The Space I Get for Myself, O God.

Sometimes there needs to be a space for the silence
of singing voices of strangers in the emptiness of my room,
of incense and candles cradling the air
while I lie half naked on my newly made bed
on yellowed sheets kept in boxes without tops,

open wide for the future and spiders,
open wide to let flames lick at their edges
should a house fire fall upon us (God I hope not)
but for this vacuousness in all its beauty,
in all its loneliness

makes me miss my crib and cradle,
makes me miss the cradling of your warm arms last night
the arms of my mother a decade ago.
It makes me want to hold the old woman I don't know
her name was Kathy, the woman in church who cried over her husband riddled with new-found cancer.

Behind her dark sunglasses the rain came down
wet on the hands of all who gripped her shoulders to steady her
wet on her silky green shoulder pads
already missing the one she loved, the one who was not yet gone
cursing You who took him from her.

If you can do this to us God
burn my house my head my heart, but
how am I supposed to love you if you kill us off
if you let me snap twig branches and burn ants,
let me watch old women cry
if you let me love so strongly
but will eventually take them from me?