Any Other October

Our lives are changed forever or are forever changing or is it that we are changing forever through the beloved lens of attention? Acorns fall, snow melts, geese can be seen grazing in the far corner of the pasture. All the ways this October is not any other October! Deepening unto yet more deepening. Is this what they meant when they said stillness? At 5 a.m. I give up on going it alone and ask for help and that which shows up isn't helpful and anyway keeps going. I cast aside my shoes, now I have to cast aside my feet as well? We flee before that which reminds us of that from which we flee. The clouds are here and then they are there and in between them floats . . . precisely what? At dusk I run my hand along the horse's mane, talk to it in low tones about the many Kingdoms I left behind in order to arrive here, empty-handed but not unprepared. The lovelily prism cast by the lens of attention becomes us you see. Not even the mountains kneel anymore, not even the river kneels. Even the old barn cat on her haunches by the gate - swinging open, swinging shut - is thinking it over. Again. And again. And again.