Stone Jetties, God and Love.

Someone decided just how big the stones needed to be.
How large.
Enough to hold back all but the worst of storms,
enough to slow the speed of the tide.
How many it would take and how
to stack them, one on the other
for steadiness and strength.

Someone decided what God to believe in
and why. How to live a life within the confines
of commandments and history and belief
in who and what is important. Someone decided
who matters and who does not. What bombs to drop
and which people to feed.
Even the oblivious have made a decision,
what to believe, and how much and then to whom
they can cling to when the storm is too much
and the seas are too high.

Someone decided, who to love, and how much
and what the word actually means. Decided
what to cherish and what to take for granted
until the garden turns brown one last time. Decided
when to prune and when to plant and whether
love languages matter enough to learn.
It is all in the translation, or lack of it.
Love is in the decisions,
or lack of them, waiting for the storm
that proves.

Where then to stand?
What then is left?
It is all in the deciding.

About this poem

Someone wrote me yesterday. “It seems your poems interweave love and faith and life..” Well, yes. Because life does that, and I suck at fiction.

The photograph was taken in Kennebunkport, Main.

Tom