I’ve Narrated the Road

I’ve Narrated the Road

(“Let us look only to Jesus. He is the one who began our faith, and he makes our faith perfect.” Hebrews 12:2a)

The story doesn’t end there, even though it felt like the final chapter.
The asteroids still circled obliquely.
Bring me another water please; my throat is dry and I have
such a long tale to tell.
We haven’t finished, though we needed a moment’s rest.
The pale yellow butterflies show it best, the way they
flit from flower to flower undisguised as the day lengthens.
The beginning has little thrills,
the middle is unexciting,
but the ending is unexpected and sometimes causes me to flinch.

When you have come this far already it is hard to
see clearly the beliefs that may be unsupported by the facts.
My story is full of pitfalls, my tale surrounded by struggles,
my ending unreliable, my addendum just a summation of facts.
But I suppose I’ll keep writing,
I might keep believing if there are no more suitors for my heart.
I could use a navigator,
a fellow traveler who knows the terrain well. Or someone
who doesn’t mind traveling blind. You take the wheel for a while
and I will nap until our next pitstop. We can write our bearings in
the journal I’m keeping, another chapter to a story I would never
have written if I hadn’t traveled so far. I could use a navigator,
I would love an illustrator to picture my ups and downs.

I’ve narrated the road from beginning to end, from “gentlemen
start your engines” to the checkered flag. I finished far back
in the pack, which explains why so few follow me.
But on further cogitation, I say, without qualification,
that the one who began the race still accompanies me and
has completed the story long before I’ve crossed the finish line.