The white birds appear as points of light in the river until they can be heard
They obey parliamentary procedures for the most part until ordinary words are not enough
Then they either
Fly
Across the vault of the sky lights rise and fall, signaling splendor
Morning and evening
And it was so.
Genesis 1:20 NIV
[20] And God said, “Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the vault of the sky.”
I hope mommy is sleeping in heaven, she says
No. I say, she is dancing and singing in heaven
People don’t sleep in heaven
I wish I were in heaven she says
We have work here for now, I say. That is why we have God time–sing and dance
So we are ready for heaven
When it comes
She wore a soft, pink sweater (her sister bought) as though the cool chill of October could touch her anymore and the small group of people gathered at her ad hoc memorial are floating up as the sky darkens
The ashes and the pink sweater and the flash of inexplicable light get me again and again
I have to conjure some litany for this–
Sprite, fly
Luminesce
Alight upon yonder shore
Grief been here before–Target was closed and we drove
In my presbyopia I could not identify the man or his freaked out dog
Who can tell between Sirens and mermaids? They are both capable of artifice and the old-fashioned waterborne howl in
Such dark waters
I swim back to the day
The park
Beauty all around
And fast food wedding feast
Pregnant bride vomiting while
Someone took money from the medic’s bag
How did we drive back across that precipitous bridge?
All I can do is elide the best of you with
What will be
What must and shall
Be.
John 2:5 KJV
[5] His mother saith unto the servants, Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it .
When we met Mary and Charles they had some vocabulary specific to the western Pennsylvania region. They used the word yins for the second person plural, the way a Texan would say y’all or a Parisian would say vous.
I’m-gonna-beat-yins-to-the-house! She would yell joyfully, running up the small hill to the porch.
Eventually she lost the yins
But I am praying that she did
Beat us to the House
Genesis 12:13 KJV
[13] Say, I pray thee, thou art my sister: that it may be well with me for thy sake; and my soul shall live because of thee.
Modern translation–I would rather live without you than die for you
It is as though Abram knew he must treat his soul like a kidnapped child–my soul must live, sister, let my soul live.
It feels like chattel to me, the moment Abram exchanges his wife for his alleged soul. We are all cowards sometimes, I know this, but it is amazing that this guy is the guy by which all redemption covenants are measured and paid.
For what good does it do for a man to
Gain the whole world and lose his own
Soul?
God gets her back
Because God never breaks a promise
When Mary talks now on the Fisher-Price phone of loss, she speaks with a five year old’s falsetto. She is breezy, upbeat even, and we exchange pleasantries through the medium of her daughter’s voice.
Mary, the girls have your laugh, I try to tell her before the line cuts off. Mary, I always wanted to be your real mom, I tell her before the line clicks off. Mary, that last day haunts me. The girls talk as though you still have the giant carnival unicorn, as though you tucked it under your arm and carried it right through
The earth will soon dissolve like snow/The sun forebear to shine/But God who called me here below/will be forever mine
Little One says
Is mommy sleeping in heaven?
No, I say
She is wide awake
Dancing and singing
I wish I were in heaven
Little One says
No, not yet dear
Let us sing and dance together as though this were the porch and the lights from the house were burning bright
Stay with me here on the porch for awhile
We will dance and sing out
grief and hope together until
These ancient gates open wide
Daniel 10:12-14 KJV
[12] Then said he unto me, Fear not, Daniel: for from the first day that thou didst set thine heart to understand, and to chasten thyself before thy God, thy words were heard, and I am come for thy words. [13] But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me one and twenty days: but, lo, Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me; and I remained there with the kings of Persia. [14] Now I am come to make thee understand what shall befall thy people in the latter days: for yet the vision is for many days.
We have so misunderstood and utterly misrepresented
What angels do
Who they are
Or how they might appear
(While surely they might be anyone–
Women, children, the dispossessed)
They stand their ground
Fight for us
Maybe when it would seem
We are otherwise entirely
Abandoned
I have friend who is an aficionado of romance. I am too old for that stuff myself, but I tell her that
Jesus is like the nerdy guy who likes you at the lunchroom table you should sit at but what will the cool kids think?
Yep. I am way past cool kids and would argue that if that were a thing, the guy who pays it all for us would have to be the coolest one of us all
But he is ok being
The nerdy guy who
Sends us love songs
All the time
Carrying Light 