Happy Union, Texas
at the waterhole, north end of grandfather's farm
where Kirby keeps his cattle.
It's evening and 110 degrees.
Barbas de Oro is whooshing up from El Rio Grande.
The chaparral throbs, and the cornfields rattle like pissed-off snakes.
I float in a pond, listen to killdeer, and scissor-tails.
Frogs plop in the water and ripple after ripple
passes through me.
I'm a buoy connected to Yahweh.
My head bobs in the swish\swoosh
body of water, and I muse –
If Jesus is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent;
if He is here at this moment,
has He counted every strand on my head?
If He knows me fully,
and I know Him,
having consumed His body
and drank His blood,
if He is here now,
does He ascend in golden plumes,
arms raised, palms turned outward,
pale face, blue-eyed, and blond;
or, is He in the water
nude,
dark, shiny as a stone;
hair raven and in curls,
eyes black and catholic?
"Well Rabbi," I begin,
"It's like this --"
We talk late in the evening.
Just me and Jesus
-- neither here nor there --
in the heart of Texas,
in a slow spiral,
our heads bobbing
in the swish\swoosh
body of water.
