Healing Rhythms 

It is winter
and the sunlight is cold.

You stand,
bundled and warm enough.

You release yourself,
surrender to the crash of the waves, a mantra

to replace your unruly thoughts
with God’s steady rhythms

that have managed to live far longer
than you.

This is where you find peace,
not the only place, but perhaps the strongest.

Here, all the complexity is hidden
beneath the water’s surface, and you lose yourself, content

to let the waves order your mind
and leave you, for a while at least,

whole.

About this poem

The ocean does something for me. I did not discover this about myself until I was nearly sixty. It calls to me. From time to time, I am able to answer.

The Photograph was take in Newport, RI.

Tom