Larger than Fulfillment

Larger than Fulfillment

(“Be patient, therefore, dear friends, until the coming of the Lord. Note how the farmer waits for the precious harvest of the earth, being patient for it until it receives the early and latter rains.” James 5:7)

Stranded midair between the conception and completion
is the day we swallow our food without tasting, drink wine in gulps
and count every miscue that needs resolution to bring ourselves
to perfection.

Better to watch the rain as the red-hooded woodpecker, ignorant
of our project,
finds his food rounding the gray wafered bark of autumn’s late tree.

But our count is incomplete, our uncertainty competing with
the movie we produced in our memory before we ever began.
Now, halfway through, there is a quarter done,
and, without a time-bending solution, we will land far short;
proving the fact we should have started much earlier,
or scripted something shorter than our ambition imagined
inking open the first page and day.

Associates do not return calls; texts fly out, competing for space
with radio waves. They are late, they always say. They forgot,
conveniently mistaken. They would have told us yesterday
but (the writer apologizes, but cannot think of a worthy excuse
to follow the previous phrase. Excuse, please, the inability to
complete the thought). Stranded midair, yesterday hums like
a record sung backwards and texts never answered.

Better to what the river run with logs and branches from
upstream’s overflow riding the brown water. Better to see
geese overhead with silhouetted wings against the charcoal sky.

Better to take the next step grounded, and finish today what
yesterday started with dreams larger than fulfillment. I’ve seen
the day change in a moment and clouds split at the most
unexpected break in time.