Crossing the Road on The Way

by Jane Tawel

heino eisner — unsplash

Crossing the Road on The Way

By Jane Tawel

January 26, 2025

*

Resting my head on small, fragile hands,

too fragile to hold the world up.

What would happen if I dropped the world?

What would happen if I gave my thoughts 

 — Up?

*

Holding my heart,

pushing it deeper within.

Stunting or fronting true selves.

Who would I be if I opened the cage?

What would emerge if my heart was set free?

How much Love can a soft heart give?

Why, All the Love that there is.

*

Embracing the shattered,

the least and the lost,

Inside me — 

but also in them.

How would I live?

 if I–

Stopped.

Looked.

and Listened……..

before crossing the road

On The Way?

*

© Jane Tawel, 2025

Fall and Flow

by Jane Tawel

Fall and Flow

By Jane Tawel

January 22, 2025

*

Beginning — 

A bud appears on a dung heap

Beauty despite, beauty despite….

Somehow from garbage,

New birth.

New shoots reach up

from old roots,

Searching

Dreaming

Creating Hope.

*

Stay small,

as small as you can be.

In this Un-brave New World,

find your courage in

laughter,

meekness,

small acts of kindness.

Become curious.

Be curious only about — 

What you can see

What you can smell

What you can taste

What you can hear

What you can touch.

Keep your focus on

What you can experience in this moment

and perhaps, what you can change.

Nothing but what is real for you

needs to intrude on your reality.

*

Use your fear wisely

and then fear not.

This is not the beginning of the end.

This is the end of yet another beginning.

Many have come and gone before

And for you, there is only — 

This time

This place

This now

This task.

Find those to whom

you alone can help,

find those to whom you

would do unto

as you would have them do

unto you.

*

Herein, lies peace.

Trust that you can fight for right,

and stand up for Goodness

but only where you are planted.

Be a beautiful small flower.

The garbage is only here

to help you flourish and grow.

Let other people tend their own gardens

or wallow in their own dung heaps

as they will.

They are not for you.

*

Endings…..

A leaf falls from a tree

A wave flows out to the Ocean

And dust returns to dust

Let go

Fall

Flow

And you will find where you have come from

and return.

*

© Jane Tawel, 2025

Child’s Play Prayer

by Jane Tawel

Unsplash: Omer Haktan Bulut, Photographer

Child’s Play Prayer

By Jane Tawel

January 18, 2025

*

Hi.

I don’t understand You,

and that’s okay,

but I know You are my Parent.

I knew You when I

was in Your Womb, Mommy.

I knew You from the first day

You held my weak and wandering

eyes in Your loving gaze,

caressing me with Your thoughts.

*

I know how strong You are, Daddy,

because time and time again,

no matter how big I have grown,

You have lifted me up

on Your strong shoulders,

and held me in your strong hands.

*

Forgive me for growing up

to think I had to earn your love.

Forgive me for thinking You could

ever love me less if You also

loved my brothers and sisters

just as much as You love me.

Forgive me for thinking

I could ever put Your Love aside

like a memento from the Past,

store it in a little box,

shelving with other books

I might take down and read sometimes.

Your Love is not a once upon a time thing.

Your Love is not one thing at all.

Your Love is One — 

not You. not Me.

I am Yours, and You are Mine.

Mommy. Daddy. Creator. Love.

*

You, Parent-Creator,

are higher than my highest thoughts,

and lower than my deepest desires.

Release me from want — 

from needing

from needing or pretending

to be an adult around You — 

an adult full of doing and thinking,

not trusting and resting

at peace

at home

 in Your Love.

*

Help me flunk my test today,

so I will relearn how to go out and play.

Let me be again

Be… again… 

 Your dearly beloved

Child.

Amen.

© Jane Tawel, 2025

Right Now, Right Here

Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

*

Right Now, Right Here

By Jane Tawel

January 2, 2025

*

So full of grief for moments past

So anxious for next moment

So bitter that this life won’t last

So rife with pain and mindless foment.

*

I wander blindly, thought to thought

Not seeing, hearing, tasting.

I miss what Is for what is Not

While precious Nows go wasting.

*

This morning as I woke — my dream

did linger in my consciousness

And for a moment, it did seem

I could escape this awful mess

of all the negativity that I allowed to fester,

and so, I set my mind to be an open-minded quester.

I realized what I called my life,

was really just a reverie,

but I had wasted so much time

in future fears and burdening memory.

*

I vowed this day to change the way

that I would think, and act, and live in

this precious moment — just that — no more.

No future fears — the past forgiven.

This Now, I will embrace, explore

with senses full, mean thoughts all emptied,

and previous ghosts of hopeless frenzy

I banish now from my True Being.

I’ll breathe. Take steps. True Self. Vast. Freeing.

*

As Shakespeare said: “Life’s what we’re dreaming.”

The Wise One said: “All comes in season.

As Jesus said, “No need to worry.”

And Buddha said, “Please stop your hurry.”

*

Hello, sweet Now,

I greet You anew.

The Whys and Hows,

I’ll leave to You.

My life is just Right Now, Right Here — 

This moment, — Precious, Treasured, Dear.

I open to the glory of

My Self as just a story of

a birth, a life, a death — and then?

One moment more — I wake — reborn again.

*

© Jane Tawel, 2025