original doubt

You’re neither the devil I would fear
Nor quite the angel I would praise
With songs cosmic and booming.
But during days when the sun
Prides its teeth too much, I envy
The natural order of chance.
Not like grocery lists, not like
Chips on the finest China.

But something in the league
Of nautilus shells or the promise
Of zygotes. Especially, I envy
The perfect mirage of you
In a picture frame. All smiles,
All in rich disaccord to the times:
In a faraway country, maybe famine.
Maybe the crumbling of a wall.

These couldn’t be chance. So
How come when you say it’s real,
When you say you believe me,
I hear instead the tired music
Of lost harps, feel the spindly legs
Of a kid tremble with its first shot
At judgment? I am a practitioner
Of questions eluded by answers.

True, it remains a wonder to me
How all of this starts with these:
Your message on my phone, your voice
In my ear, the textures and shapes
Of things I come to yearn clasped
In my hands. But you see, doubt
Is delirium undistilled, adoration
At its peak. Hear me until it’s gone.