We cradle the precious things

and place them carefully upon our lap

the miracle of newness is like a sacred prayer

it is hands raised high and heads bowed low

yet always in that moment eyes opened wider

we marvel and bask in the wonder of it all

it is a full moon in a hungry sky

hope’s whisper of a million questions

before the answers will ever reach our lips

a blooming garden at our feet

a child’s hand clutching ours

yet still we walk too fast

as time brushes by.

North Texas is a land of storms and in 1970 so was our living room,
and when you're 6 years old you can’t just pick up and leave town.
Your stuck like a fence post in the middle of tornado alley.
The rain is going to come down hard.
The winds may knock you down, cause your heart is a trailer park.
That is just the way it is!
So, you learn to pray and sometimes look the other way,
like the eastern window of an old house.
Then no matter how you try part of it follows you
down the road are pieces of your past.
Like remnants of a tornado’s destruction and you find yourself sitting
back in that same old place even if it is just for a little while.
I look back and I see that 6-year-old sometimes and find she is not that far away.
Just another rain storm away from remembering
what not to say.

Is it the longing for the majestic sunset
for the man that can no longer see?
Or is it the ignorance of the colors
for the woman who has never seen?
Is it the ache for the one now left
with only recollection of years
of mother's embrace?
Or is it the emptiness for the orphan
who cannot recall her face?
Is it the loss of the mighty tree
burning as it falls?
Or is it the lack of the tree
that never stood at all?

It is the open arms that we long for;
the bright lighting up of the eyes when we enter the room.
An old man can deny it, but the 5-year-old within still knows.
We want to be welcomed like a sunflower field,
or the sweet voice of a grandmother at the door.
The need to truly belong is a force in itself.
You see everything in life has an impact;
the power of love and the compulsion of hurt.
The open doors and the slammed ones,
the last words spoken and the welcoming's,
our heart never forgets them.
You were too weary for open arms,
and too hurt to truly shine.
Truths an old man can discern,
but a child
can only feel lost in the darkness of it all.
For it is the open arms that we long for;
the bright lighting up of the eyes when we enter the room.
An old man can deny it, but the 5-year-old within me still knows.