Two poems, one story

This year has been a year of holding opposites - learning to live in that tension. One of the tensions I’ve been holding this year is between doing and being. And that has informed and colored my becoming. So, here are two poems that give some texture to this tension. The first one, about the purple orchid, I wrote on April 6 this year. The other one, about the drop of water, I wrote this morning. I offer them both to you - both as two poems, and also as one story!

1 - The Purple Orchid

I am so full of blessings
Openings, apertures everywhere
I feel a bit like a rainforest in monsoon.
So much growth
So much life
It’s all a bit overwhelming.

But all this is necessary
For that one rare purple orchid
To not go extinct.
All this profusion of life
All this cacophony
For this one purpose.

What is my one rare
Purple Orchid?
I don’t need to know what it is.
I just need to know - it is.
And it is in my power to provide it
With the only ecosystem where it can thrive.

I lay my life down
At the feet of this unnamed purple orchid.

2 - The Drop of Water

The drop of water
At the very edge of the leaf
Shimmers, shudders - in ecstasy.

I am poised
At the threshold
Of the known.

The great fall awaits
Into the unknown
The mystery.

No guarantees of a soft landing.
I have made peace
With this point of no return.

Committed, now, I tremble
In wild anticipation
Of that final union with the Beloved.