Joy and Pain Lie Close

Rev. Jeffrey Symynkywicz, January 30, 2005

Joy and pain lie so close in our hearts,
cradled in the arms of everlasting life.
Where we see the darkness,
God’s light shines just beyond,
immutable, unchanging, as
the holy darkness of creation is impenetrable
to the garish human daylight.

We are a unity of forces complementary
and completing, a sacred consummation
of light and dark. We would call them
“opposites”, but life knows that they do
not oppose one another, but realize;
and each one holds the germ of the other
within its living soul.

So, if we have a choice, we choose
the sugar-coated pill of happy, easy times;
but our deeper nature knows
we ought not run from the pain
(though only a fool steers directly into it).

Let us cling to the precipice of our love
for one another, emboldened brothers
and sisters of all the world,
divine children both of dark and light,
both of joy and pain.

jbs
5/29/03 -1/30/05

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