Climbing

This morning,
in the small basement shul,
amidst several Chasidic students lost in prayer,
I looked up from my siddur
to see a man in worker’s clothes climb a ladder
and enter through an open ceiling panel.
And I thought, Oh yes,
he is just another one
like all of us
trying desperately to ascend,
but knowing full well he must come back down
to perform the work of this earth.

From the book G‑d's Optimism by Yehoshua November