Attentive and Oblivious

We hear a tremor in a voice,
But sometimes miss the words.
We notice light upon a face
While someone waits unheard.

Where does your attention go?
Where something draws us in.

And who is waiting at the edge?
Let us look again.

Attentive and oblivious,
So much we miss and see.
A whole world in a certain look,
Someone beside us with a need.

What does love reveal?
More than we can say.

Must you hold its meaning?
Let it breathe its own way.

A faint smile passes between us;
We feel the spirit there.
We reach for words to keep it
And lose it in the air.

Must you name what moves you?
We want to understand.

Can you let the moment live?
Without closing our hands.

Attentive and oblivious,
So much we miss and see.
A whole world in a certain look,
Someone beside us with a need.

What does love reveal?
More than we can say.

Must you hold its meaning?
Let it breathe its own way.

And when our thoughts go wandering,
When feeling fills the room,
How do we tend the work at hand
And leave a little room?

Who needs your attention?
The one who calls our name.

And when you fail to hear them?
We turn and ask again.

We carry this between us,
This nearness and this distance.
We bring each other into song;
We need each other’s patience.

What wakes when you are loved?
Something comes alive.

What can you give each other?

Room for it to rise.

Attentive and oblivious,
We’re learning as we go.
To hear the words, to meet the eyes,
To let some things stay unknown.

What does love awaken?
Something in us all.

How will you attend to it?
By answering the call.

Is there a final word?
There’s another voice.

Then what shall we do?
Listen, Dearest, listen.

Listen to love!
Attentive and oblivious,
Listen to love calling
Through the voices of us all.
Let it wake what lives within us—
Let us answer when it calls.