This week, our Life in View series explores Pre-View, imagining the year ahead through values rather than resolutions. Wednesday’s poem sits with the paralysis of the blank page and discovers that one small mark is enough to begin. The repeated refrain builds toward a simple truth: we don’t need a map to start walking.
🎧 Hear the poem aloud or read at your own pace—whichever speaks to you today.
First Mark
By Scott Tilley
The journal lies open,
its pages still white,
and I wait for something to say.
I hold the pen like a question
I'm not sure how to ask,
the whole year pressing down.
Everyone else seems to know
what they're becoming.
I know only this morning.
One word, then.
Not a declaration. Not a map.
Just a single word pressed into the page.
One seed pushed into soil
carries no promise of harvest,
only the fact of beginning.
One word, then.
The ink bleeds slightly at the edges,
finding its own shape.
I thought I needed everything.
One word is what I had.
One word was enough.
Outside, a mockingbird
starts its January song
with a single note, then another.
One word, then.
I will build this year
from whatever small things I offer.🪞 Poet’s Note
I stared at my journal for ten minutes on January 2nd, unable to begin. The pressure to have a vision, a word of the year, a theme for the next twelve months felt paralyzing. Then I just wrote “present.” One word. The pen touched the paper, and the paralysis broke. Sometimes beginning is the only resolution that matters.
✍️ Poetry Matters from Spirituality Today