Peace Overflows in the Tub

I took a bath yesterday evening for the first time since I don't know when. Please don't be mistaken, I do shower daily, but a bath is a rare occasion. Anyway...

I was surrounded by everything calming: warm water, bubbles, the soft glow of candlelight, poetry. I was serenaded by sweet music, as well as by the steady rhythm of Butkus breathing, who was sleeping by the side of the tub thankful that he did not have to take a bath. The big boy is not a fan of water unless it is in his water bowl.

The experience of the bath was ever so peaceful and for that moment in time my life was perfect. (It is in the little and often unnoticed things where perfection resides.) I was where I was meant to be right there and then.

Instead of feeling lost in this world, I was lost in the eloquent language of poetry...

But surely death must possess that one tiny,
Intricate light created by the small certainty
Of its own name. And, darling, I know this too,
That in the moment that death comes to cover you,
Lying down carefully over your body, fitting itself
So well, forming belly to belly, matching
Its spreading fingers exactly to your open hands,
Finding its own thighs and its heart and its motion
By finding yours, in that moment, just like a flame
Catching hold suddenly in the center of a lantern
And rising then to fill the dark void of the forest
With its place, death will have no choice,
Must be transformed, illuminated, filled to its farthest
Boundaries by all the glorious sins and virtues
Of your real and radiant grace.
-Excerpt from "The Light Inside of Death" by Pattiann Rogers in her book of poetry entitled Splitting and Binding

Instead of feeling lost in this world, I felt found in ideas. I was stripped of my worries, fears, doubts, and insecurities. All of the "noes" slipped away the moment I slipped under the still water. I was blanketed in serenity, hope, joy, and truth. I was exposed and I was me. I was real. Yes.

I prayed to God that the peace would settle in my soul and linger. That everything that has been holding me back from pursuing peace daily, would wash away like the dirt from my body. I prayed to come to know Him better and through knowing Him, that I would come to know myself even better and realize His dream for my life and fulfill it. I prayed to live and I mean really, truly live.