Let’s Be Clear

Let’s Be Clear

(“Then the Lord put a message in Balaam’s mouth and said, ‘Return to Balak, and speak what I tell you.’” Numbers 23:5)

Let’s be clear,
not everything that is spoken can be heard;
not everything in creation can be seen.
Not every pocket is empty and not every
wallet is full. There are holes in my jeans
I never paid for; there are angels assigned to
lead us, or so we hope, or so we believe,
or so we tell everyone when it was all just
a matter of coincidences. It was two atoms
in the same place at the same time and they pulled
each other apart like the yoke of oxen in the field.

Sitting up straighter I can peer through the window;
my posture has been bent by pain and years. You say
you don’t believe, and I understand. Doubt is a ladder
up or down, depending on how you’re persuaded.
These noises have continued unabated and fill the silence
that anxiety brings.

I would speak if there was anyone to hear. I would talk,
but the varying results make me fear the knocks at my
door and who may be waiting to criticize my past
agony and my present
disquiet mind. I would apologize, but I’ve tried
that before. Forgiveness was granted but the
icy wind still blew through the cracks in the windows.

That has left me suspicious of everyone who possesses ears.
As much as they pretend to hear, I know they have never seen
the authentic me, so I may as well paint a picture they would prefer.
I may as well lock myself away. It is a risk too far
to assume how the highwire will hold the full weight of
my blended truth. I’ve welcomed the vagrant whose
story was as murky as my own. And now, in my spiritual
vagrancy, I look for someone to listen to my vague
incarnations of stories and stumbles.