-- Stillness in Movement --

John Herlihy

In wind lies the breath of the world,

The world breathes at will.

Everything in nature in movement,

nothing stays still.

Each day, the quiet dawn arrives in transit,

Its silence makes it seem still.

The light and the shadows ever shifting,

The day itself ever drifting.

Each evening, the quiet twilight takes its leave,

In movement, always still.

Dust motes of darkness allow one final reprieve,

The day in repose until. . .

The bee hovers in movement in the rose garden,

Its buzzing makes me feel still.

In its devoted industry, the bee seeks no pardon,

That too gives me a thrill.

The light of the sun manifests as iridescent glow,

The duck silent as glass.

The ripples move upon the water row upon row,

Ever still, never fast.

In flight, the butterfly paints a moving picture,

The image alights on my heart.

Its beauty ties me in the stillness of its suture,

May such feelings never depart.

The earth itself in perpetual motion,

Its movement seems still.

Its rhythmic harmony creates a magic potion,

Its ink flows from a quill.

The movement of the earth then compounded,

On its axis around the sun.

Its silent movement in the universe resounded,

As movement in infinity spun.

At the center of the dance, I feel perfectly still,

In stillness, worlds transform.

The body moves in unison, the heart center ever still,

There in the eye of the storm.

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(c) John Herlihy 10 May 2020