Times I think I have it all together, I swim and swim and the water is beautifully wet and it holds me up until there is that moment when I am suddenly washed up on that shore.  Oh yes, I know what shoreline this is, this island,  I know it is the one where the tower is, and I thought I might just for once emerge from the water of Life with some kind of dignity, and walk tall toward that Keep.  It’s not like I haven’t been there, I know where to go to find that bower where the endless, empty dance takes place, that dance with no one and no thing, that dance of emptiness, the one with all that is and has never been…

But no.  I am half in and half out of the water, knees, belly and palms grinding into the rocky shoreline, vomiting water and sand, gasping for air, weighed down by time and rage and want and resentment and guilt, oh, all those ones that cling, afraid to be known.

I slide down, flat out, and let the shoreline hold me.  I breathe it in and out and wait while the water takes away the  false constructs and the toxins of living….  And eventually I’m able to stand up and begin that slow walk, that slow but sure walk toward the Keep and that rocky climb up to the bower, up to that dance with no one and no thing.  It always comes if I’m not too big a fool and retreat.  And because I am a soul, a she, He is always waiting.