Our Secret Poetry Appreciators Society has gone quiet, but I know you’re all out there. You know now, I hope, there are more of you than you imagined.. people holding little gems of word packages close to their hearts, in their pockets, for low moments, for 2am moments, for joyful moments, for shared moments.

Kerry Dorey was the first person to send me a reading, when I shared my idea with them. It was the torch paper. The spark that got me acting on an idea. Ideas, for me, are easy. Action… that’s harder. It’s always good to be reminded that we don’t have to be so heroic, so stoic, imagine doing everything always on our own. We can share an idea. We can invite others to play. We can let the collective and momentum carry us – they’re forces as powerful as gravity. Feed them with reciprocity. And settle into the loveliness of being one among many.

Here is our final poem offering for the year, The Bell and the Blackbird, by David Whyte, as shared by Kerry Dorey.

The Bell and the Blackbird

The sound of a bell
Still reverberating,
or a blackbird calling
from a corner of the field,
asking you to wake
into this life,
or inviting you deeper
into the one that waits.

Either way
takes courage,
either way wants you
to be nothing
but that self that
is no self at all,
wants you to walk
to the place
where you find
you already know
how to give
every last thing
away.

The approach
that is also
the meeting
itself,
without any
meeting
at all.

That radiance
you have always
carried with you
as you walk
both alone
and completely
accompanied
in friendship
by every corner
of the world
crying
Allelujah.

David Whyte
From: The Bell and the Blackbird