Grace

In meditation, floating in the ocean of consciousness,
Sometimes
I find myself
in a state of grace.
A glorious space of absolute freedom, light and peace.
All too briefly and infrequently glimpsed.

I wonder,
Is there a real Life that is this continuous state of grace?
A Fibonacci spiral of endless flowing joy?
Could such an eternal Isness be
The very essence of this little life
I’m fashioning for myself?
Is it always there,
Obscured and out of my reach,
but perhaps tangible
If only I knew how to liberate my identity from my socially conditioned self?

I know I lose connection with this grace
When I give more value to the world’s ways rather than to those of the spirit.
While I’m clutching desperately at worries and hurts,
struggling and striving to meet this one’s needs,
that one’s expectations, to prove myself, to make a ‘living’,
To be loved, to make something of myself,
I‘m all at sea and drowning
Fearful and lost.

As I live a more spiritual life I learn to recognise this state of grace
Shining,
through the cracks
I feel it -
In the warmth of a smile returning mine as we pass in the street;
In the kindness of a stranger “Don’t forget your umbrella”
As I stand to leave,
My umbrella unwittingly abandoned;
In the generosity of the soft acceptance
Of my unsophisticated intensity
In an enthusiastic exchange with a fellow exhibition viewer;
In the quiet joy of realising that I can trust myself to return
This love I have always craved;

And so I learn to allow myself
To believe
A state of grace as my truth.

©Megan Chapman