Can you tell there's a puzzle piece missing? It looks like the tiny but perceptible emptiness is right above the eagle's heart. Apparently, he/she can still fly and cry and keep his/her eyes wide open.

We all fly, cry, and keep our eyes wide, as long as we can lift our wings. Even though sorrow and frustration and loneliness poke holes in us where the cold whistles through, we stay aloft as long as we can.

What lifts our wings? Our strength is spirit. What strengthens our spirit? Memory. We are a busy tapestry of memories, of loving words, warm embraces, revelations, vistas of color horizon to horizon, melodies, fragrances, the touch of bare feet on soft grass, what we've looked for with all our focus, and all we've found, by accident, all the gifts as well as our own best giving. Those days, minutes, hours not only make up our unique lives, but clear a path in front of us. Suddenly it becomes clear why we are where we are, with what we know and what needs doing. Our strength is spirit.

Irish writer John O'Donohue begins his famous Anam Cara ("soul friend") Book of Celtic Wisdom, 1997 with the following poem. One stanza contains sailing imagery, with the Gaelic words "canvas" (sail) and "currach" (boat), speaking of our resolve "fraying," our strength weakening at times. I want to share his words here, for courage to all of us, for whom the worries of the day often gnaw at the fibre of our strenth. The title of the poem is "Beannacht" (blessing). These visions, messages, of "home," of all we trust, have been poured out on us in all our days, stored in our being, and wait to be tapped when we need to "patch our sails."

On the day when

the weight deadens

on your shoulders

and you stumble,

may the clay dance

to balance you.

And when your eyes

freeze behind

the gray window

and the ghost of loss

gets in to you,

may a flock of colors,

indigo, red, green

and azure blue

come to awaken in you

a meadow of delight.

When the canvas frays

in the curach of thought

and a stain of ocean

blackens beneath you,

may there come across the waters

a path of yellow moonlight

to bring you safely home.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,

may the clarity of light be yours,

may the fluency of the ocean be yours,

may the protection of the ancestors be yours.

And so may a slow

wind work these words

of love around you,

an invisible cloak

to mind your life.

~John O'Donohue 1997