Near Light

My wife is hummingbird. My daughter is sun though we call her Raney. My father is dead and deer now. I see him all the time. He looks like The Great Prince of the Forest from Bambi. Every now and then he gazelles over my car and I almost hit him and he almost dies again. My next-door neighbor sees ghosts, too. Once she saw a dead chief in her bedroom, on a horse. He offered her a peace pipe I think. I’m also pretty sure Lazarus is the woman in one-o-five-d. When she walks her dog, she floats. Only the leash keeps her tethered to here.

I have a friend I call Brother who stands in hurricanes looking for his lost sons. I have a sister who lives alone and collects stone hearts. I know a beautiful woman who can shape shift into a swan. I know another beautiful woman who wishes she could transfigure every bullet casing into a flower vase. I know an asshole down the street. I’ve never met him, but I know he’s an asshole because he has a sign on his front porch that says “I’m an asshole.”

I live on Bethlehem Road. It must be the Bethlehem where Jesus was born because all the lawn signs say “Thank you, Jesus.” Damascus Road is five minutes from me. I drive down it almost every day but have yet to have a Damascus Moment. My eldest daughter saw Him when she was five though. She said his skin is blue because he lives in the sky. I’ve never seen any god. But I did hear something one night in Botswana I thought was a god. He was singing a requiem for whales. The next morning our guide said it was just a bull elephant breathing outside our tent. I didn’t believe him.

I am certain I saw a host of angels in Mexico, however. They were camouflaged as a coven of hellboys to scare the shit out of the real evil in the world. They were stupid drunk on mezcal because real evil scares the shit out of them, too. It’s tough duty being an angel on earth.

(From an extensive project on the Devils of San Martin de Tilcajete, Mexico.)

“Only if there are angels in your head will you ever, possibly, see one.” - Mary Oliver