Beannacht/Blessing
—John O’Donohue, Ireland (1956 – 2008)
For Josie, my mother On the day when the weight deadens on your shoulders and you stumble, may the clay dance to balance you. And when your eyes freeze behind the grey window and the ghost of loss gets into you, may a flock of colours, indigo, red, green and azure blue, come to awaken in you a meadow of delight. When the canvas frays in the currach of thought and a stain of ocean blackens beneath you, may there come across the waters a path of yellow moonlight to bring you safely home. May the nourishment of the earth be yours, may the clarity of light be yours, may the fluency of the ocean be yours, may the protection of the ancestors be yours. And so may a slow wind work these words of love around you, an invisible cloak to mind your life.
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Sláinte agus beannachtaí dár ndomhan, gach lá!
Health and blessings to our world, every day!
Thank you for reading today’s sublime and sublimely Irish poem/blessing.
On this most Irish day, with our world starving for blessings, how could I not return to the soul nourishment
that John so richly, richly offers? And that we can offer to one another?
John O’Donohue was an Irish poet, author, priest, and Hegelian philosopher.
He was a native Irish speaker, and as an author is best known for popularising Celtic spirituality.
My favourite book of his is Anam Cara