St. Brigid at the Market I saw her in the market backlit in the doorway from the evening sun, blue cloak ripples like water dandelions and primrose in her hand. Passersby brush past this moment of light and song in a rush to get shoes off and dinner on, just another day of traffic, bills, and angry bosses. I stood, mouth open, holding three lemons, a pile of sunlight, a miracle in yellow, tiny halos a little girl stops next to me, giggles, points to the door, her mother’s yank drags her back to the world of lists. I fear

Dreaming of Stones In the world before waking I meet a winged one, feathered, untethered, who presses in my palm three precious stones, like St. Ita in her dream, but similarities end there, her with saintliness and certainty, me asking questions in the dark. All I know is I am not crafted from patience of rock or gravity of earth, nor flow of river, I am not otter with her hours devoted to play. I am none of these. At least not yet. The stones will still be singing centuries from now, made smooth by all kinds of weather. If

Stop by this link to read W.S. Merwin’s poem “To the New Year” Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, I offer you a reprise of my reflection on Embracing Mystery in the New Year: Ten Essential Practices. Let mystery have its place in you; do not be always turning up your whole soil with the plowshare of self-examination, but leave a little fallow corner in your heart ready for any seed the winds may bring, and reserve a nook of shadow for the passing bird; keep a place in your heart for the unexpected guests, an altar for an unknown God. -Henri-Frederic

Dearest Monks, artists, and pilgrims, Today is the feast day of Thomas Merton and I share with you this excerpt from my book Illuminating the Way: Embracing the Wisdom of Monks and Mystics: “The rush and pressure of modern life are a form, perhaps the most common form, of its innate violence. To allow oneself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many demands, to commit oneself to too many projects, to want to help everyone in everything is to succumb to violence.” (Merton in Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander) I first read