Everything Is Waiting For You

After Derek Mahon

Your great mistake is to act the drama
as if you were alone. As if life
were a progressive and cunning crime
with no witness to the tiny hidden
transgressions. To feel abandoned is to deny
the intimacy of your surroundings. Surely,
even you, at times, have felt the grand array;
the swelling presence, and the chorus, crowding
out your solo voice. You must note
the way the soap dish enables you,
or the window latch grants you freedom.
Alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity.
The stairs are your mentor of things
to come, the doors have always been there
to frighten you and invite you,
and the tiny speaker in the phone
is your dream-ladder to divinity.

Put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into the
conversation. The kettle is singing
even as it pours you a drink, the cooking pots
have left their arrogant aloofness and
seen the good in you at last. All the birds
and creatures of the world are unutterably
themselves. Everything is waiting for you.

-David Whyte

Commentary

Your great mistake is to act the drama
as if you were alone. As if life
were a progressive and cunning crime
with no witness to the tiny hidden
transgressions.

These first lines remind me of a passage in Mikhail Naimy’s The Book of Mirdad.

“Think as if your every thought were to be etched
in fire upon the sky for everything and everyone to see;
for so, in truth, it is.

Speak as if the world entire were but a single ear,
intent on hearing what you say;
for so, in truth, it is.

Mikhail Naimy in The Book of Mirdad

The first lines of Whyte’s poem may at first seem intimidating, as if Santa Clause is once again peering into every corner of our life, marking down each time we have been good or bad. They may sound, to those who have grown up in patriarchal religious traditions, to be more of the same blame and shame game played by an angry god who has very little to do with Love.

But, reading Whyte’s poem further, we see that this is not at all what he means. In fact, quite the opposite.

To feel abandoned is to deny
the intimacy of your surroundings. Surely,
even you, at times, have felt the grand array;
the swelling presence, and the chorus, crowding
out your solo voice. You must note
the way the soap dish enables you,
or the window latch grants you freedom.

Whyte is inviting us into the experience of what Thich Nhat Hanh calls “Interbeing.”

“Interbeing is the understanding that nothing exists separately from anything else. We are all interconnected. By taking care of another person, you take care of yourself. By taking care of yourself, you take care of the other person. Happiness and safety are not individual matters. If you suffer, I suffer. If you are not safe, I am not safe. There is no way for me to be truly happy if you are suffering. If you can smile, I can smile too. The understanding of interbeing is very important. It helps us to remove the illusion of loneliness, and transform the anger that comes from the feeling of separation.”

Thich Nhat Hanh, in How to Fight

In the state of interbeing, we recognize that all is connected. We are in radical, naked contact with all of life around us. Even ordinary objects like a soap dish or a window latch seem to emanate their own marvelous essence.

Alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity.
The stairs are your mentor of things
to come, the doors have always been there
to frighten you and invite you,
and the tiny speaker in the phone
is your dream-ladder to divinity.

Stumbling into this state of interbeing requires a “hidden discipline” of alertness. It requires us to be vulnerable to the world.

“The state of interbeing is a vulnerable state. It is the vulnerability of the naive altruist, of the trusting lover, of the unguarded sharer. To enter it, one must leave behind the seeming shelter of a control-based life, protected by walls of cynicism, judgment, and blame.”

Charles Eisenstein, The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible

Put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into the
conversation. The kettle is singing
even as it pours you a drink, the cooking pots
have left their arrogant aloofness and
seen the good in you at last.

The reward for our vulnerability in opening to the world is a connection with the mystical love underpinning everything. It is a recognition that beneath the apparent dance of opposites we live in, the universe is fundamentally benevolent.

Even the cooking pots have “have left their arrogant aloofness and/seen the good in you at last.“

All the birds
and creatures of the world are unutterably
themselves. Everything is waiting for you

We learn that not being alone does not mean being observed, but being connected. We are connected, and profoundly interconnected, with the symphony of life around us.

Not only this, but the whole magnificent world is waiting for us – yes, us – to join in the dance of being “unutterably themselves.”