Palm Sunday

It’s like this, I said,
you can live in your certainty –
the way you want her to act
and how she should look,
the father you wish she had –

The imagination of the black
haired girl and freckled boy
you will have together
three years from now
after you have settled down –

How you want her to grow
and would like her to change
and how she will help you do the same
in all the ways you want.

You can do all that, I said,
and never get exactly
the life you dreamed –

Or you can let go –
into the mystery –
recognize, that here, in fact, is someone
with whom you want to go –
set sail into the wind,
and let it take you
where it will.

To set out for Tahiti –
and end up in Tacoma –
it happens that way
sometimes,
but what is important,
what really matters,
is that you want to go –

Despite everything you fear –
into this great unfolding –
to see together
just what might happen.

Maybe, it will have something to do
with how you dreamt it would be –

Or maybe not much at all –

But for sure, you will never learn,
unless you go.

Out there –
where you do not know –

Out there –
where the wind will carry you –

Peter Ilgenfritz
March 26, 2015