Atoms of my old faiths and passions dancing
A poem about remembering you are dust
Every faith, every spiritual and ethical practice, includes times set aside to remember that we’re mortal creatures in a mortal world. My own faith tradition is entering one of those times today.
I wrote this poem after being in church on another Ash Wednesday, watching dust motes dance in the rays of light pouring through the windows … and thinking that dust might not be such a bad thing to be, the way the Light loves it and invites it to dance. The poem has shown up here before; here it is again, for this particular Wednesday, or really for any day when the realization of your dustiness hits you.
ASH WEDNESDAY 2002 Almighty and Everlasting God, you hate nothing you have made…. Remember, mortal, that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. — From the Ash Wednesday liturgy, Book of Common Prayer Dust of fire now spent, of green wood charred, it smears my forehead with myself. Remember you are dust. Remember wishes, blazing in their moment, then blown out like candles; remember friendship bright as steel, now tarnished into habit. Vows erode, hope sifts away, in tiny ways, day by day, grain by grain. To dust you shall return. Return to where, God, in your restless world? You hate nothing you have made; then will I one day turn and see atoms of my old faiths and passions dancing like dust-motes in the heavens to declare your glory, fused into stones that cry out your hosannas when men are silent? All the songs your children sing or never sang, the love we gave or were afraid to give — dust now on the breath of your Spirit and singing still, loving still. The heavens, God, declare your glory, the stones cry out: you hate nothing you have made, and we are dust, returning to dust, and the dust is singing.
Wow this was fantastic :)
Oh wow.