A poem for Tim and other activist Goshen College students.
Give up perfection for just one day.
Feel yourself a creature of flesh and bone,
walk around in the cold, wind chafing
your face, joints jarring as your worn
soles pound concrete.
Keep walking till you face
your deepest failure—not
with clenched fists, not blinded
by shame, but with a detached
curiosity that opens to
compassion. Finger
the glazed wound tenderly
as you would caress the gash
in Christ’s side. You see
one doesn’t have to travel far
to know suffering, though you
may carry it to the ends of the desert
before you discover it’s yours.
Before you discover the light
failure lets into the darkness
look through the window
into that other human soul
wear it lightly
as God’s fingerprints.
All else is mirrors.
Christ was wounded
so he could be like you.
Reprinted with permission of the author.