A New Poem: Falling

Our front door (visible in this photo) is down an outdoor flight of stairs, as we live in the lower unit of a duplex on a hill.  

I've been worried about the grandkids on the stairs ever since we moved in.  The two who live upstairs often run up and down, but wouldn't you know it?  I was the one who fell.  It was a doozy - headfirst down some number of steps (I don't really know where the slip actually happened.)  I was really fortunate in that no bones were broken and I didn't get knocked out.  Just nicely banged up and bruised.  This was a few weeks ago, and I'm fine now, and, boy, am I careful going down now!  An experience not to be repeated.

Interestingly, afterwards I was in a Zoom meeting with about 25 other people, and it turned out that six of us had fallen recently.  It set me to wondering what was up with that, and in such dark times that we are living in.

And so, this poem came.

 

Falling.

We are all falling.

A trip

         on a tree root.

A headfirst dive

         down a staircase.

Carrying groceries.

         Or crossing the room.

 

We are all

Falling.

Birds are falling

         to the ground.

Whales are falling

         onto the shore.

Bodies are falling

         from missile strikes.

What does it mean,

         all of this falling?

Will there be time and a way

         to rise back up, or

Will we sink down, down,

         going down with the ship?

Will we sing

         as we go?

 

A card falls out of the deck,

Landing face up on the altar.

It is the card

         of Gratitude.

If we land there,

         our hearts may

Fall

         open.

 

SoulCollage® card: Gratitude