On the day when
The weight deadens
On your shoulders
And you stumble,
May the clay dance
To balance you.

And when your eyes
freeze behind
the grey window
and the ghost of loss
gets into you,
may a flock of colours,
Indigo, red, green
And azure blue,
Come to awaken in you
A meadow of delight.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
May the clarity of light be yours,
May the fluency of the ocean be yours,
May the protection of the ancestors be yours.

And so may a slow
Wind work these words
Of love around you,
An invisible cloak
To mind your life.
~John O’Donohue from “Beannacht“

We all will stumble, bearing the bruises and scars of our fall.
We all waken to gray days when there appears no point in getting up.
We all can be sucked into the darkest thoughts,
tunneling ever more deeply.

In those moments, those days, those months,
may we be wrapped tightly in love’s cloak of invisibility,
hiding us from a darkness that can swallow us no longer.

We are led onto a brightening path of light and color,
filled with contentment and encouragement, our failing feet steadied.
The gray is absorbed into an ever-changing kaleidoscope,
the way to go illuminated with hope.

May our brokenness be forever healed by words of blessing.