead,
a moment of pure being, no longer in time,
a moment of pure seeing, pure feeling,
a moment in which life simply is,
and that ‘Isness’ grabs you by all your senses,
all your memories,
by your genes,
by your loves and
welcomes you home.

Jon Kabat-Zinn