Paying Attention

In the end
you won’t be known
for the things you did
or what you built,
or what you said.

You won’t even be known
for the love given
or the hearts saved,

because in the end you won’t be known.

You won’t be asked, by a vast creator full of light:
What did you do to be known?

You will be asked: Did you know it,
this place, this journey?

What there is to know can’t be written.
Something between crispness of air
And glint in her eye
And texture of the orange peel.

What you’ll want a thousand years from now is this:
A memory that beats like a heart—

You are here to pay attention. That is enough.

-Tara Sophia Mohr