Our Choreography Renewed
(“The curtain in the Temple was torn into
two pieces, from the top to the bottom.” Mark 15:38)
Once the illusions are scattered,
once the veil is removed,
once the hardened arteries are cleared,
once the implanted devices that replace the
original design are removed,
we might see the sun the same again.
Why is everything so small,
why are the stars any different here?
Why do imprisoned thoughts
sit enthroned behind halls draped with
crosses?
Though a thousand flags wave,
though banners catch the wind like cannonballs,
though lavender is turned to dust,
though our sculptures rust in the rain,
We can learn to trust the love within
the center. We can drop the disguises we
thought defended the shores from foes we
never had.
Our beds are unmade,
our pillows are stone,
our vision is dilated,
our view is myopic.
We see what we have been taught,
we teach what is written,
we do not read it beforehand.
We underline words that
close the doors to
the expanse that existed before we had
A single second to think.
The illusions can lift like fog, the rifts can fill
with
the cooing of doves. The fields can be spotted
with does standing in the snow.
Our breath can come slowly,
our choreography renewed.
The chances are good if we sit in
Someone’s kitchen, smell the bread baking
against the uncommon rain,
that we will see the length between us is
only the same as the space between angels,
as the rays of light between droplets of dew.
We will learn to dance unrehearsed and put
our distinctions away while we savor the sunlight
that drenched the vine, savor the moments like
early wine.
And learn, without trying, that veils only obscure
the truest nature of things.
