And if it’s true we are alone,
we are alone together,
the way blades of grass
are alone, but exist as a field.
Sometimes I feel it,
the green fuse that ignites us,
the wild thrum that unites us,
an inner hum that reminds us
of our shared humanity.
Just as thirty-five trillion
red blood cells join in one body
to become one blood.
Just as one hundred thirty-six thousand
notes make up one symphony.
Alone as we are, our small voices
weave into the one big conversation.
Our actions are essential
to the one infinite story of what it is
to be alive. When we feel alone,
we belong to the grand communion
of those who sometimes feel alone—
we are the dust, the dust that hopes,
a rising of dust, a thrill of dust,
the dust that dances in the light
with all other dust, the dust
that makes the world.
by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer
A good poem for a day when the ‘adult aloneness‘ that David Whyte speaks of, tips into loneliness. I woke up this morning with a heaviness in my heart, a nameless sadness that weighed down my movements and dampened the enthusiasm I often feel for the day. And with it, a turning into myself, a disconnect from others. Sound familiar?
Until… the remembering the kinship with others feeling heaviness and aloneness. The poet, teacher and writer Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer says it so beautifully here: “When we feel alone, we belong to the grand communion of those who sometimes feel alone”… And although it wasn’t a magic wand transforming what was there, the isolation lifted and there was a softening rather than a bracing against. There will be days like this, and that’s ok.
PS if you’d like to explore how to respond with compassion to the inevitable challenges of life, our Level 2 Course is worth looking at!
Photo by Jonas Weckschmied on Unsplash