A New Heart

Looking at the sky has always given me perspective – clarifying the confusing, shrinking problems to manageable. The idea that human life has only been on the planet for one hot second if Earth’s age is measured by one 24-four-hour day is humbling, to say the least.

A galaxy of stars our ceiling, four billion-year-old terrain our floor, certainly we are still learning how to be human. We are such a mystery to ourselves! We could learn from the orb weaver how to build the perfect home, from the coati how to eat well, from the eagle how to look ahead.

On my walk with Katy, I read a handmade sign posted above the backyard garden gate: “This world is not what we name it or think it. All created things are like a dream, an illusion, a bubble, or a shadow. Like dew or lightning, we should view them like this.” The sign at the front of the house reads: “Remember this: all life is nothing but light.”

This message brings me hope because our failings will be supplanted by something beautiful, full of light. A life we can create every day. I look forward to seeing what we all will make of this world.

© Amada Reza
August 2021

With no clue, we find our heroes among the tall legs of the world. While the roll of the chosen grows and shrinks, curiosity drives me to consider the qualities of this elite group.

Coming up to seven decades, my heroes have seen a sea change, but as a child of the 50s, I own the expectation of my father to be one. I can only imagine how difficult this burden was for him to carry.

Today, I see into the heart of this hero we craft so ably before we can talk. We project our image upon the person or object of desire that is to save us from our fears and failings without realizing we will always be our own hero, that we are the only ones who can approve of our worthiness.

Thirty years after my father’s passing, I choose his laughter – so deep from his heart it brought a smile from the most curmudgeon. His voice, when he read his most beloved stories to us snuggled safely beside him. His feelings at the ready, whether happy or sad. His helpfulness to all children, his own or not, when he taught us to swim, fish, ride a bike or play ball. His faith, tenuous at best, remained a shiny aspiration beneath all the smoke and mirrors of bravado.

Let’s choose to laugh, be the resonating voice of comfort, the connection, and helpmate to all, with enough faith to be satisfied with the hero we are, knowing the stars in our eyes belong to us.

© Amada Reza
March 2021

I honor memories
as ancestors,
grateful for their
prescience (true or not),
forgiving their gaffes
(always one-sided),
and welcome the
entourage of feelings
into the tired space
of a weight reclaimed.

Yet even the loudest
of us goes silent
when, through the same
door, comes the
ephemeral Present,
wearing a gown
sparkling with vision
and possibility
with its breathtaking risk.

Unbound by time,
all of us – beggar
and beauty – belong
in this dance of what is
and what will be.

We come as ourselves
in every moment.

Amada Reza
July 6, 2024

sus•pend, verb:
to keep from falling or sinking by some
invisible support (such as buoyancy).

Standing between the physical and spiritual,
visible and invisible, it’s taking all my faith
right now to suspend myself within these
two realities.

When I was young I believed I could erase
humanity from my idea of a perfect world.
Our collective failure to dignify all beings,
and see ourselves as part of a whole, marred
what I thought of as the order of the universe. 

Still, amidst creation and destruction,
harmony and discord, light and darkness, 
we have not fallen into gravity’s black hole. 

It is the simple grace of the human soul
that provides a moment of weightlessness – 
the fulcrum to living both an external and
internal life.

Rumi beautifully describes this moment:
Out beyond the ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I’ll meet you there. When the soul lies
down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase each other doesn’t
make any sense.

Life is a game played by choices.

Choose to be helpful and honest or choose to be self-serving and dishonest, the rules of your game are set in motion.

There is no ref or ump to call a right or wrong action, the important thing is where the ball is in play.

Believe in yourself and your teammates, play with all your heart, mind and body, keep your eye on the ball, and be fair to all players, even if they aren’t on your team, and you will never lose your game.