Time to Think

The poem starts out innocent enough

The poem

Starts out

Innocent enough,

Then takes a turn

Toward the truth—

Sudden and unexpected—

Like finding some

Abandoned shack

Deep in your woods,

The woods you thought

You knew—a place

Known only to

The animals—

It goes that way—

To some place

Old and uninhabited,

Forgotten—

Moss covered roof,

Weak, sagging porch boards—

The poem turns

Toward the truth

Like that.

Judy Brown, April 17, 2013

Steppingstones pg 68

Lately I've been thinking about what helps us have a strong voice and a clear perspective about as Oprah says, "what we know for sure".    Solitude helps. Time to think. Conversations with wise friends help.   Colleagues who share our values and our passions help.  Sometimes we are surprised by the truths that become clearer to us, and the actions they prompt.  That's often my experience with writing poetry.  As this poem describes and as the picture of the falling-down shack hidden in the woods suggests, we can be surprised by the truths that make themselves evident to us when we take the time to notice what is there