Cease-Fire

Cease Fire

Not enough

Not worth love

All these words

Versions of violence

Self-perpetrated

Weapons and walls

Destruction and division

Waging war with my own heart

What a gift to know

That the cease-fire begins

With the very realization

That I don’t have to believe

Everything this mind

Thinks up

c.sharshel

9/19/2015

May every judging thought be tempered by wisdom and the greater truth of the life inside of this heart.  May the cease-fire hold strong, so that, even in the face of failure and adversity, it may respond with compassion and grace, and may this shift serve to awaken genuine understanding and awakening  that ripples out in ever widening circles to all hearts everywhere.

Stay

Stay

The day falls away

Like leaves in November

While this mind settles

Into the rhythm of sitting

Breathing in, breathing out

Quiet attention

What is the state of 

My heart right now?

Knotting, clutching

Aching sadness

Bigger than the walls

That surround me

The life outside this room

Calling with the promise

Of numbing distraction

The life right here

Gently whispering

Stay…

c.sharshel

9/12/2015

On Seeing and Being Seen

On Seeing and Being Seen

Every day, someone looks at me

With their eyes

Making wild guess judgements

About the length of my hair,

The color of my skin

The maker of my shoes

Never knowing what is real

Or who I really am

Once, someone looked at me

Through a compassionate heart

And all that was invisible

Was revealed in the light of it

Pain, fear, love, hope

Fresh wounds and old scars

Longing and aspiration

And my own heart smiled

Under that gentle gaze

In the clarity of both seeing

And being truly seen.


c.sharshel

9/06/2015

May all that I see be seen, not through my easily deceived eyes, but through the soft focus of a compassionate heart.  Informed by this clearer vision, may this heart be a mirror...reflecting love back to another, and another, and another in ever widening circles.  May all beings be seen…known…awake...free.