“Sometimes” can be found in David Whyte’s collection Everything Is Waiting for You. This poem is read here by Whyte himself. He is referencing his fascination with Native American stories he read while growing up. This is an invitation to stop everything and allow those important questions that are part of our inner world to have time to surface. These are questions as he puts it that “have no right to go away.” I thought the poem was evocative and beautiful. I hope you enjoy it too.

You can learn more about David Whyte and his fascinating life and work at https://www.davidwhyte.com/biography.

SOMETIMES
by David Whyte

Sometimes
if you move carefully
through the forest,
breathing
like the ones
in the old stories,
who could cross
a shimmering bed of leaves
without a sound,
you come to a place
whose only task
is to trouble you
with tiny
but frightening requests,
conceived out of nowhere
but in this place
beginning to lead everywhere.
Requests to stop what
you are doing right now,
and
to stop what you
are becoming
while you do it,
questions
that can make
or unmake
a life,
questions
that have patiently
waited for you,
questions
that have no right
to go away.