Category: Poems

We glance over the ordinary, expecting to see what we’ve always seen.  But when an ordinary event is seen under extraordinary circumstances, the impression can be awe-inspiring.   One night, while attending  the American Wilderness Leadership School in the Gros Ventre Wilderness of Wyoming, I looked up.  The altitude enhanced clarity of the western sky forever changed my view of the stars.   

Continue reading “MIDNIGHT PRAYER”

I attended a funeral yesterday, a familiar ritual that reminds us of our unfailing vulnerability.  A funeral reminds us of priorities and realigns our view of ourselves and our relationships with others.  I attended a funeral yesterday.   It was a good ache.

Continue reading “PASSED (for Todd)”

Who are we? How did we get here? And, where are we going? If we fail to answer those questions, how can we succeed at anything else?

Continue reading “MEETING OF MINDS”

There is very little that we truly know, and even less that we understand.  What we know is all we have.  Understanding is all we can hope for.  Before knowing and understanding, there is warmth  –  a fire in each of us that we graciously share.

Continue reading “KNOWING”

What can you say to a son who aspires to care for others, especially when those others are least able to care for themselves?  Eventually, all of us run out of options.  Then, we are left with one choice – to submit and entrust the outcome to another.   When the circumstances involve risks to our most precious possession, our life;  a threshold of intimacy is crossed that a relative few practitioners of medicine experience.

Continue reading “HE WHO WIELDS THE KNIFE”