Language Against Which We Have No Defenses

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Friendship

The ultimate touchstone of friendship is not improvement, neither of the other nor of the self: the ultimate touchstone is witness, the privilege of having been seen by someone and the equal privilege of being granted the sight of the essence of another, to have walked with them and to have believed in them, and sometimes just to have accompanied them for however brief a span, on a journey impossible to accomplish alone.

from "Friendship" in Consolations

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Start Close In

Start close in,
don't take the second step
or the third,
start with the first
thing
close in,
the step
you don't want to take.

Start with
the ground
you know,
the pale ground
beneath your feet,
your own
way to begin
the conversation.

from "Start Close In" in David Whyte: Essentials

Featured writing

The Well of Grief

Those who will not slip beneath
the still surface on the well of grief,

turning down through its black water,
to the place we cannot breathe,

will never know the source from which we drink,
the secret water cold and clear,

nor find in the darkness glimmering,
the small round coins,
thrown by those who wished for something else.

from "The Well of Grief" in River Flow: New & Selected Poems

Featured writing

Hiding

is a way of staying alive. Hiding is a way of holding ourselves until we are ready to come into the light. Hiding is one of the brilliant and virtuoso practices of almost every part of the natural world: the protective quiet of an icy northern landscape, the held bud of a future summer rose, the snowbound internal pulse of the hibernating bear. Hiding is underestimated. We are hidden by life in our mother's womb until we grow and ready ourselves for our first appearance in the lighted world; to appear too early in that world is to find ourselves with the immediate necessity for outside intensive care...

from "Hiding" in Consolations