Waking Hours

It's in these waking hours, when the mind is caught between the realms where my dreams have been haunted by the blue bird and that same poem speaks to me in volumes unimaginable: 

How surely gravity's law, 
Strong as an ocean current, 
Takes hold of the smallest thing 
And pulls it toward the heart of the world. 

Each thing--- 
Each stone, blossom, child--- 
Is held in place. 
Only we, in our arrogance, 
Push out beyond what we each belong to 
For some empty freedom. 

If we surrendered 
To earth's intelligence 
We could rise up rooted, like trees. 

Instead we entangle ourselves 
In knots of our own making 
And struggle, lonely and confused. 

So like children, we begin again 
To learn from the things, 
Because they are in God's heart; 
They have never left him. 

This is what the things can teach us: 
To fall, 
Patiently to trust our heaviness. 
Even a bird has to do that 
Before he can fly.