Startled by Existence

Hum i lity: 6/01

Sometimes I get jealous of other people and wish I were like them. I sometimes even wish everyone were the same, but one day I thought about my wish and decided it was a horribly stupid wish. On the school playground everyone would play the same thing. You couldn’t find your home because every house in the world would be the same. After I thought of all this destruction I liked myself more. I thought there is only one me and I am the only person who can be that person..

The Silly Wish – by Kayla Jordan (5th grade, school essay)

I have seen the naked lobes

of Pentecostal women at the Wal-Mart Store,

Their unadorned necks and broad foreheads

set, like polished alabaster

lifted lovely from the doilies.

 

I have seen a dog

radiant with pleasure

at the fact of my existence.

 

I have seen a shadow

tangle with my feet or fade;

He has stretched but never strayed.

We parted for some seconds once – on a high river bluff

I saw him emulate a diving swan,

But I pierced him

Like a bull’s-eye

on the water’s top.

 

Note:

I’ve never seen my shadow

Join the shadow of a bullet,

or that of a falling house.

 

(Selah.)

 

I have heard

A guitar fluoresce

In my ear,

Felt a flute flutter, dance, or curl

Like streamers

In my brain:

 

I have framed the moving

Ever evaporating earth

At least 36,000 times.

It goes with the job, and my love.

 

Indeed,

I have raised my glass at the sky;

Channeled particles and waves

Into my Nikon tele-porting--time catching

Space-mashing--memory enhancing –

light encoding – sun imploding

trap.

 

I have pressed

Fragile disappearing blossoms

Into the future,

placed huge mountains in a box

I have surveyed the tossed aftermath of pain,

and talked to a woman who rode

a funnel-cloud for two hundred feet.

 

I have stood at the top of the isle

Over four hundred times,

As some angel of a woman

gave her eyes to me

(flash)

And then her soon-to-be husband.

 

I have stood two feet away

From the most powerful man on earth --

No one in between.

He ignored me as I clicked –

I thought of leaping up and laying hands:

“Hey, I’m praying for you brother”

but I figure the guys in black

might misunderstand, and drop me on the spot.

 

Three hours later

I would photograph

The richest man in America;

He was shy and uncomfortable

Before my lens –

and I wondered how he knew

who were his friends.

 

Indeed,

I have photographed

The un-powerful, and un-rich;

A mass of un-shy children spilling

Like maniac pups into my wide angle-lens,

They stretched their septums forward

Into the glass like horses,

Rolling eyes and making faces,

Pushing me over, in the slums of Juarez.

 

I have also lived to photograph my children.

--

 

Could it really be that

I have seen three persons

Slip into the world --

bud and build like nimbus clouds

play and argue;

Move like ballerinas

in the living room to the booming

a two hundred dollar stereo.

 

I have tasted milk

From a hidden source.

I have felt the breasts

Of my beloved

Lap against my chest

Like the wake from a boat.

I have seen a woman

who once screamed:

“Don’t you ever say you love me” --

take my hand

and apologize for saying “damn.”

 

I have seen an encroaching kingdom

Building turrets in our hearts,

The grand physician

fixing broken history.

 

I have seen

The sun on the sky

Behind the fog

All clean and blonde

Like a compact disk

 

I have heard

whispers from another world.

I have eaten with the King of Kings.

I have talked to myself

And had a good conversation.

 

It is true:

I never asked to be born, but if I could

flicker into life for just one moment

in order to answer the question,

How in the world, would I

having tasted awareness

then refuse?

 

Could I – having been me,

ever wanted

to be anyone else?

 

I know my pains,

and mine have been enough to question

my continuance, once or twice …

but then, I don’t know yours, and

am not sure, that I could ever

take that risk …

 

So before I swap my life, for any other

I ask,

Would he come

with salvation or a camera;

Would he have a taste for small odd verses?

Would he come

with my same wife, or mom, or kids?

 

Would he have you

as friends?

 

(pause)

 

(Thank YOU, Thank You .... Thank You very much)