The Glass Grows Warm I tried to give you what the night had done and all I had was daylight in my mouth. The whole of it arrived at once, then left me counting syllables out loud. I burned the field to write the map. I named the heat and lost the flame. You held the paper like a hand and wondered why it said my name. Come close. Don’t ask me what I mean. Just let the sentence change your breathing. The Word was never in the ink. The Word was waiting in your chest, believing. I watched you almost understand and then I talked and talked it dead. Forgive the lantern. It was never meant to keep the sun instead. If I say love, I mean the weight that settled in my ribs and stayed. If I say God, I mean the hush before the mouth agrees to say. Come close. Don’t ask me what I mean. Just let the sentence change your breathing. The Word was never in the ink. The Word was waiting in your chest, believing. I cannot carry fire to you. I can only shape the air until your own small furnace remembers it was there. So take the poor true thing I managed. Leave the clever part behind. If something in you answers first and only later finds a mind— that was the prayer. That was the transfer. That was the Lord refusing to be captured. Come close. Don’t ask me what I mean. Just let the sentence change your breathing. The Word was never in the ink. The Word was waiting in your chest, believing. And if you say you knew already— beloved, that was the receiving.
