Surrender to the splendor of the now
Surround yourself with love’s serenity
Suspend disbelief just for the moment
Find peace within the chapel of your heart
Part the narrow furrow of your thinking
Seeding the same row every spring season
Sow a different plot of untilled land
Tie a bow in reason’s linear ribbon
Look out the window at the full blue moon
Resonating through rectangular panes
And Mars to the right, forlorn, reddish bright,
Polyptych painting, a cloudless night sky
With other pray-ers alone in the room
Once in a lifetime, moment of many,
Meditating in silence together
Then chanting the single syllable: Om
Seek oneness with God through closed eyelids
Feel the warmth of the woodstove fireplace
Incense smoke wafts your olfactory sense
Transports you where you belong, which is here
Barry Winkelman
Barry Winkelman, Brayton’s close friend from high school, spent a month at Agape in the fall, “finding what he wasn’t looking for.”