‘No Hay Camino…’.

Today Maricarmen read me a poem because it was the last day of my intensive…

The three weeks have felt to be a very special and transformative time… Maricarmen and I have spoken a lot about not making plans, about allowing things to emerge; about letting the path unfold in each step…

This has been very evident in learning Spanish… The more I travel the path, the more I see how long it is… But then I return to now, to the place I am, to the foot print I am making – to the unfolding of this path that doesn’t exist until I tread it.

When I learnt to speak English, I never looked ahead at all the people who could talk fluently, who could read and write, who knew words I didn’t… So why would it be any different now?

The poem she read to me is written by the Spanish poet Antonio Machado and the name of the poem is

‘Caminante, Hay no camino’… Walker, there is no path…

I loved the poem, where the poet is speaking of there only being a path when we tread it….

‘Caminante, son tues huellas
el camino y nada mâs;
caminante, no hay camino,
se hace camino al andar

Which in English reads thus : Walker, the road is your footprints and nothing else; walker, there is no path. the path is made by walking…

He describes how when we look back at the path we have trodden, there is no going back. It does not exist and it is like the wake left by a boat on the sea… It disappears behind us as we walk…

It was very resonant too for my path I didn’t plan… To run barefoot across Spain; the plan planned me… And I am following.

I do not truly know why I am doing this thing, how it came about – or where it is leading… The idea seemed to come from my feet… Because I see that the path is being revealed with each barefoot step I take…

We all have paths to tread, each one unique, and there is a joining together through these footprints across Spain… Many people, many paths, many lives connecting and journeying together…

And I am reminded again to simply walk the path…

Run the path… It is being made by running…