Leicester Great Heart Circle, Thurs 2nd June

This evening we held our monthly meditation training circle in Leicester. It was a warm Summer's evening, and the big trees in the chapel garden were lovely and green and alive. We talked about two poles of leading a spiritual life- the need to create spaces of refuge and peace for ourselves and others, and the need to plunge headfirst into the messiness and pain of life and be with it lovingly. Once again, a great celebratory feast was enjoyed at the end. Here is a poem written recently by Mike Petterson, one of our regulars:

Invigilation

To hear the broken silence
With every sense of being
To see the confusion of the moment
And feel the stillness of the soul

To penetrate the barriers of division
And fuse the hopes of today
To live life's essence every second
And see truly disappointment and joy

The dot of the i, the dash of the t
The red of light and greys of night
Blood and bone, sinew and flesh, atom and particle
The details missed, part of you, part of me

To really travel the journey
Each foot, each step, every breath of the way
To touch the heart of the wind
And fall every inch of the chasm

The space between, the sound below
The coolness of the sun, the heat of the moon
Intense joy in melting, becoming, losing...
Surrendering to the here, today, as it is.

A fleeting glimpse, a treasured touch
A glancing arrow searing the skin
Awake, for the blink of an eye, a humming bird's wing-flap
Vacuum to fullness, vastness in a thimble.