Winter Confession

Sage CohenPeople I admire4 Comments

By Mark Nepo

I’ve tried to follow every wind and
listen for its source. I’ve tried to follow
every light, and with my face in the sun,
all the things we carry that are afraid of
the light scurry to the back of my mind.
I’ve tried to find the truth and when I
have, I’ve found it’s everywhere, and that
I step over it in my pain or want for some-
thing I can’t have. Thankfully there have
been ordinary blessings. When I followed
your presence into what would be our love.
When I took a left in the path that led to
the sea and stayed there for days, putting
down all the names I’d been given. How
months later, while dropping a book of
poems by George Seferis, a wet clump
of grass stained his instruction to speak
plainly. And the small light that brought
me back while I was in surgery. It was a
crack of dawn promising so much, if I
could just get up and walk beyond death’s
slim tree. And here I am, all these years
later, mouth open, still in awe. Yesterday,
in the pines, my dog put her nose in the
snow. What a teacher. I slipped to one
knee and did the same.

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