Worship

Photo by Karl Fredrickson on Unsplash

I haven’t been inside a church of my childhood faith for years. I went to one recently, to honor the memory of someone who was dear to me. And although the words and the gestures of the service came back to me immediately, I found that I had outgrown the space.

We walked out of the church

into a bright winter afternoon

(December light brittle and brilliant as glass)

On the way home I told you

the story of my childhood Sundays,

incense that smelled of caves,

words that drew language upon itself

into utter silence.

It was no place for human beings--

more narrow than a coffin,

darker than midnight seen through closed eyes.

This is no place for worship.

Later we stood at the trunk of our favorite tulip poplar

feeling her embrace sky and earth together

with room enough to hold us too.

There, beneath the sunset purple sky

we found a truer sanctuary