Joe Paddock: "One's Ship Comes In"

I swear
my way now will be
to continue without
plan or hope, to accept
the drift of things, to shift
from endless effort
to joy in, say,
that robin, plunging
into the mossy shallows
of my bird bath and
splashing madly till
the air shines with spray.
Joy it will be, say,
in Nancy, pretty in pink
and rumpled T-shirt,
rubbing sleep from her eyes, or
joy even in
just this breathing, free
of fright and clutch, knowing
how one’s ship comes in
with each such breath.

"One's Ship Comes In" by Joe Paddock, from Dark Dreaming, Global Dimming (Red Dragonfly Press, 2009).

Curator's note: The poet is married to Nancy Paddock, another of our mindfulness poets and presumably the "Nancy" of this poem. 

Art credit: "Bathing Robin," photograph by Adrienne Smith.