One Spirit,
one Body.

Holy One,
         we are all one in you.
Already One.
         Already Holy.
Already yours.

All our love,
even of strangers,
         is purely returning.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

May 21, 2021

Winds pummel and scream,
the tops of buildings blown off,
half the landscape tumbling by.

But leaves are undisturbed,
the little tin vane waves gently,
the candles burn straight and calm.

And yet inside these people
silently, meekly,
the rush of irresistible winds.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

May 20, 2021

         When the day of Pentecost had come,
         they were all together in one place.
         And suddenly from heaven there came a sound
         like the rush of a violent wind,
         and it filled the entire house where they were sitting.
                   —Acts 2.1-1

How do you find you way in this life?—
with no true destination,
so many urging paths,
a hundred little blue lines,
a thousand competing maps.
The choice is ongoing, and fraught.

Let the map go.
Be a cloud in the wind of God.
Clouds go where the wind takes them,
rising when heated,
falling as rain,
but never resisting.
Their power is in the wind,
and their closeness to it.

         Wind of God, lead me.
         Breath of God, bear me on.

_______________________
Weather Report

Windy,
as a warm mass of the Rising One
draws air from lung to lung,
with gusts of beauty, courage and compassion.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

May 19, 2021

Fire of God,
be my light.

Heat of God,
be my fuel.

Furnace of God,
purify me.

Blaze of God,
be my upward leaping.

Spirit of God,
may I burn with your love,

your passion to spread mercy
in this flammable world.

Flame of God,
be my breath.

Wind of God,
be my steady leading.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

May 18, 2021

He is the strangest pickpocket
steals things from the deepest inside
but leaves the ones
that are just lying around
because he knows
you can let go of them on your own

sometimes he’s a reverse pickpocket
every once in a while
stopping carrying around your secret for you

and some day
you think you’re reaching out to him
and accidentally
how in the world does this happen
not knowing not meaning to
you’ve picked his pocket
and come away with it

or even sometimes by surprise
oh his sleight of heart
you find it in a pocket
you didn’t know you had

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

May 17, 2021

         He was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.
While he was going they were gazing up toward heaven…
                   —Acts 1.9-10

Sometimes empty sky
is what we get,

loss and absence
our only version of the Beloved,

the fact of lack of tact
our faith, for this:

the One has exceeded now
one flesh and is flesh

with all flesh, the Body
raised into all bodies,

your place no longer there, but here,
in love, even when borne as grief,

the emptiness in us
your shape.

Even your absence
hosts your presence,

our yearning
is you.

_________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

May 14, 2021

         He was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.
                   —Acts 1.9

         God raised Christ from the dead
         and seated Christ at God’s right hand in the heavenly places.
         The mystery of God’s will… is to gather up all things in Christ.
                                 —Ephesians 1.20, 10

Christ, risen and ascended,
you are no longer one person, but the whole.
Christ, you are raised bodily,
and your Body now is us,
and all Creation.

Loving One,
may I live this day
as your body, your flesh and blood.
As the only purpose of my hand
is to be my hand, to move as I will,
so my only purpose today
is to be your hand, your eyes,
to touch and to bless,
to create and to heal, as you will,
as your Spirit moves me,
one with my whole Body,
gathered in your grace,
the flesh of Christ,
the flesh of Creation,
the body of your love,

________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

May 13, 2021

         He was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.
While he was going they were gazing up toward heaven—
                   —Acts 1.9-10

Ah, Mysterious One, you befuddle us,
you laugh at our small minds scratching
at treasure behind glass.
The child, impossibly, forgives.
Through the tiniest crack in the dawn
a tenderness reaches that takes up
saint and derelict alike.
No one understands. We guess.
If we are wise, we wonder.
We belong to a universe, to a God,
stranger than our knowing,
more infinite than our imagining,
more wonderful than our fear.
Lay down your compass and ruler.
Kiss the sky.
Just tell the story.
Love has risen to the top.

_________________
Weather Report

Light,
falling at all hours of the day,
neither adorned nor diminished
by our knowledge.
100% chance of sunrise,
somewhere, every minute,
unaffected by the thin layer
of what we’re sure of.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

May 12, 2021

I want to say the oak is patient
unfolding its little parasols of leaves
so gradually
even as the birches rush ahead,
but it is not patient,
any more than light is patient
taking 100,000 years
to cross the Milky Way.
It is simply in the present moment.
It is I,
who think of schedules,
who think in this spring chill
of shade on a hot day,
who must be patient,
who must surrender
thought of slow or fast,
who must
without thought of elsewhere or elsewhen
be at peace in this moment
and receive without judgment
what is.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

May 11, 2021

Not the image you seek,
that’s the idol to avoid,
but the paying attention,

not the voice
you want to hear,
but the listening itself,

not the answer but the waiting,
this is prayer.
Here we meet the holy.

Not the object
but the love,
this is God.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

May 10, 2021