I love the flickering of candlelight this time of year.  Winter in the Northern hemisphere offers reflective space.

John O’Donohue wrote: Candlelight perception is the most respectful and appropriate form of light with which to approach the inner world. It does not force our tormented transparency upon the mystery. 

 I’m still in clean-out mode.  The Mill Valley library is thrilled with the condition and range of the books I’ve donated, and there’s more to go, though it’s not easy. I love books and want them to have good homes, so I scatter pieces of myself out in the world, my choices, shared.  

This poem by Marci Calabretta Dancio-Bello speaks to me as I read of animals fleeing from fire in Australia.  How do we stroke the bones of fear and open out and share the spinal hum?

Ode to this Small Joy

Someone discovered

the giraffe hums

at a harmonic rate

of 92 Hertz,

voice thrumming

the tower of spine

and trachea once

thought to be silent,

and her humming is

like monks chanting

holy and ascetic,

the vibrations rolling 

up the vertebrae

gentle and slow,

a long-lashed

face lifting

from water to sky,

taut dark sides

veined with light

ready to crack 

open the body. 

• Marci Calabretta Cancio-Bello