Meditations: ImpermanenceEverything changes, though I forget this every morning. The river is never the same, still—it wears the same clothes. I watch it slip past the roots of the cedar, a silver thread through a quiet needle— mending something humans can no longer see. My mind wants to fasten things down— poems, memories, the morning light— but nothing holds. Even my joy becomes something else the moment I clutch it in my hand. Still— I make tea. I light the small candle. I feed the little birds that gather behind the woodpile. Sometimes I cry for no reason, and then remember every reason, my heart like a heavy locomotive— impossible to get going, and impossible to stop. I hope my son will always look at me and know: that we will all lose everything, and it will be okay. I will walk the earth again tomorrow, and though everything may change, her moss will still be soft beneath the heel of me, a Mother, offering what comfort she can. — Zoë Dawkins
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