Foolish

How do we know at all? 
Is knowing just the firing of synapses, 
objective jolts that organize 
electrons into truth? 

Or can we also know from foolish stories, 
that cross through seas and centuries 
and land upon our hearts, 
the stories that our broken hearts collect? 

What is it softens hearts to breaking open, 
that readies us to know, by open hearts, 
another sovereignty, another realm – 
one ruled by healing, gentleness and beauty, 
by weakness that is strength misunderstood, 
and folly that is wisdom, after all? 

Epiphany begins among the shadows: 
deep darkness, ominous gifts, the smoke of prayer; 
a crown of gold and then a crown of thorns; 
myrrh for anointing – holiness and death. 

The story that is grief is in our path, 
that tells of crosses, tombs and tears and love, 
in which appears the shape of our redemption, 
that makes its way into our softened hearts, 
and carries us across the cold frontier 
from desert waste into the watered garden 
that only foolish broken hearts can know.

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