Practicing Death

Oh how this low light

Of coming winter

Streams in the warmth

Through the naked trees

Through the south facing

Bank of windows

Luring my body toward

Sun flooded swivel chairs

To slip, to slouch low like the sun

To do more of nothing

Not from illness,

not from exhaustion,

not from grief

Just to lean into the brightness of nothing

As if the coming of winter’s death

Enters me too now,

in practice

In stillness,

in deeper rest

In a magnetic glow from below

Where I might just stay forever

The bank of windows I notice

Also lure the flies toward

The low light of sun

Pull them toward the brightness of death

As if they already know to let go

To do only nothing now

To allow themselves into stillness

As the spider wraps them snuggly

Into the webs of death

Only to become more Life

Only seen now in this coming winter light

Only noticed by me

in my slip into stillness

Oh how this low light

Of coming winter

Streams in the warmth

Through the naked trees

Through the south facing

Bank of windows

Luring my body toward

Practicing death

Sitting with my own death

My Slip into impermanence

To lean into the brightness

of being nothing

To become consumed by that surrender

What else would I practice

In the streams of warmth

Coming in through the naked trees

in this world so full of busyness?

What else would I practice here

But to become a part of all of this—

This beautiful web of all existence?