On An Ordinary Tuesday

"Tell me something I haven't heard before. Poems about nature - " My friend fell suddenly silent. "Sorry, that wasn't what I meant." I closed my folder containing eight new poems - about nature. I was ready for this. "It's 8 am. Do you think you'd say this at 8 pm? " My friend looked puzzled. "The day is young, and you are waiting for its summons. You're impatient to make your mark, make your contribution. I understand this: listening to poems is an activity for day's end, not its beginning." He looked relieved. "That's what I meant to say, but words, the right words, well, that's your skill, not mine." I seized the dangling moment. "Poetry is the way I make my mark on passing time. No poem can stop time's relentless flow, but at least it now carries something of us, the mark of our being in its mad rush forward. You see, that's what poems do, all poems. What they mean varies, it's secondary anyway." My friend looked puzzled again. "I never thought of it that way, " he said slowly. "Well, you asked me to tell you something you haven't heard before." At that, we both laughed, and we both knew our talk had reached a turning point. "You have an idea, don't you? " I said. "Spill it." At that moment, my friend smiled with resolution: he was ready for this. "How often have we walked through our neighborhood, their yards and walls blocking our contact with the people inside? Who are they? What do they need, because everyone needs? We can't just go up to their doors, ring the bell, and when that stranger we've seen for years appears, we say - What can we say? How can this not be rude, an intrusion? " My friend fell silent: words were not his friends. They betrayed him, saying too much or too little. And his silence was his acceptance of defeat again and again. But not this time. "You have something to propose, don't you? Don't let it waste inside you. Speak it. I'm listening." His smile of resolution reappeared. "I know we can't rescue the world on our own, not even this neighborhood. But what if we put everything in higher hands. I mean prayer, my friend. Let's walk slowly and prayerfully passed all these houses. It will become an offering, we will have done something, and the rest rests with our Father." I was moved past words. Imagine that: a poet moved past words! And so it went: our walking became prayer, prayer became offering, and morning light was Heaven's Grace spreading everywhere we stepped.