Now is the Accepted Time

Edward Carpenter (1844-1929)

Above: Magnolia Blossoms

Now is the Accepted Time

Amid all the turmoil and the care — the worry, the fever, the anxiety,
The gloomy outlook, fears, forebodings,
The effort to keep up with the rush of supposed necessities,
supposed duties,
The effort to catch the flying point of light, to reach the haven
of Peace — always in the future —
Amid all, glides in the little word Now.

As when the winds of March with their long brooms sweep
the dead leaves from the surface of the ground, and the Earth
in virgin beauty with the growing grass once more appears;
So when all this debris of thought from the Past, of anxiety
about the Morrow, is at last swept away,
Does the vast ever-Present beneath reveal its perfect rondure.