Remembrance

Driving south in steady rain
one day past Thanksgiving,
I'm splashed by passing
trucks on the old highway,
grateful to be far
from interstate madness.


A crusty red pickup
pulls off pavement
into tall, drenched
grass;
hitched to the truck is
a flat, open trailer,
optimism in metal.


He’s a hunter
hoping for a deer.


Weary from a lifetime
of judging, I’ve sworn off.
It’s not my job
to judge.

Instead, I remember a doe
I met one day in the foothills
who didn’t run away
at the sight of me.
There was more majesty in her
neck than in an entire human--
elegant, trusting, strong.


She is with me now, her
eyes knowing things mine
will never see.
I still feel her tenderness.


She was not afraid.


No Pulitzer or Nobel
could have meant
more than the honor
of her trust
that day,
blessing
and benediction
in a cathedral
where one need not bow
to the Creator
nor offer sacrifice
to know Divine
gifts in the ragged
reality of humanness.