Faith

Faith came as a gift from above and lay nearly dormant within me. Nearly, I say, because even as an ember, it emanated enough energy to keep the search alive. Its hard to say whether its emanations served to push or pull, to seek or be found. Was it a source of motivation, continually driving me to find that which would set it free? Or was it rather like a magnet, constantly drawing to itself the source of its freedom?

I picture it somehow like a beautiful glowing gem covered with dirt, yet still possessing the power to shine. I picture it pulsating somehow, like a lighthouse, like a heartbeat, like the rhythmic in and out, on and off, here and there, now and then, dark and light of life.

Though I see it as a hard, solid thing, I feel it soft and timid. Though in my imaginings it is indestructible and eternal, I sense it fragile, vulnerable, needing protection. Though it seems perfect in every way, I feel the obligation, responsibility, the need to nourish it.

When I neglect my faith, when I take it for granted, eventually I feel sorrow and regret. Is that weeping I hear within? Can faith shed tears? And if it cries enough will it extinguish itself with its tears? Will its emanations cease, or is it only I who will cease to sense its emanation?

But faith, when I nurture you, when I tend to you, when I abandon myself--my mind, my heart, my will--to you, how you swell and rejoice. Is that laughter I hear within? Can faith laugh? Or is that me--or finally the lack of me--who has made room to hear the delight of life?