Somewhere Beyond

My regular readers will not be surprised to discover that today’s ponderings are based upon a sailing metaphor. The undeniable fact is that I love the ocean and derive great pleasure from boating. However, while I speak and write constantly of far horizons and distant shores, I rarely get very far from home. In fact there’s a very clear line I never seem to cross, at least on my own. That point is a local island which lies just the right distance offshore for a weekend away and, like a homing pigeon, I return to it time and again. Other islands call from a hazy distance and beckon to me from the maps I so love to study, but they hover beyond the reach of convenience. Comfortable anchorages, tired crews and Monday morning work schedules always seem to hold me at bay. So we never make it around the point to the next island … or the big wide world which lies beyond it.

I believe most of us have such lines of demarcation in our lives. We love to dream. We love to talk. Yet we never seem willing to round that final point and abandon the safety of familiar shores. Sometimes we can even see the next islands off in the distance, but we know that rougher waters must be traversed in order to reach them. In effect, like many who lived before the time of Columbus, we allow our fear and ignorance to determine the size and shape or our personal worlds. Is there a point in your own life which you can’t seem to cross? It could be geographical, relational, spiritual, vocational, financial or emotional. Do you keep sailing to the edge and turning back, like the coastal navigators of old? Let this be your wake up call. Somewhere beyond that next point of land, shrouded in the dreamlike haze of the unknown, lie the far horizons of the future. They beckon us to brave the oceans of life and set sail to discover them, to plant our flags upon their exotic shores and claim them as our own.

So join me, if you will fellow travelers. It’s high time to haul our anchors up out of the mud, hoist our sails and venture beyond the familiar harbors which we have haunted for far too long. The world is your oyster, and it’s waiting for you … somewhere beyond that last point of land. I believe all that remains to be said is, “bon voyage.”

Somewhere Beyond
Somewhere beyond that point ahead
An open ocean beckons to me
Beyond where no stone or human voice
Taints the broad and trackless sea
One final landmark, one last island
Then this continent will be gone
Thence the ocean, like my dreams
Stretches on and on and on
I hear it singing on the wind
I feel its tugging swell
This sea, the vixen of my soul
Whose voice I know so well
It whispers from beyond the point
Of shores I’ve yet to know
My heart is drawn beyond that point
Where I must someday go
By Frank Carpenter ©