WORDS LIKE LIGHT 

Saturday, September 4, 2021

EPIPHANY

            One definition of an epiphany is “a moment of sudden revelation or insight”, something that I’m sure happens to all of us more times than we realize. I’ve had thousands of epiphanies over the last 79 years, everything from suddenly realizing, one April day back in 7^th grade, that I was in deep trouble with Sister Virginia Marie, to unexpectedly understanding, one morning several years ago, how to securely install a bracket for a flag to an outside wall. I suppose we have these epiphanies almost constantly – these sudden understandings, unforeseen eye-openers, “aha!” moments that make some part of life instantly comprehensible. Strangely, one of my most common epiphanies is the out-the blue understanding that I don’t really understand much of anything – that this life is ultimately a beautiful but unsolvable mystery, of which I am a small but essential part. These are instructional epiphanies that, in a flash, make clear to me my safe and lucky place in this hugely puzzling but relentlessly perfect universe. I’m always grateful when they make what have become their regular daily visits.  

A WONDERFUL ACCIDENT

Every moment
his life reaches a peak.
It's like everything
is food for his heart,
like he can see the heat
of the center of his life,
like a wonderful accident has happened
and cast him into a paradise
where he can sit in peace
and play pitch-and-catch
with both joy and disappointment.