Strange Luck
Brandon Cook
It seems strange that
So much destiny
Is rooted in misadventure and chance, uncontrolled, and happenstance
No one asks to be born
No one knows in advance who their parents will be
(On which so very much depends)
And no one chooses their native soil
A great throw of the dice, then
To step mute and blind into the bright world
And how does God stand at that table, a bystander,
To see what’s rolled?
How does God stand the endless letting go?
He becomes like a bartender wondering at the sad swan songs, drowned in alcohol,
All around Him
The shipwrecks of so many tender souls, bereft of hope
In the mis-adventure and the course of life
Any fate can be overcome
But still,
The beginning imprints so very much
Like hot wax sealed over a human heart—
How your parents looked at you
How they raised their hands
To love or strike you
And how they measured up to life itself
All the while:
The grass does not curse its mother
She is faithful as the father sun above
And the earth does not toil or labor or spin
But then again
The trees around us so easily fulfill their desires
And
The field mice have no drunken fathers
The birds of the air no unfaithful sires