The Twin Suns

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Early morning sun rays drift through fog,
shy of the sky today,
sleepily sweeping aside the filmy veil
to make way for the day
and wash it with light.
Warm sunbeams now angle through east windows
and wander out the west
only to bounce back in,
mirrored from my neighbor’s window
in a perfect round reflection.
It looks like the sun has stopped
to rest in their kitchen.
The light from these twin suns, east and west,
meet at my double-paned windows,
play off each other,
splash reflections across the glass
in geometric patterns—
scooped-topped squares,
skewed rectangles,
swooping ribbons,
sword-straight lines.
There are reflections of shadows
and shadows of reflections.
Both are close kin.
Both are the artistry of light.
Both are shifting shapes,
fascinating, frivolous,
flirting, fleeting.
Quick! Look!
Here I am.
Hello!
Farewell.
Here and gone,
this one moment of golden glory,
has left its reflection in my heart,
has poured its light into my soul,
has wrapped its bright arms
around my inner shadow
like Love itself.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:


Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.

A Blank Piece of Paper

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Smooth and inviting,
full of potential,
here sits a pristine piece of paper,
generously blank,
an open field,
an open window,
an empty space patiently waiting
for me.
So where do I start?
Where is my heart?
I see so many possibilities.
Write? Paint? Draw?
A splash? A dash?
Elegant? Edgy?
And if I dare to make my mark,
if I dare to share myself
with this page, this paper,
this wide open future,
the possibilities narrow.
Each mark means making a choice.
A mark is a visible voice,
a stake,
a statement:
this way, not that.
It says, “You have found me;
Now work around me.”
Blank.
This paper is still blank.
I hesitate, lost in “what if?”
What will it become?
How will it turn out?
A wise woman once told me,
“If you know how it’s going to turn out,
why bother?”
There is adventure in the blank page.
Its invitation is to discover,
to make possible the possibilities,
to make known what’s unknown,
to create out of curiosity,
to encounter what never existed
before that first mark,
that first spark,
that daring decision to dance
with the blank page.
Smooth and inviting,
full of potential,
here sits a pristine piece of paper,
generously blank.
But not for long.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:


Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.
Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.

What Song Will Be First?

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Dawn today comes soft and cotton-quiet,
spaciously silent but not empty,
brimming with the pulse of simply being,
a sentient serenity
flowing with what is,
buoyant with what could be.
I wonder what sound, what song
will be the first to find its way
into the fullness of this silence.
This morning, it’s the purr of a jet
flying west, fading fast,
followed by the hum of a distant train.
A bird begins chanting on repeat,
five sharp chirps sung again and again.
Now a bright bong of a song
calls out from a bell tower,
eight straight, measured, solemn tones.
I think of a poet I heard last night, who,
after reading her work said,
“Thank you for sharing this space with me.”
I thank the bell in the tower
for sharing this morning space with me.
Thank you, little bird
and distant train.
Thank you, jet flying west.
Thank you for being part of my morning.
Thank you for sharing this space with me.
And of course, there you are reader,
listening in all this time.
Thank you for sharing this space with me.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:


Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.
Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.

For the Price of a Pause

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Spring tiptoed in during the night.
I didn’t expect her so soon.
Winter may yet wave
a final icy farewell,
but today the air hums with Spring,
and I have paused my plans
to revel in her return,
to wonder at the newborn world.
Daffodils dance in a drowsy flowerbed.
Tiny purple blooms run wild in the grass.
Pear trees show off snowy white blossoms.
Lenten roses raise their faces, blushing.
Above in barely budding trees,
birds chatter and cheer and
sing welcome
as if they’ve been secretly saving,
all winter long,
this exact song
for this exact moment.
The breeze, mild and gusty,
flirts with the flowers,
ruffles the robin’s feathers,
whispers to the bluebird
a hint of rain to come.
I marvel at Nature’s generosity.
For the simple price of a pause,
she pours out to me more than I can hold—
seasonal symphonies of sound and song,
an ever-changing gallery of shifting colors,
shapes and shadows
coming and going and coming again,
all mine to see, to hear,
to hold in my heart,
all for the price of a pause.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:


Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.
Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.

Windows and Wings

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Surfacing from the depths of dream
in the middle of the night,
I find my mind replaying
a difficult day,
rewinding, reminding.
All I want to do is turn over,
return to sleep.
Instead, I walk the edge of wakefulness
wishing to will myself into slumber,
but my mind hums,
will not will itself
to leave life alone for a while.
At last, I ease open my eyes.
There on my night-gray ceiling
are two splashes of light
from my neighbor’s yard,
filtered through my window
and stretching above me,
skewed and angled,
softly crossing
like stylized wings
painted protectively overhead.
Windows have become wings,
and that feels just right,
for windows are wings for me.
By day, by night,
windows set my soul to flight,
open me to the dancing expanse
of wonder and hope
that lies beyond
and beyond the beyond.
My eyes drift closed.
Grateful for windows,
grateful for wings,
I settle once more
into sleep.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:


Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.
Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.

I Looked for the Moon

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I looked for the moon tonight,
wanting to find this faithful friend
who’s currently a waxing crescent.
I wanted to admire her curve,
contemplate the stars beyond,
feel the wonder of time
stretched
into eternity.
I wanted to sit with her serenity awhile.
But the night sky is crowded with clouds
reflecting city-shine,
making the darkness nightlight-soft,
vanishing the vastness of deep space
and disappearing the moon.
Still, the moon is in her place
up in the cold silence
and still, I am in my place
down in the warm hope of home.
The moon is so ancient
she will not remember me.
But I remember her.
I close my eyes, see all her moods,
her shifts and shapes
from plump and playful
to a bright bowl pouring out stars
to a slim curving thread of possibility.
I see all her colors,
her brilliant bride-white joy,
her reddened omen eye,
her haloed softness,
her rising orange-gold bravado.
Sometimes she’s a sky-sailing galleon,
sometimes a pale canoe
caught in the branches of a tree.
I looked for the moon tonight
and found her in my heart.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:


Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.
Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.

Somebody’s Home

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Winter twilight crisp and clear,
red rush-hour tail lights
ease north, disappear over a hill.
Bright white headlights
stream slowly south in the oncoming lane.
Above the river of traffic,
bare tree branches lace across
a quickly darkening evening sky.
Left and right, houses come to life
as windows wink on
in squares and rectangles of gold.
The car in front of me slows,
signals,
turns left into a driveway,
and something inside me warms.
I feel somehow lighter.
Somebody’s home, I think.
Somebody’s home.
I’m not far from my own house,
my own driveway,
just three more left turns
and then that deep hum of a breath,
the hug of home-ness.
I know that “home” is not warm joy
for everyone,
nor has it always been for me,
but it is now,
and for that, I am grateful.
A few days ago,
a photo popped up on my phone,
a random memory:
me and my youngest sister
standing side by side
under a tent in West Texas
in front of our dad’s flower-covered coffin.
After making his way through the maze
of a full and wondrous life
with all its curves and corners,
switchbacks and straight stretches,
uphill slogs and downhill slides,
Daddy had slowed, turned left in front of me,
and made his way home.
Someday when I cross through the twilight,
the divine veiled divide,
into the mystery of beyond,
I hope that those who see my handful of ashes
will feel somehow lighter.
I hope their heart will warm.
I hope they will smile and think,
somebody’s home.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:


Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.

Tangled in a Tree

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There’s a balloon
caught high in a neighbor’s tree.
I’ve been keeping an eye on it for weeks.
At first it looked like a grand butterfly
flapping oversized wings
as the wind tried to blow it down.
It never dropped but day by day
shrank until it dangled,
entangled and trapped in twiggy tentacles.
Each breath of the breeze
makes it wave like a flag,
flapping and flashing gold-red in the sun.
My mind wants to make something natural of it—
perhaps it’s a precariously perched hawk
or a squirrel out on a limb,
maybe a clump of mistletoe
or an angel trumpet bloom,
maybe one last giant red autumn leaf
clinging to this leafless winter tree.
But this metallic dangling thing is not natural,
probably poses a danger
to birds,
to squirrels,
to buds that will come in the spring.
I once untangled a robin caught in a string
that was, in turn, snagged in a bush.
I once freed a sparrow
whose foot was trapped
in the bars of a feeder.
I remember how helpless they were,
weighing almost nothing
but fighting with every ounce to get free.
So I hope that before a bird is tangled
in this saggy baggy balloon,
the ribbon will wear thin,
the mylar will tear,
and the danger will fall from the tree
to be tossed into someone’s trash can.
But for now, there’s a deflated balloon
dangling high in a neighbor’s tree.
I’ll enjoy the magic of its changing colors
as the sun comes and goes,
the surprise of its shifting shapes
as the wind sighs and blows.
I’ll keep an eye on it.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:


Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.

Fog

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(Today we have snow. Tomorrow ice. But a couple of days ago…)

A sweet sparrow-song wakes me this morning,
a tumble of bell-tones,
a liquid waterfall of notes
echoed somewhere in the distance
by a fellow sparrow singing in answer,
“Good morning, good morning.”
And what a gentle good morning it is.
A feather-soft cloud of fog
has silently settled
on us,
with us,
around us.
Nature has drawn a shawl of whispery mist
across her shoulders,
turning stoic trees into
shy, wispy silhouettes
barely visible through the veil of silver-white.
The rays of the rising sun scatter
through droplets of drifting cloud,
spreading a soft glow
that gradually brightens and lightens,
easing the silver of dawn into
a golden pink, cloud-hugged morning.
The sunlight is insistent,
though today it has to swim in,
but little by little, trees become more distinct.
Roofs emerge.
Just as quietly as it descended,
the fog lifts.
Nature sheds her shawl.
Still and soft,
the day opens.
A sweet sparrow-song,
a tumble of bell-tones,
liquid waterfall of notes
echoes somewhere in the distance.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:


Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.

“Lovely,” She Said

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Last week at the grocery store
as I reached for my usual carton of eggs,
the brown ones,
the large ones,
chilled and nesting
in soft gray cardboard,
I heard a woman’s voice behind me.
“Lovely eggs,” she murmured.
“Lovely eggs.”
I turned to look.
“Sorry,” said the young woman
scanning the stacked shelves,
“I’m talking to myself.”
I smiled. “No need to be sorry.
It’s a beautiful thing to say.”
I turned back to the carton I held,
which now felt precious,
a fragile treasure.
I gently opened it,
checked each egg for cracks,
as I always do,
but this time with a sense of wonder.
What a marvel an egg is.
Truly, a holy marvel.
Round, smooth, a miracle in a shell,
it holds life—
in one form to fuel me,
in another, to morph into its own small self.
I have been in awe of eggs for days now.
And this week when I went to the store,
I paused before the bin of bananas.
“Lovely bananas,” I murmured.
“Lovely.”
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:


Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.