Waiting to Be Picked Up

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I was ready to fly home after teaching in Albuquerque, when the sudden light on the underside of a palm trip took me to another time.

WAITING TO BE PICKED UP

A burst of light makes me look across the way,

where a sliver of dawn slips under the leaf of a

palm tree. The lift of the palm feels Egyptian and

the trap door to our age opens to all time. Sudden

light can do this. Like now. And I realize in this

breath, before getting on another plane, it doesn’t

matter how that door opens. We can run into walls

or bounce off each other. We can fall, thinking we

can fly. Or exhaust ourselves by asking life, “Why?”

Or turn in sudden pain. Or rise from our knees in

awe. Or trip when a stranger from the side looks like

someone we’ve lost. It doesn’t matter how the trap

door to our heart opens. My driver is here. I can

feel him watching me stare off. I can’t stop looking

at the light in the palm. I feel certain, if I go and

touch it, we’ll all be in Egypt before the Pyramids

were built. I wheel my suitcase to the car, knowing

that once in the open, the light will find us. When

no one’s looking and we’re out of things to say,

the ancient light that lives beneath words will

fill the hole in our heart that we show no one.

A Question to Walk With: In conversation with a friend or a loved one, describe what you feel when you suddenly have nothing left to say.