Awake!

From Ann Glover O’Dell’s Midwifing the Soul:

Awake! and keep awake!

While eyelids close

to give the body rest

touch not the lashes

of the Spirit’s ever watchful orbs.

Exercise the practice

of the cloistered one

who regularly rising

through the patterned hours

commits attention to that which

beckons him beyond

the chronos of the calendar

to events foretold

in sand grit

sharp as any irritant

to mollusk or to man.

Read instructions writ small

around the edges of the mind

before the sea salt blurs the words

and the search begins again

for clues and crumbs.

Hoist lightning-quick antennae

to catch the faintest quiver

to transmit to relay stations

information for the soul.

Kairos commands:

Keep awake!

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