Lone Walking

I shall forever be grateful for the time
I spent alone among nature.

For clear skies helped to clear my mind.

Fresh breezes helped to freshen my soul.

Pure waters helped to purify my heart.

It took hills, trees, valleys, and streams to teach
me the truth about myself and my people.

For years afterward, there were times when I walked
backward in embarrassment, self-pity, and pride.

Regardless, light patiently shone from above, stone kept
supporting me from beneath, wind still lent me breath.

Water gave me drink, vegetation provided me protection,
and animals offered their flesh for food.

The Creator lengthened my days, and in each of those days,
nature humbly showed me how I hadn’t been,
and could yet be, with my people.

After many years, this humility was finally able
to penetrate a barrier even as thick as my pride.

The rain of the great storm led me
to the entrance of the lands of my youth.

And there, a dream finished what light, wind, and rain
had started.

The Step to a New Life

When the heavens stopped beating on me and the sky
finally cleared, I collapsed to the earth in exhaustion.

How long I slept I do not know. It might have
been hours or it might have been days.
But I did not rest in my sleep. I walked far.

And I awoke desiring to step anew.

For in my sleep I met a legend among my people—
a man long revered, with a name so sacred
it is spoken only in praise or song.

In my dream, I climbed the slope of a mountain.
My father climbed with me. I did not know the purpose
of our journey, but it appeared as if he did.

I say “appeared” because we didn’t speak. We walked in
silence, although not the warring kind I had known in my
youth. It was rather the silence of reverence.

After what seemed like both a long time and barely a
moment, we reached the summit. My father stopped,
and with an outstretched arm he invited me
to proceed beyond the next bend.

I did as I was bidden.

As I turned the corner, I was overcome by the
presence of an incredible being—a being that
I instinctively knew to be the holy one from our legends.

I recall that he was in some sort of conversation with
another person. But he turned toward me, and I was given
to know that he was waiting specifically for me.

He radiated an incredible light, yet the light was neither
blinding nor harsh. It was inviting, soft, and loving.
Nevertheless, it was bright beyond description.

I felt in that moment love as I had never known it.
It drew me to him. I rushed to him and we embraced.
I think that I fell at his feet, but I can no longer remember
for sure. I shall never forget that embrace, however,
nor his eyes, for they were pure love.

But amid the glory of the experience, there was an element
that left me troubled. For while I knew by instinct that I was
in the arms of the holy one, I remember wondering while
we were embracing whether it really was him.

In that moment of uncertainty, I knew that
something in the way I had been living my life
held me back from experiencing his fullness,
and my heart shuddered in anguish.

Then I awoke.

My young friend, I wish you were near me
so that you could see the conviction in my eyes
and hear the feeling in my voice.

I truly saw what I have described to you.
It was a dream, yes, but so much more of a
dream than any other dream I have known.

I had never before experienced such joy
and had never before felt such pain.

When I had collected my thoughts, I lifted my voice
to the sky, thanking the Creator that I had been given
another day to leave behind what had held me back.

For you see, I was carrying in my heart rememberings
of a life lived in backward walking.

If I was to move forward,
I needed to leave all that was backward behind.

Perhaps in this regard, as well, you and I are alike.
Perhaps there are aspects of your life that need
to be started anew.

Whatever you carry that invites a backward walking,
leave it behind.

I did that on that very day.

I have had to repeat the offering many times since.

Make an offering of all that is old within you.

For the embrace that awaits is too sweet to miss.

Together Walking

I speak of not only the embrace of my dream
but the embraces of this world as well.

For my failure to fully embrace the holy one was
a type and shadow of my failure to embrace my people.

I told myself that I had reason to hold back from them.
After all, they had done wrong.

But the holy one replaced my logic
with his love. For he took me in his arms
despite all the wrongs I had done.

I shall ever remember the day I descended Big Mountain
to walk again among my people.

It was a warm summer day, and the sun shone high
in the sky. Children were playing the games of our people—
the games I had loved in my youth.

The smell of roasted venison greeted my senses and brought
with it warm memories of feasts from the past.

My family lived in a humble home
on the opposite side of the village.

I had so much to say and no idea how to say it. I had stayed
three days on the slopes of the mountain trying to prepare
my speaking. But every preparation seemed wrong.
I felt moved to go and speak purely from my heart.

I saw my father first. He was frailer than I remembered—
more bent, more weathered.

I came up from behind him as he struggled to move a log.

“Father,” I said, with more respect than
I had ever heard in my own voice, “can WE help WE?”

He turned to me and froze, as if trying
to recognize the image before him.

Then his eyes welled with tears, his body softened,
and we fell into each other’s arms.

This embrace was followed by many others
as I began a new walking with my family.

Life became sweeter than I had ever dreamed it could be.

Don’t misunderstand. All walkers sometimes stumble.
Sometimes, despite all I have seen, heard, and felt, I have
nevertheless withheld myself from their embraces.

But every time I have seen the dawn, or felt a breeze,
or drunk from a stream, or walked on a stone, or
eaten of a plant, or looked upon a lamb,
I have been reminded again of the truth:

My feet were placed on Mother Earth in the midst of others’
so that I might learn to walk together with them in my heart.

You and I, my young friend, walk only as far and
as well as our hearts walk among our people.

Words to a Friend

I now bid you farewell.

I wish I could see you and you could see me.
I wish we could look together at the night sky and
drink together from the same mountain stream.
I wish I could take you into my arms and let you feel
the truth and joy that it took me so long to know.

My words will be all that you know of me.

I offer them to you in peace, in the hope that perhaps
you will discover within you and in the world around you
a Guide who will lead you home.

Listen closely and you will hear whisperings.

Follow them, and eventually you will discover
a voice so distinct in its peaceful stillness that it will cut
through the noise of the most confusing days.

I know this voice. I have learned to stay close to it
and to feel when I am pulling away. Time after time
in my walking, it has returned me to my people.

Mercifully, despite my weaknesses and stumblings,
all now is as it should be.

Is all as it should be for you?

That is my question for you, dear friend.

Perhaps you have your own mountain to descend
or village to cross.

And perhaps someone you have left awaits an embrace.

If so, you are fortunate indeed.

For those you need are still with you.

I now lift my voice to the Creator in your behalf,
that you might have courage where you need it.

That you might be blessed by light, by wind, by rain.

That you might learn from stone, plant, and lamb.

That all creation might work for your healing.

That you might embrace all you have left.

This is my desire for your walking, dear friend.

That you, too, will discover a people.

And with them, the joy of WE.