S omewhere somehow

sometime long ago

someone lit an oil wick and You gave a miracle.

What have You given me?

You gave me a thin whisper of smoke curling

upward and dissipating.

You gave me a puddle of wax and burnt oil wicks

in an uncertain world

and the tragic loss of a blazing fire that didn’t happen.

Give me a miracle.

We’re pleading not for the glow of a flame

but for the glint of a reminder:

Someone is still holding that candle.

Somewhere in this world

floating in the vastness of the ocean tide

swirling amid the mist falling in the rain

embraced by the sand and swaying in the petals

of a flower;

somewhere in the restless cycle of this world

somewhere there’s a memory

of that fire

enduring for eight golden nights.

Somewhere there’s a memory

of a fire

guiding a Nation through a barren desert.

Somewhere there’s a memory

of a fire

crowning the crest of a mountain.

I have no fire;

no miracles. (Excerpted from Family First Issue 571)