30/30: 4/4/09

Lazarus to Matthew Shepard: A Guide on Returning

The secret
is to not look down.

Rather, to step from the edge
onto a path leading beyond vision’s borders.

Abandon gravity in favor of Grace
and dare only your cheek as shield
against the arrival of the World’s punch.

You must learn to turn corners
at impossible angles.

To slide between strangers’ thoughts.
Bisect the distance between two words in conversation.

You must learn to live in houses built of light & darkness,
called “shadows.”

You will never be more homeless than this,
nor will you ever be quite as free.

You will become a library of all things Breath.
Tomorrows will splay themselves upon your lap

as the Sun disrobes from its petals,
like your own personal dandelion

in your own personal game
of “He-Loves-Me-He-Loves-me-Not.”

Your birthday
will slip from you.

The memory of your face?
Obscured by a blood mist.

Instead, you recall the image of a barbed wire crown
adorning a face that is yours, but not…..

This is where the advice comes in:
Wait. Wait for this Doppleganger to call your name.

You will likely linger longer than I did in my turn,
and your patience stretch into a haunting.

Yet still, you must wait.
And rage upon the fence that is your strange bed

why He does not remember your name
when you followed His exact route here so faithfully?