To the Grave

I feel shackled today.
Tied down.
Locked up.
I turn my eyes upward and my heart cries out.
The Truth is supposed to set us free.
What if the truth evades us?
What to do when it feels as if the truth sits on the horizon, just beyond reach?
On a bike ride today I came across a doe and her two fawn crossing the path in front of me.
In that moment I caught a glimpse of heaven.
Nature breathes life into my soul.
These moments fill me with hope and a feeling of simplicity.
For as long as I can remember I've had fantasies of running through open fields filled with flowers.
Lying down in the wide open air.
Maybe under a tree.
Maybe near a source of water.
I imagine I could stay there all day.
Lost in my own thoughts.
Soaking up the solitude.
Opening my heart and mind to the truth.
Resting there until it alights upon me, fills me up, and quenches my hunger for peace.
I think I would do it every day if I could.
I found a place like that once.
In the most unlikely of places.....
A cemetery.
In front of my sister's headstone.
There I was able to pour out my sadness, my pain.
There, tears poured freely.
I would go there full of pain so intense I thought my chest might burst.
I would leave with peace.
I drove away with a renewed sense of purpose and appreciation for life.
But repetition tends to grow stale.
And in our humanity we search for new experiences to replace the old.
In our search we may walk straight into temptation instead of the deliverance we seek.
Temptation so sweet it seems innocent in our naivety and longing.
Once we succomb to it we find it to be a thief.
Robbing of us of our joy.
And then we are humbled by the light shining awareness on the path we've taken and on the places we've fallen along the way.