Darkness and Light

Today is Winter Solstice, the shortest day and the longest night of the year. From this point forward, the sun rises for longer every day – definitely something worth celebrating! It’s traditional to celebrate with a meal of seasonal food, decorating the house with evergreen plants to remind you that the world outside is not dead, just sleeping and awaiting the sun again. The darkness only lasts for a season…

The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light.
For those who lived in a land of deep shadows—
light! sunbursts of light!
-Isaiah 9:2-3, The Bible

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
– John 1:5, The Bible

“In the depths of winter I finally learned there was in me an invincible summer”
– Albert Camus

Sweet Darkness by David Whyte

When your eyes are tired
the world is tired also.

When your vision has gone
no part of the world can find you.

Time to go into the dark
where the night has eyes
to recognize its own.

There you can be sure
you are not beyond love.

The dark will be your womb
tonight.

The night will give you a horizon
further than you can see.

You must learn one thing:
the world was made to be free in.

Give up all the other worlds
except the one to which you belong.

Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn

anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive

is too small for you.