In Secret

“I love you as certain dark things are to be loved, in secret.” — Pablo Neruda Sonnet XVII

One night I put God away,

packed Him—Her, perhaps it was—

away like an old toy, a childhood journal.

Not the right path I said, and it was true—is true

that God is too small, a cutout painted,

the edges jagged from scissors that tore the cardboard.

But I packed something else away that night

a love, some slant of light on the sparrow at the bench, 

from a face on the street.

Not gone entirely, some scrap

of song, a darkness on the wind

coming round about, not at the front door

but a leak through the sash of the window

no longer nameable.

Maybe this had to be—

to stop pinning and naming, being good,

to stop doing the work

and let the work lead on its secret way.

But, oh, I have lost—the honey

green of leaves in childhood,

a light like milk falling from a basement window.

Throw it on the fire my teacher said. 

If it’s true, it will not burn.

And I, childlike, threw it in—

God and all the sacraments, the voice 

that whispered to me, the desire

for light and sweetness falling from the air.

And so a long, slow burning

a prayer like a coal in the mind.

So many years, all the world burning 

and I do not know where I stand

in a land sacred despite me.

Me still wanting to love—but what?

a glow in the night sky?

Me still wanting to throw it all on the fire— 

myself, God, Zen, the boxes and doors and names,

still wanting to stand in the rain and be nothing but rain

still hearing a sound chink chink 

bird call, whistle tone

voice asking, do you love me?

and my child voice answering, Yes. 

Yes, I love you.

If you tell me to, I will do it again.

—Sarah Webb