Walking Meditation

This time we’ll walk in silence.
You’ll trip on hidden roots;
my boots will sink into sand
as we try to understand it all,
and fail, of course,
again.
Our vows of silence, too,
will end,
our minds both hungry and full.

“This must be the way” you’ll say,
your voice blustery, assured,
gesturing onward
to the beyond.
I’ll follow, trusting
your sense of direction
more than mine. Surely
this time it will lead us
to the crucible.

But we’ll circle back
to where we’ve been,
with just a glint of recognition.
The truest test still lives
in a riddle
dangling above our crowns.
We can barely touch its edges
and never get
the gist of it.

Elizabeth Landrum, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist whose work has most recently appeared in Southern Womens Review, Grey Sparrow, and RiverLit. Her poems have also been published in Shark Reef where she has served as co-editor for poetry.  She received her doctorate in Psychology from the University of Louisville and practiced as a private psychotherapist for 30 years in Louisville, KY and Edmonds, WA.  After retiring, she moved to an island in the San Juans where she shares a new home with her wife and two dogs.  She has found inspiration for her poetry from her beautiful Northwest surroundings, from the inner world of dreams, from stories of suffering and survival, as well as from other poets.