When Words Fail

Tonight's e-mail to Brett:

Brett,

Perhaps only fields of snow drag at my heels, perhaps only the mist rises from the snow in the dark, the lighted school sign creating a halo over the soccer field, perhaps the night itself rattles the branches full of crystallized water, the high tinkle of ice falling through wind. There is a silence in moonlight, the tall teeth of memory snap towards it without sound. What if all this beauty, perceived by the passing truck drivers only as snow, is as melt water darkening our pants from the knees down? We wade in memory, a frozen interruption in a cycle that flows. Does the season come on its own feet, or do we bring it, a cast iron key in a rusty lock? What exactly do we open?

Tonight Graham pointed out the mist and looking I saw it, and seeing I carved a whole with it, all those suspended droplets drifting between the certainty of gravity and the transience of clouds. Up to his ears in it, the dog, sniffing, smells more than I ever will, his neural net recording data, for what? To survive? To last long enough to transfer his seed? But this one is neutered, his function shifted towards the desires of humans, his only lasting influence, warm footprints across the frozen lake where I keep my sturgeon, the scale-less fish waiting for something larger than skin to enfold it.

This morning I waited for the curving flight of a swan, banking to the south, before I begin walking again. And the dog by then was at the end of his leash, nose in the snow, not aware of the large birds in the sky, not smelling their decent from the stars. Having spent my energy on talk and anger, having exhausted the city offices, our words too large for bureaucracy, I sought the morning, students passed us going to school, cars tailed each other towards the production of something measurable, and we slipped into the forest, the dog and I, thousands of tiny branches littering the blanket of snow, pocked with slush-balls shed by the old ones, God's own pruning service, this well evolved system, a tuned spring towards something always random.

Funny to hear the phrase, ‘out of integrity.' I think of burlap sacks tossed in a corner of the old cold cellar at Covenant Bible College, more potatoes than I had ever seen in one place. All our spiritual talk supported by roots and ground beef, the prairies howling with northern lights when we would walk in the evenings free from warmth.

Today I talked with Matt about smoking, brain development, the rule of law, and why I would not give him two dollars for guitar picks. He saved his cigarettes to sell, then saved one last one, the last one he hopes, before quitting, stuck through the hole in his ear. While I was talking to him, my mind raced ahead, wondering just how many words were enough. The analogy I used for obedience, he changed so that I would see why he doesn't trust me, why my experience is not enough. I looked into the dark then, saw the absence in him, the connection we both have with a fearful mystery, the imperfection of everything. Last night, we talked of the addict's journey, my point being that sometimes you can't do it on your own. His conviction that he can. Why do I feel we must surrender, give up control to the divine music? Why do I still believe that harmony is possible, even in this discordant world? The physicist on the PBS show we watched said that being smart didn't insure our survival as a species. Einstein didn't live longer than the rest of us. How much choice do we really have? Even these words I am picking out, are they from me, or somewhere random, somewhere out of sight, out of meaning, beyond thought? Like the swan flying without the knowledge of aerodynamics, like the beagle smelling people without knowing their names, like the rain transformed into something lighter, more beautiful, but colder... is it possible that in the end, it is not what we know that counts, but wordless witness to the grandeur of it all?

Richard