A BOY OF LETTERS

I love it. To write. Always have. Always will.

Not just the thinking of thoughts

that call words and worlds into being,

but also the penning of each letter one by one;

the forming “g’s,” the crossing “t’s.”

I read Rilke and say, “That’s me!”

Silly, you say? Perhaps. I can’t know.

It’s all much too close to my heart’s heart.

Too much a part of the who that I am.

As a young boy, my favorite back-to-school activity?

Buying and filling my new plastic pencil case!

But always I did it with mixed feelings---

excited for the fun prophesied by each purchase,

yet shy to admit this joy not meant for a boy.

Then, a few years later, a typing class. Love, on a lark!

Still, I was ashamed to admit my glee.

Now. So many years have played out and passed on.

Still, I remember the sweet spirit of that boy, that young man.

Still, I’m stirred by his ever-present effervescent smile.

Still, his early love of writing calls to me from everywhere.

Still, this exuberant joy in thinking thoughts, tapping keys.

Still, this love that claims to know me so well

invites me into an intimacy with myself, my world, my ways,

the likes of which we preserve for the precious. The few.

And still, I wrestle with giving myself permission

Especially to write what I feel.

To reveal the who that I am.

Maybe to me as much as to you.

Such is the art and act

of my coming into being again today.

Like e.e. cummings wrote,

the hardest part of becoming one’s self

is a world bent on making us into someone else.

Can we do otherwise and still be true to our loves?

This beckoning from beyond

may not be a game that we can win,

but neither is it one we dare forfeit.

To it we must wholly and whole-heartedly give ourselves.

“To be or not to be,” isn’t just the question.

It’s the quest.