Every Speck

The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away. (Job 2:21) We walk through the land of Taketh Away even as we wade through the clear brown broth of St. Joseph Bay, pulling our girl of four, in her soft, silver boat. We walk through this water, even as we believe happiness lasts forever, her father and I, one on each side of the boat’s bow and sunburned to the elbows, our chests red “V’s” beneath open collars. We walk through the land of Taketh Away even as we bend and harvest sand dollars, scallops, or pick up a living sea anemone to place, tickling, in our daughter’s palms. She will know this pungent water field, two or three of its thousands of brackish mysteries, as her father’s legs and feet and mine slush in unison through and across sandbars and dark sea grass, almost stepping, with naked feet, on the back of a scuttling crab or a sting ray hidden, but which the vigilant sandpiper’s daughter sees from her perch. The air is still, except for our hands dipping, dripping, and a sea gull that flies over, crying, Giveth. The bay water reflects gold on all our faces. Our daughter’s hair hangs in one long pigtail I plait in the morning. It is full of the white, dry sea salt of oneness. Bittersweet If you live only on the bitter, your eyes will be hard. No one will want you. A corpse laid out alive, a hammer, a mirror painted black. You will want no one, Only strike out with impotence. If you live only by the sweet, the bitter will not exactly touch you. It will annihilate you early on. They will find you, a smiling vegetable in a nursing home, or on a screened in porch, where you are unable to grow anything good dirty orange like a carrot. Even taken together, bitter and sweet don’t help you. You are simply aware of good moments, small, but numbering in the thousands, along with the knowledge that a single misstep or even the most right and best step can take you down in a moment. The thread you use is spun sugar. You build your webs, tasting your own sweetness, licking all the icing of all your loves that flow from you, with such ease, such grace. Never forget, though, you will be adeptly rolled up in your own superb dewy strands, stored away, to be eaten by your own desires, or by a God whose perfect lips you’ve never seen or by spiders that have absolutely nothing to do with you, that live in jungles, in those trees you’ve never even climbed. Some spiders may arrive by mangos or in the cage of an exotic animal. On the bus, there is a man in a normal gray coat. He has a gun in the pocket. You are the one he shoots in the eye. Until then, beige cream to cut the edge off your over-brewed coffee. A kiss to soften the earth where you bury again and again what you most love. A single word of affection on a day of horrors, a slice of orange on a night of loss, drops of brandy ministered to tea. For a moment, you will see a way out. A hole in a piece of paper becomes a tunnel. Dance on the rails like a drunken hobo before the train overtakes you. Dance with fear or dance without it. No matter. Sparks fly from your heels. I adore your kerchief, filled with a piece of good bread, damp matches, underwear washed in a stream. I love you. You are more courageous than a soldier, a statesman, or a man selling hot dogs. Learn to love the warmth of your lover’s body. Lie down, walk, or run. It will kill you in your soul. Learn to love pain. Learn not to die from it until the very last moment. --Bonnie Roberts