My people:
seeds scattered across scapes
some raised in ready crowds
some grown alone
edged out among the distance.
You are quiet now:
Fellow laborers
letting the weight of the rake
drop itself back into the ground -
every bit helps,
every natural inclination you can leverage,
you do:
It is so hard to feel the purpose of the work.
It is so hard to look over your shoulder
and find only empty field.
In doing the work of God,
it is so hard to labor alone.
You can’t pretend this isn’t what is happening.
Any one of us would have finished
the effort of belief
if it didn’t involve Sunday morning meetings
with pews or cheap chairs
with wine or grape juice
with small plastic cups and small paper pamphlets
with a cultural inheritance we would rather forfeit.
I want to follow him
just not in droves.
So many of us have been cornered
by the logic of the deep and personal unknown
but cut off from the implication of him
in other humans.
In this eerie season of homeboundaries
in the callous quiet of the streets
in anticipated grief of coming disease
can’t we now know the need
to be together?
And if together in general
then together in purpose,
together in place,
together in pleading
together in praise.