Sometimes you hear that Voice, speaking through people, and were it not for the proximity of their words, the identical nature of those sentences, you’d put off the emerging truth.  It can jump off the page of poem, scream through an essay, or whisper through conversation over tea or wings or johnny cakes.

The Voice may come through the often misunderstood tones of a faithful friend whose so dependable that he’s overlooked.  But it will not relent.

Like a burn it sears something on your skin, a purple bubble of skin that can’t be avoided.  There’s no pain in it.  The scar that’s left will be a memorial to the power of that influence you thought took flight.

Speaking, reminding, and convincing is the terrible and deeply comforting Voice saying one thing or another.  Then there’s the choice to turn and listen, or try to, or to walk away from the words spoken.  To walk away is to return a gift.  To listen is to enter into an unknown world of faith.  Indeed, hearing that Voice is hearing a melody of faith.

Walking in a foreign place