The End of the Year

The turning of one year into the next is always a time of contemplation for me. I often imagine the past year as a dear friend and ask if there is anything it needs before stepping into the new. On the other hand I imagine the new horizon stretching out before me, asking it in turn if there is anything it needs from me to be AMAZING, BALANCED and FUN?

As I was asking this question today, there was a ping on my computer. I looked over to see an email from my lovely friend Lis who always sends me the most beautiful words at the most beautiful times.

Here is John O’Donahue’s invitation for endings and beginnings…

At the End of the Year

The particular mind of the ocean
 
 Filling the coastline’s longing
 
 With such brief harvest
 
 Of elegant, vanishing waves
 
 Is like the mind of time
 
 Opening us shapes of days.

As this year draws to its end,
 
 We give thanks for the gifts it brought
 
 And how they became inlaid within
 
 Where neither time nor tide can touch them.

The days when the veil lifted

 
 And the soul could see delight;
 
 When a quiver caressed the heart
 
 In the sheer exuberance of being here.

Surprises that came awake
 
 In forgotten corners of old fields
 
 Where expectation seemed to have quenched.

The slow, brooding times
 
 When all was awkward
 
 And the wave in the mind
 
 Pierced every sore with salt.

The darkened days that stopped
 
 The confidence of the dawn.

Days when beloved faces shone brighter
 
 With light from beyond themselves;
 
 And from the granite of some secret sorrow
 
 A stream of buried tears loosened.

We bless this year for all we learned,
 
 For all we loved and lost
 
 And for the quiet way it brought us
 
 Nearer to our invisible destination.

~ John O’Donohue ~
 
 (To Bless the Space Between Us)

#NewBeginnings #JohnODonohue #Poetry #Ocean #Gifts #Blessings #Destiny