Teary Balm

The rains return,
a blessing and a communion
for all that is parched and scarred,
for the cracked and dry rotted;
the rains return, a teary balm.

Soft sprinkles gather
to dance on leaf and blade,
to explore forming buds and
unfurling fronds of fern,
reaching deeply into
and encouraging
the dormant
mosses.

Any accumulation
pours forth where it can,
settling accounts with roots,
pooling intimately and deeply,
rolling in ever widening waves,
with a depth of touch
and seeming awareness
of that most real commingling
that lies at the heart of being.

The rains return as teary balm
—for the earth and all dwelling thereon;
Holy rains, heal our parched and scarred,
heal our cracked and dry rotted,
heal us from the very roots
to the tips of each branch,
flow into the budding flowers,
and fill the wellspring of our awareness;
Oh, beautiful teary balm,
bring blessing and communion
to full bloom and being
in us.

© 2014 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

What I Wouldn't Give

Though we’ve never met,
we meet constantly

—In my dreams before waking,
in my waking thoughts,
in the sparkle on bay water
that blinds my senses

In the rare moment of quiet,
I apprehend the simplicity
of your great magnitude,
so near, we should be touching—

Yet, there is no need,
for we are, by near and far,
flexibly and inextricably
inlaid upon one another,
a complex, shared mosaic
of music and spirit,
tumbling into bits
and reforming
amid and among
the indelible, ineffable all.

What I wouldn’t give
to be face to face,
blinded by your beauty.

But I would not survive
the unraveling it would take
to get to where you are Now.

I am, you are,
and we together are us—

And, for the love of Now,
that will have to do.

© 2012 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen