Paul Dunion, EdD

I have met you, but I don’t know you.

I wonder what it would take to move

from stranger to friend with you.

Some say your presence is fleeting,

leaving me curious about offering

you a fervent invitation to stay.

Could it be me? Do I not offer you

an authentic welcome? How does

my attention drift away from you?

The ancients say you are quiet.

Maybe you are the absence of

both outside and inside noise.

Is it possible, I have an attachment

to the noise? Yes, likely a needed

distraction from the angst created

by my will being at odds with the will

of life. Is it hard for me to believe life

doesn’t wish to cooperate with my wishes?

Does peace depend upon some armistice

between me and life? And is this agreement

dependent upon my letting go? What is

letting go? It might be a loosening of my

grip upon what I want and how I think

things should be.

Does this loosened grip suggest I may

be less of a demanding child? Might I

become more curious about what life

wishes from me? Will peace hear my

welcome as I release my expectation

that life should serve me?

Why did I come here, if not to be served

by life? Can I summon a measure of honesty

regarding demands placed upon life? Can I

allow the truth of my mortality  guide me?

Maybe then, I can accept that I am here to

serve life, with peace responding to such a welcome.