This Christmas, my six-year-old son taught me the lesson of how valuable it can be to pay attention–a found poem.
Guilty Bystander
The gate of heaven is everywhere.
—Thomas Merton, “Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander”
“I don’t know,”
says Finn,
and I forget
what that first
question was,
but speaking
into the microphone
of the karaoke machine,
I then asked him,
“What do you know
for sure?”
And he says
into his mic,
“If you only
ask Santa
for one present,
he’ll bring it to you.”
I ask him,
“What else do you know?”
The reverb knob
is turned to max
so his quick answer
bounces around
the room, “Sometimes
nothing can be true.”
So I ask him,
“What else?”
and he says,
“The world
changes.”
I so love this. The world changes indeed. Reverb and all, tiny voices. True is true.
Ah…to have such wisdom magnified via mic, at such a young age…so that he can hear his own words reflected. This was such a treat tonight, Rosemerry–thanks!
And happy holidays!