Lightning Strike

Writing the morning pages was put on hold as I typed up the poem I’d written after meditating last night. “Lightning Strike.” I’m always amazed at how the words come through me and up out of me. It IS just like a lightning strike! There’s a kind of coming down or into me and also a coming up and out of me – just like lightning when the electrical charges in the earth rise up to meet the lightning strike coming down.

Lightning Strike

The air shimmers,

tension builds

It boils … It simmers …

SNAP!

It flashes down

before I can blink and

arcs through me

striking the ground

in a glorious array

of unseen color

I can’t breathe

Reverberations echo

through my body

trapping me

in mind-numbing shock

Glued to this spot

I can’t move

my body tingles wildly

in the exploding power

vibrating in silence

around me

I can’t breathe

In this microsecond

of time

I’m too paralyzed

to even think, and

as I struggle to comprehend

what just happened,

the earth erupts

with a soundless deafening roar

blasting through me

once again

I breathe in

I can do nothing

but wait for release

as the residual energy

rains down on me

wrapping its charged essence

over me as if draping me

in a new warm cloak

then dissipating

into the dust

at my feet

I breathe out

With the charred smell

lingering in the air

and fingers still tingling,

I slowly pick up my pen

A poem falls onto the page.

And so, my morning took a detour, as it does so often. It never ceases to amaze me that my first thoughts of what the day will bring seldom stays true to the original plans. At the end of the day, though, I am satisfied with what I accomplished, and I don’t regret what I didn’t get done. I guess my days are not about staying on a straight, paved sidewalk, but they meander wooded trails over rocky and bumpy terrain. It makes life interesting, that’s for sure!

I love that I don’t have an adrenaline-pumping need. I love that I find excitement in the seemingly simple things. I love that I see beauty everywhere.

“Interesting” is my favorite word and “journey” is another. Life is an interesting journey if we allow ourselves to see it as such. Even a simple life isn’t really so simple when you’re living it, and what we allow ourselves to experience and acknowledge open our eyes to the beauty of life. And practicing living wholeheartedly makes life special and soul-rewarding.