The Gift and Necessities of Travel

My new poem about what travel does to the soul

Something happens when we travel. A door opens and we walk through an experience that shapes us and forms us.

Gwen took this picture while we were in Greece at a place we rented for the weekend to get out of the traffic and hub-bub of Athens, a city of over six million people. This open door reveals what I want to describe here. Travel is the journey through the door—no matter where you are and no matter how close or far you go to travel.

We do not remain the same when we return. The same box that held us no longer fits. We expand our mind. We grow our understanding. We taste foods we love. We become smaller after seeing that the world is so,so large. No box can hold the soul. Travel makes the walls of our attitudes, prejudices and per-conceived ideas fall apart.

In every age and time, we have to explored shores beyond our own and these discoveries have ignited us and instilled passions held in the human heart for centuries.

Travel is the best education— to explore, see, learn and transform our ideas.

Having just returned from a journey I will relish forever, I sought to write a poem to help me put into words what stirs in me when I move about this great world of ours.

Perhaps, every trip is a pilgrimage. It doesn’t have to be to foreign soil. But to a mountain trail it by the sea shore somewhere salty will do. We are taken out of our small ways of being and forced to deal with weather, altitude, traffic or forests which all remind us of the truths of ourselves and one another.

The root word for “scholastic” is interesting. We quickly recognize it has educational meaning and it does. But, what’s interesting is that “schola” means FREE TIME. We learn in the free time of travel and our five senses are our best teachers to the soul.

It is my hope that this poem might be a blessing as you go or when you return. And if we find tears in our eyes because we have been so deeply touched by our journey, then may our tears wash us and cleanse us removing the dirt of sameness and the grime of our daily stresses that we need to escape from for an hour, a day, a week or a lifetime. Travel Mercies! It’s what I titled this special poem.

My poems are set up for those to read and enjoy who both support and benefit from my work as a writer and poet. You can become a supporter being a “paid subcriber.” But here’s the deal, if you just can’t do that, just email us at info@pottersinn.com and we’ll add you to the “paid” subscriber list so everyone can enjoy. No questions asked.

Here’s my new poem, “Travel Mercies.” I hope you enjoy on this beautiful Sunday morning.

Every blessing,

Steve