Yes, there are the flames of Pentecost,
the drama, the consuming blaze,
the rushing, pushing wind, desperate
for something on its loud crusade.
But for some it is enough
to be the wick of God,
of love made known in unlearned tongues,
beyond our understanding,
to be the deep where God’s creating spirit broods,
where new things come to light and life
without our doing, or knowing how
a soul comes to know its own belovedness.
Our oneness is not within but out there,
one spirit breathing in and out through all of us,
a gathering of many nations, our strange utterance
merely the cry of recognition.
Drawn to our completion,
we follow the breath to our other selves
and love them with love that’s not our own
but all of ours, breathed into us.
The secret is beyond us, a language we won’t learn,
but still go out into the streets and speak.
—June 4, 2014