by Jill Crainshaw
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| Epiphany Painting by catherine forsayeth |
“Come with me.”
“Where?”
“Wherever the star takes us.”
“What star?”
“The fierce one—”
“I never liked the graveyard shift.
How will we stay awake?
When will we sleep? I need sleep.”
“Sure, why not? I think the star
is whimsical, by the way.”
They turn their eyes skyward. At night.
Eager.
Reluctant.
Nonchalant.
“Wisdom wizards follow foolish flight of fancy—”
a cosmic planetary alignment
a sixth spirit-sense
a thousand lifetimes of longings
“Stop looking back.”
“I left—things—lost—things—back there.”
“What’s lost waits up ahead.”
“What’s lost nips at our heels.”
They emerge from a forlorn forest.
First light nudges Mama Wren from nighttime
nesting in a smooth-barked dogwood.
The whimsy-fierce star hesitates—
They do too.
Midnight morning trees breathe
an infant lullaby,
music brighter than light.
“Come with me.”
Jill Crainshaw is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and a liturgical theology professor at Wake Forest University School of Divinity in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
