What will be

           You may sense it in the call of a Canada goose in flight   a
longing strong enough to carry an entire flock to their destination
           You may feel it in the grumble of a distant storm   that dark
dissatisfaction at what is   in comparison with what will be
           The people who should never let us down   let us down   The
cabin roof groans with the weight of so much snow   The stairs in
the old farmhouse complain with every footstep   even with the
memory of feet that move no longer   The branches of an enormous
oak moan in the high wind
           You many hear it in the spirituals nurtured in the cotton fields
of the deep south   a deep sorrow at temporal hopelessness distilled
into hope for beyond   Comin’ for to carry me home
           You may think you merely imagine it in the whistle of a train
as it rumbles through a midnight crossing   but the tracks through
BC’s mountains were laid with the blood of Chinese navvies   the
sweat of abandoned dreams   & the boxcars rolling through the
prairies   during the depression   carried the last hope of the
unemployed   Don’t imagine that that wail   has nothing to do with
human grief
           Sometimes our wounds heal completely   sometimes they
leave a scar   A woman learns of cancer in her breast   a man finds
his heart is failing   We fall to our knees for a miracle   & are
startled when an answer seems to come   a taste of what will be
           Hear the wind in the cavity where the siding is loose   Hear it
banging against the wall   Sometimes our wounds don’t heal at all
           We fall to our knees   but the sky grows grey   featureless &
silent   We long for what we had   what we almost had    what will be
           You may sense it in the stillness of a beaver pond   or in the
rush over Niagara
           You may see it in the sunflower   pushing through the soil
reaching for the sky   for the sun   When we most identify with this
world   we are least content