Lee - Behind My Eyes

One makes it difficult for him to see the words hes written and crossed out on the paper. The other keeps him from recognizing another master than Death. He squints. He reads: Does the first light hide inside the first dark? He reads: While all bodies share the same fate, all voices do not.

Dont ask her what she thought she was doing turning a childs eyes away from history and toward that place all human aching starts. And if you meet someone in your adopted country, and think you see in the others face an open sky, some promise of a new beginning, it probably means youre standing too far. Or if you think you read in the other, as in a book whose first and last pages are missing, the story of your own birthplace, a country twice erased, once by fire, once by forgetfulness, it probably means youre standing too close. In any case, try not to let another carry the burden of your own nostalgia or hope. And if youre one of those whose left side of the face doesnt match the right, it might be a clue looking the other way was a habit your predecessors found useful for survival. Dont lament not being beautiful.

Get used to seeing while not seeing. Get busy remembering while forgetting. Dying to live while not wanting to go on. Very likely, your ancestors decorated their bells of every shape and size with elaborate calendars and diagrams of distant star systems, but with no maps for scattered descendants. And I bet you cant say what language your father spoke when he shouted to your mother from the back of the truck, Let the boy see! Maybe it wasnt the language you used at home. Maybe it was a forbidden language.

Or maybe there was too much screaming and weeping and the noise of guns in the streets. It doesnt matter. What matters is this: The kingdom of heaven is good. But heaven on earth is better. Thinking is good. But living is better.

Alone in your favorite chair with a book you enjoy is fine. But spooning is even better.

Exodus, Eyes Snatched Away, Superstition at the Side of the Road. All cards are good or bad depending on how you play them. Defeated by Wings, Eating Forbidden Blood. No card possesses inherent value. Among the Lepers, Burial by the Solo River, The Extracted Oil. Every player begins in bondage.

Every player eventually dies. Everybody plays whether they know or dont know theyre playing. Maybe this isnt a game. Maybe its the World Evening News. Maybe this time Ill rescue my mother. I cant tell if I thought that or if she said it.

Maybe this isnt the news. Maybe this is a dream God is having and somebody should wake Him. Good boat, first boat, old boat, Mother, my first night with you lasted nine months. Our second night together is the rest of my life.

Wait for the playground to empty. Then call out those companions from childhood: The one who closed his eyes and pretended to be invisible. The one to whom you told every secret. The one who made a world of any hiding place. And dont forget the one who listened in silence while you wondered out loud: Is the universe an empty mirror? A flowering tree? Is the universe the sleep of a woman? Wait for the skys last blue (the color of your homesickness). Then youll know the answer.

Wait for the airs first gold (that color of Amen ). Then youll spy the winds barefoot steps. Then youll recall that story beginning with a child who strays in the woods. The search for him goes on in the growing shadow of the clock. And the face behind the clocks face is not his fathers face. And the hands behind the clocks hands are not his mothers hands.

All of Time began when you first answered to the names your mother and father gave you. Soon, those names will travel with the leaves. Then, you can trade places with the wind. Then youll remember your life as a book of candles, each page read by the light of its own burning.

Two: A man is four winds and three fires. And the four winds are his fathers voice, his mothers voice Or maybe hes seven winds and ten fires. And the fires are seeing, hearing, touching, dreaming, thinking Or is he the breath of God? When the wind turns traveler and asks, in my fathers voice, Have you prayed? I remember three things. One: A fathers love is milk and sugar, two-thirds worry, two-thirds grief, and whats left over is trimmed and leavened to make the bread the dead and the living share. And patience? Thats to endure the terrible leavening and kneading. And wisdom? Thats my fathers face in sleep.

When the wind asks, Have you prayed? I know its only me reminding myself a flower is one station between earths wish and earths rapture, and blood was fire, salt, and breath long before it quickened any wand or branch, any limb that woke speaking. Its just me in the gowns of the wind, or my father through me, asking, Have you found your refuge yet? asking, Are you happy? Strange. A troubled father. A happy son. The wind with a voice.