the secret

.

Since I am
Somebody’s dream,
I have a good life.

Sometimes I go away in my sailboat on a cloud
and take a quiet little trip.

I have a secret

which I have learned how to read inside myself;

if I told it to you,

it would make you laugh.

My heart is naked

and no one can put clothes on it,   

and nothing can be put on

that will not immediately fall off.

My secret is ignorant,   

it doesn’t sing songs,

no lie,

it has nothing to tell you.

My two eyes

are maps of the planet—

I see everything

and nothing upsets me.

Just now

I was in China

and saw there a great piece of happiness   

that belonged to one man.

And I have been to the center of the earth,   

where there is no suffering.

If on your loneliest nights,   

I visit other planets

and the most secret stars of all,

besides being no one,   

know that I am you   

and everybody.

But if I go away

without giving you a name to remember me with,

how will I find

the right dream to return to?

You won’t have to mark down

on your calendar that I am coming back;   

don’t bother to write me into your notebooks.   

I will be around

when you aren’t thinking about me,

without hair or a neck,   

without a nose and cheeks   

no reputation—

there won’t be anything.

I am a bird   

which God made.

–Thomas Merton

.