The Predicted Rain

Morning begins without me. It's hard to keep track of what I've already said vs. what's actually true vs. who I'm trying to seduce. She used the word "correct" in a spiritual context and I literally hopped liked a sexed-up robin. Yet later - walking up and down Main Street in a mist that never made it to the predicted rain - I used the word myself, so who's judging who. The insistence I not live in her gaze - that my life not be conditioned thusly - intensifies. The so-called year of engagement becomes a not so subtle request for divine extraction, the papers in order, signed in triplicate, notarized et cetera. Yet at 3 a.m. the Lord visits and reminds me of my training, importance of not deviating, everybody's upstairs is counting on you, I know you can do it and so forth. "Thanks, Coach," I mutter yet rather than get up and execute the familiar avoidance strategies, stay down until I can sleep. In a dream then it is given me to loosen my hold on a particular idol, worship of which has been ruinous, and the ruins somehow escaping my notice until now. Thank Christ for my daughters, Beyoncé's Lemonade and Whitney's "No Woman." In the kitchen making coffee Chrisoula makes me laugh and for a moment there is nothing to remember for what could be missing? Then a little voice says "remember this." Then it is day.