You Can Find It

At the center of your being you have the answer; you know who you are and you know what you want.
—Lao Tzu

You can find it in candlelight & firelight
or celestial bodies in an inky sky
You can find it melting in a chameleon’s disguise
or the slither of a snake
You can find it in beats & rhythms
offbeats and extremes of heat & wind
You can find it in strands & shards of memory
embedded in ten thousand tattoos
You can find it in the ripple of a shoulder or a hip’s sway
walking away
You can find it dancing in the ether
or an auspicious eclipse
You can always find it in mirrors
dazzling refractions & watery reflections
You can find it lurking in the jungle
nocturnal as a leopard’s eye
You can find it on arrival or departure
by way of ascent or descent
in the seams of royalty or hands of the homeless
in waves of transients & tides
You can find it in lobes & strobes and cracks in concrete
brushed with a blaze of love
You’ll see it in fog enveloping banks & bridges
hovering in humid fronds & pressing readers of palms
You’ll find it in shifting patterns & starlit illusions
in free falls & the rush of waterfalls
You can see its glow in a phantom slant of light
ephemeral hints of invitation & provocation
You can find it twisting between time
& all kinds of lines
You’ll find it in zaps of attraction
dripping with desire
You can sense it in the signs
flowing with currents and undercurrents
undulating transformations
vying for a vision
You can entice it with uncanny incantations
& manifest wild incarnations
You can find it in a vein of crimson
a swirl of deepest indigo
& in the blend of black and white
You can feel it in a splash of sun—the cloak of moon
in a fusion of clarity and mist in midnight’s whisper
You can find it in ice caps & tendrils of hope
infinite with fireflies & fiery dreams
Oh, you can find it—
keep looking!

What tools do we have? What can we count on? You can count on yourself.
— Patti Smith