I'm thinking how so much so often
comes of showing up, comes of being
willing to arrive, regardless,
as our several mute anxieties subside, and now
I startle, blinking—so much so

that I am for the short term almost wide awake—
and see a bit more clearly how
this willingness or that
can make of the confusion yet
another likely scene, make of the troubled,

packed interior a zone of calm, which calm
avails momentarily a glimpse
to mark among so many frank,
unlikely revelations that I continue
to observe that I am blinking still.

But what was I to make of it? What of it
beyond for instance a sudden, chance
recognition of a likely other?
The God, presumably, will carry on,
will fetch me from affection to affection,

and some can seem, immediately,
longstanding, and some suggest again how
both widespread and pervasive might become
this giddy gratitude I recognize,
if all would be sufficiently awakened.

—Scott Cairns is the author most recently of The End of Suffering (Paraclete Press).

Copyright © 2009 by the author or Christianity Today/Books & Culture magazine.
Click here for reprint information on Books & Culture.