Locked in Stone

Locked in Stone

("Look!" Joshua said to all of the people. "This stone will be a witness against us. It has heard all of the words the Lord has spoken to us. Suppose you aren't true to your God. Then the stone will be a witness against you." Joshua 24:27)

Last time you spoke to me,
or I should say,
last time miniature terms bounced across
the predated conference table,
you would not admit the words you had said
to me in private just weeks before.

But the stones know,
the mortar and the field-stones that
the master craftsman quietly measured
to last on the walls longer than his sons or
daughters would live there. We sat within
15 feet
of his handwork,

And now there are
none of us who occupy the same space.

Except the stones who know
exactly what was said, and keep the vibrations
within their molecules for centuries

And may release them, decoded; rocks have no
particular point of view. They may release them,
like bar codes which cannot ask for a judicial review.

The rocks on the wall, the pebbles in the gravel,
they all heard it true, and will hold the marvel of humans
who think the air is a vacuum where nothing is heard without
a third person.

But the stones and the boulders, have no orders to obey,
no seared conscience to sway the opinions from fact to
a better face. Even mirrors will not truth our spoken,
less our broken image.

Hold the stone to your ear and re-hear.

Lest you fear
more than I,
it holds that half of conversation which I said too;

Forgotten or faded, it holds my words unspun
and empowered enough to blush me as much
as I wish it would for you.