Touching the World

A friend of mine posted this quotation on Facebook yesterday...

~We never know when we will blossom

into what we’re supposed to be. It might
be early. It might be late. It might be after
thirty years of failing at a misguided way.
Or the very first time we dare to shed
our mental skin and touch the world.~ 

—Mark Nepo—

 The line about daring to shed our mental skin and touching the world opened wide and welcomed me in.  Story after story after story came to the memory of my heart...of times both when I chose to touch the world and times when circumstances chose for me.  Times when flight seemed possible and times when the ground gave way beneath me... and the Love that was there, always there.

Touching the World

When we dare
to shed our mental skin
and touch the world,
All is open and all is 
such a nearness...

And it looks like daffodils given to a first crush,
like a love letter written with tumbling haste;
And it feels like a knock on the door,
like a thousand sighs in flight;
And it tastes of shame and honesty,
of an herb that heals from the inside out;
And it smells of sun dried sheets,
of soup kitchens and church. 
And it sounds like a man unafraid to die,
like the inward arcing contours of  poetry .

When we shed our mental skin and dare
to touch the world, we get a sense,
enough to sustain us,
of what, oh glory,  it will be,
at Home, at last, all embracing.

—Kimberly M. King, RSCJ