Like Marcus

What matters lies within—
all else is smoke and shadow.
Your thoughts are yours alone;
tend them like a garden.

When pain comes, do not turn away.
Say instead: Here is my teacher.
When joy comes, hold it lightly.
Say instead: Here is a gift.

The sun rises without your permission.
The stars wheel without your consent.
In this vast dance of atoms,
your only power is to choose:

How to meet this moment,
How to carry this burden,
How to love what life has given,
How to let go of what it takes.

Pride is a prison.
Anger is a chain.
Fear is a fog that hides the truth:
You were made for this exact day.

So stand in the storm
not because you are strong,
but because you know—
strength comes from standing.

Accept what is.
Do what must be done.
Love what you have been given.
Ask nothing more of the universe.

This breath is enough.
This moment is enough.
This life, exactly as it is,
is enough.

The Bench

How the day bends itself to joy,
like trees leaning toward light.
Here, silence hums—
a presence, not an absence.

The air holds a simple truth:
that love is quiet,
that a heart can rest
when it knows it is surrounded.

Here is the world,
its breath threading
through fur, through laughter,
through eyes that see and do not ask.

The earth beneath holds no grudges,
the sun carries no demands.
The moment—
is enough.

And what else could you want,
sitting still in the company
of those who know
what it means to belong?

To them, you are everything.
And here, you are whole.

These are the mathematics of joy—
three pairs of eyes,
watching nothing in particular,
thus everything.

This is what the soul looks like
when it finds its pack—
content as fallen leaves,
complete as autumn light.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​