I Will Always Stay

 I Will Always Stay

(“O Lord, by your favor you have made my mountain stand firm. When you hid your face, I was terrified.” Psalm 30:7)

If your best friend likes butter cream,
then, by all means, head to the grocery store
and pick up the cake. Birthdays are meant to be
be sticky and sweet.

Sometimes the gaze of love comes late,
sometimes we do not feel it at all,
if only we could see, behind the silence,
the heart that carries us forever. We miss
so much when the quietness is louder than
simple hope, lazy days on the lake and
pizza shared on a table with laughter we have
waited for so long.

We walk to the mountains and hope to find God,
we sit in worship and dream of beaches,
we ache for a glance from the one friend who
never walks away,
we find the air so lively we swear
we have been here more years than we have been born.

We listen for the voice, the one that always is
happy we called,
and sunbursts of confetti become the next verse of
our psalm.

But we go days on end, don’t we, wondering how
valuable we are.
We sweat and cry, or close the door just
hoping
someone will ring the bell.

We listen to music, as long as it will last, but
it never replaces the presence of the sloppy bows
tied around familiar arms,
the dazzling ancient eyes we have known so long.
We fear one day,
someday,
the eyes may turn away.

And where will that leave us?

Mercy. We cry. Mercy.
And someone, a voice so familiar we would
know it anywhere, echoes so simply,

I will always stay.