Thursday Poem for a New Year - Beannacht

On the day when
The weight deadens
On your shoulders
And you stumble,
May the clay dance
To balance you.

And when your eyes
Freeze behind
The grey window
And the ghost of loss
Gets into you,
May a flock of colours,
Indigo, red, green
And azure blue,
Come to awaken in you
A meadow of delight.

When the canvas frays
In the currach of thought
And a stain of ocean
Blackens beneath you,
May there come across the waters
A path of yellow moonlight
To bring you safely home.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
May the clarity of light be yours,
May the fluency of the ocean be yours,
May the protection of the ancestors be yours.

And so may a slow
Wind work these words
Of love around you,
An invisible cloak
To mind your life.

© John O'Donohue. All rights reserved
(from Echoes of Memory)

The late John O'Donohue's poem was written for his mother a few years before he passed beyond the fields we know, and it's one of the best poems I can think of for this brand new calendar year we are starting off on this morning. In life, OJohn was a fine poet, and you can learn more about him by clicking on his name in the first line of this paragraph.