Slowly, my practice changed.

I kissed the hem of each new day

and breathed, as gently

as you press a pear to see

if it is ripe, as slowly

as you separate your hand

from the back of a sleeping child.

And I praised this life,

a late-March garden

where new growth stands

on the bones of the old.

… from the poem Barbarous World by Ginny Hoyle