Author Archives: David Hanig

My teachers talk about enlightenment.

Some strange thing, this so-called enlightenment

No prolonged ecstasy.

This is the gentlest of surrenders.

With this surrender, you do not “rage against the dying of the light”.¹

With this surrender, you cautiously explore your most tender hollows.

Lately,

A kind of clarity has descended upon me.

A heavenly gift repaying

If I could, I would grasp that moment forever,

That moment when you and I ventured down to the muddy shore and

There we found the cloudless sky and wildest birds and open waves that

We’re all alcoholics now.

Tipplers, sots, and lushes,

Addicted to a white lightning.

It started with a few siblings departing solitarily. One-by-one they cut their ties to source And drifted down, down, down to rest on the ground Forming a quilted welcome mat For those of us still to come. On cue, the maestro Waved in Autumn, Raising his baton and, At his urging, We launched into theContinue reading “Fall Leaves”

At first, when word of it began to percolate,

I was yet asleep and

The virus a forgotten song

We must give ourselves over to “not knowing”

Not knowing what comes next

How this will all end

This is not a political stand.

This is an act of kindness 

Kindness toward those we love

I gather my eyes

And gaze at the phone screen.

There resides my 3-year-old granddaughter,

It’s icy outside my window.

The last yellow leaves linger on the boughs.

They gently surrender to gravity,

Do you see that day ahead of you?

The day, we will fold our masks

And carefully caress them