Sweet Darkness

Sweet Darkness

When your eyes are tired

the world is tired also.

When your vision has gone

no part of the world can find you.

Time to go into the dark

where the night has eyes

to recognize its own.

There you can be sure

you are not beyond love.

The dark will be your womb

tonight.

The night will give you a horizon

further than you can see.

You must learn one thing:

the world was made to be free in.

Give up all the other worlds

except the one to which you belong.

Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet

confinement of your aloneness

to learn

anything or anyone

that does not bring you alive

is too small for you.

- David Whyte (House of Belonging) Many Rivers Press 1998 

Poetic Inquiry

1. How did this poem make you feel when you read it?

2. What line reached out to you?

3. What themes does this remind you of in your work as a coach?

4. When have you come through a dark or difficult time in your own life?

5, What were the gifts on the other side?

6. Who or what is too small for you in your life right now?

7. Who in your life makes you feel alive?

8. What activities bring you to life? Feel right? Feel energizing?

9. What activities deaden you?

10. What relationships no longer have the right energy or connection for you?

11. What can you see beyond the horizon?