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february / march 2018yogajournal.com.sgI LEARNED TO PLAY PIANO AT 41. I worked my fingers
long enough that the uncanny dimension of being played
appeared briefly: In those moments, beyond all logic, my
hands started to behave more quickly than my mind,
which was trying to read the notes and position my
fingers. My teacher noticed this and thought I was ready
to tackle my first piece by Bach, a minuet known as
“Bach’s Notebook for Anna Magdalena.”
In the eighth measure of that minuet, a note smaller
than the rest appears. Almost ghostlike, it hovers very
near the others like a barely seeable angel or a
hummingbird whose path is more readily seen than its
body. It surprised me. My teacher called it a grace note—a
note that, though played and heard, takes up no time; a
note that matters, though it is timeless. And therein lies its
grace.
Now, 20 years later, I realize this is another way to
understand the paradox of epiphany, of moments that
open and transcend their sense of ordinary time. In truth,
every glimpse of eternity I’ve ever encountered has been a
grace note that has affected how I see and hear, though it
has taken up no time in the measure of my struggle. I find
over and over that the instant that we’re washed open by
the swell of the Universe is such a note of grace. And the
wisdom of mystics and sages reverberates in the timeless
space their presence holds open.
When these moments occur—when the mind is
touched by something larger than its ability to understand,
when the heart is moved by something deeper than its
capacity to dive, when the impulse to speak is stirred by
the presence of something that can’t be named—things
happen that defy the boundaries of time. Such moments
confirm that we’re part of a unity that’s always present but
seldom clear, and to be touched by that presence changes
our lives.Moments like the moon—full and stark—rising over
the garage between the oak and the maple in a friend’s
backyard as we barbecue. Suddenly, the moon is calling in
its white silence, drawing the smoke and fragrance out of
the meat into the sky, and we, without a word, feel coated
with a film of light from another world, the same as
cavemen preparing their game at the mouth of their cave.
Moments like the morning of my annual CAT scan on
the other side of cancer. When I realize that in the
tenderness of being torn open by life, we’re like these
small, red birds splashing themselves with water as the
sun comes up, hoping we will heal without sealing our
hearts over.
Moments like watching my friend’s 20-year-old cat
adjust to being blind. All at once, the cat trying to make its
way feels like our sense of being lost, no matter how we
fill our calendars.
Moments of soft, relentless grace like one the other
night, celebrating a birthday. The cake on the table; the
lights off; all of us caught watching the sparkler on the
cake. Each of us peering from our own personal seat of
darkness, gathering as we do, fixed by the hiss of light
flaring between us. Feeling the sparks fly, afraid one might
burn us, hoping that it does.Adapted from Things That Join the Sea and the Sky: Field Notes on Living by
Mark Nepo. Copyright © 2017 Mark Nepo. Published by Sounds True in
November 2017.Mark Nepo is a poet and philosopher who is devoted to
writing and teaching the journey of inner transformation
and the life of relationship. He has been teaching
poetry and spirituality for more than 40 years and is
the New York Times best-selling author of The Book of
Awakening.By Mark Nepo
REFLECTION
ART DIRECTION : ANUJA BAGADE