Who Is It That I See?

In My Head

When I putter in our flowerbeds, I see life.
Plants and weeds both thrive –
in spite of me.
That’s not enough to calm my worries.

God is, I pray.

No, He isn’t, I worry.

Oh! I need proof – that life has a point.
It’s not a joke.
I need help out of my past and through the present,
beyond sure death that terrifies me.

I once read a question
that now I hear it inside my head:
          “Do you still want to argue with the Almighty?
You are God’s critic, but do you have the answers?”

Apparently, yes, I do.
And No, I don’t . . .
Sorry to say, I am without the sense Job had
to shut my mouth.

Creation, God’s star witness, declares handiwork
no human could stitch.
Jaw-dropping beauty, yes!
Still I waver.
How then can life unravel so?

I see destruction; I hear despair.
Both Nature’s storms and man assert
God’s gone – maybe He was never here,
seeing so much is lost –
so many harmed?

Yet, I can see traces in the calamities
of fingerprints no human could leave –
Inexplicable and unexpected mercies,
personal and purposeful.

Humbled, I hear more silent questions
I didn’t ask,
What have you wasted?
Whom have you harmed?

The closer I draw – the faster I try to flee.
But still two questions outrun me.
Who asks those silent questions I did not pose —
Where are you and
Who do you say I am?