A journal of commentary, narrative and poetry about navigating through life

the flame

  Leaving Land Behind

We set off on this journey knowing
We would be sailing far from land,
Far from all the human support
On which we have come to depend.
Now, as our eyes scan the horizon,
Our gaze is met only by the rise
And fall of the sea on every point.

Hour after hour our ship glides
Over the surging cobalt sea,
Climbing up the slope of each swell,
Cresting and surfing down headlong,
Into the trough, and up again,
While time transmutes from minutes,
Into weeks and months and years.
 

As night closes quickly on the day

We align our mast to the stars;
And constantly, we adjust our fix

To stay our course on heavens lights,

As, on the vastness of this darkened sea,

We sail on beneath the celestial dome

Leaving only a phosphorescent wake.

It is in our moments at sea

That it becomes so very clear

How exposed and vulnerable we are

In our body, soul, and spirit;

For in You, O God our lives depend;

In you we find our strength and hope

To hold and stay this course to home.

 by Thomas Fideler

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