One Kripalu Day

Posted on July 8, 2020

One Kripalu Day

You can live a hundred lifetimes in one Kripalu day

You can shift your inner being, and find that it was play;

Or breathe into a stillness, where all things fall away

And everywhere you look, and all you do or say

Is nothing but a shifting mirror, in the kindest, gentlest way.

You can live a hundred lifetimes, somehow knowing that you’ve changed;

In a precious fleet of hours, your cells have rearranged

In your attitudes or breathing, or in places long estranged

The playground of the soul-released has yearned and freely ranged;

Though you may arrive with baggage, you leave much more behind

A tired thought, an injury, a pattern in your mind

Replacing closed with open, a light within is shined

In communing with your yoga mat, or stretching for a bind

You may just stretch into yourself, and deeper places find.

A breath, a joy, a feeling, a gratitude revealed

A stubborn something shifted, a darkness quietly healed.

A flowing where there once had been an inner dam congealed

And by close of day or practice, a knowing has been sealed.

The sacred hours flicker by, together with your past –

An ordinary passing, with moments miraculous and vast –

Did you see them, did you catch them? – for they are yours – at last!

As sunset falls, the rhythmic beat of mop and brush and sweeping

Cleans away the debris of day, as we humbly thank housekeeping,

Kitchen staff for the nourishment our bodies are happily reaping,

The work of teachers, crews, and staff, delivering peace; and in this peace, our sleeping –

Reminding us to bless all humans and this world, each in each other’s keeping.

You can live a hundred lifetimes in one Kripalu day.

The question is, which lifetime might you choose to take away?

By B. E. Schlubach

July 2019

RQM Press