Poetry Saturday

My Worst Habit – Rumi

My worst habit is I get so tired of winter
I become a torture to those I’m with.

If you are not here, nothing grows.
I lack clarity. My words
tangle and knot up.

How to cure bad water? Send it back to the river.
How to cure bad habits? Send me back to you.

When water gets caught in habitual whirlpools,
dig a way out through the bottom
to the ocean. There is a secret medicine
given only to those who hurt so hard
they can’t hope.

The hopers would feel slighted if they knew.

Look as long as you can at the friend you love,
no matter whether that friend is moving away from you
or coming back toward you.

This reminds me of the next couple of months of aching with cold. It reminds me that there are always times everyone aches like that, and not always in ways mittens and fireplaces can fix.

It reminds me that there’s always something to look toward. It reminds me that warm spring rain, of one sort or another, is always going to come again.