Kokum and Mushum

Kokum and Mushum cheering me on at my soccer game when I was a little tiny girl.

The next place that I go
will be as peaceful and familiar
as a sleepy summer Sunday
and a sweet, untroubled mind.

And yet ... it won't be anything like any place I've been... or seen ...
or even dreamed of in the place I leave behind.

I won't know where I'm going, and I won't know where I've been
as I tumble through the always and look back toward the when.

I'll glide beyond the rainbows.
I'll drift above the sky
I'll fly into the wonder,
without ever wondering why.

I won't remember getting there.
Somehow I'll just arrive.
But I'll know that I belong there and will feel much more alive
than I have ever felt before.
I will be absolutly free of the things that I held onto that were holding onto me.

The next place that I go
will be so quiet and so still
That the whispered song of sweet belonging will rise up to fill
the listening sky with joyful silence,
and with unheard harmonies of music made by no one playing,
like a hush upon a breeze.

There will be no room for darkness in that place of living light,
Where an ever-dawning morning pushes back the dying night.
The very air will fill with brilliance as the brightly shining sun
And the moon and half a million stars are married into one.

The next place that I go
won't really be a place at all.
There won't be any seasons-winter, summer, spring or fall-
Nor a Monday,
Nor a Friday,
Nor a December,
Nor a July.

And the seconds will be standing still ...
While hours hurry by.

I will not be a boy
or girl,
a woman
or a man.
I'll simply be just, simply me.
No worse or better than.
My skin will not be dark
or light
I won't be fat
or tall
The body I once lived in
won't be part of me at all.

And the me that was impatient,
or was angry or unkind,
will simply be a memory.
The me I left behind.

I will travel empty-handed.
There is not a single thing
I have collected in my life
that I would ever want to bring
except ...
the love of those who loved me,
and the warmth of those who cared.
The happiness and memories
and the magic that we shared.

Though I will know the joy of solitude ...
I'll never be alone.
I'll be embraced
by all the family and friends
I've ever known.
Although I might not see their faces,
all our hearts beat as one,
And the circle of our spirits
will shine brighter than the sun.

I will cherish all the friendship I was fortunate to find,
all the love and all the laughter in the place I leave behind.

All these good things will go with me.
They will make my spirit glow.
And that light will shine forever
in the next place that I go.