some days all i see is the cloud #2: three clouds, and me here wondering which will outlast the others

this is a poem that I brought to my friend C's birthday ritual the other day. for a while I thought it was going to be a song, but then I was too lazy to rhyme it.

some days all i see is the cloud #2: three clouds, and me here wondering which will outlast the others

some days my sidewalk seems clear:
lik the fog has lifted,
like my friendships are all easy,
like there is nothing to fear.

other days i only speak failure
i can't trust even my own heart
i can't walk for the murkiness:
some days all i see is the cloud.


some days i am absolutely certain
where Jesus is sitting,
and where he's patting the ground,
for me to lie down with my head in his lap.

other days, God is more invisible than immortal,
and i can't eat mystery,
and the unknowing will not sustain me:
some days all i see is the cloud.

on days when God and despair hang together
like thunder and lightning-
it is good to have some witnesses:
the sacred few and many-those pieces
of myself that walk the wider world.

some days, though leagues and odysseys would claim us separate,
they, like bread, like salt, like water in my body
are close enough to carry me
(with their arms entwined like a zipper
like keys on a piano
like books on my shelf):
some days all i see is the cloud.