I thought the divine came in small packages, like chocolates and bags of tea, but I never did think that it could be an ocean breaking against the shore, or the sun as run through the Earthly sky beyond where the clouds break to make the light all gold and silver and burning.
I was never hugged as a child. It made me insecure in my adulthood, always flinching away when I needed contact the most. The hug, the kiss. To embrace; too intimate. But,
Give me a little bit of Heaven in your smile. Make the night to day and the wind whisper gladly. No darkness touches your cheeks; no cloud passes over your eyes. There’s light in there, I know, I saw. I saw it clearly. A photograph that doesn’t fade; a perfect picture my eyes see even now, caught, captured; stills faster than the camera, clearer than the shutter down on perfect lenses curved in all that space.
No, I say, the hugs are too much and the kisses too deep. I only need one thing across my eyes. The sight enough to drive one blind, a smile upon the parted lips and dimpled cheeks, eyes that are above a perfect nose, bless once upon me and I’ll never go back. A smile. A smile.