Take My Hand

I reached out my hand to an unknown man.
I asked him, “Can you show me the sights of my new uncharted land”?
He pointed to a far sky, a never ending scene of life.
This stranger handled his manner, and his habitual ways in strife.
Yet, for him it was all a past, a now, and a future.
The waters were murky, and filled with time that has yet to pass.
He looked around, saw all that was good, all that was bad, all that was created, that he had nurtured.
The sands have blown, the Earth pillaged, the man stood alone.
He told me, “I hear the weak, I see the strong, I hold the dying, and I feel their moans.
They all come to me; I am their father, their teacher, their support.
I will not remove my face from your soul; you will not use me for sport.”
He has taken enough of the ridicule, the laughter and the tears.
“I have given you all, yet through my heart you throw spears.
The unfamiliar, has no meaning, for I am familiar with those in need.
I’ve sat and watched, looked and studied, harassed, mingled and created. I am the seed, as I give in abundance, I also receive.”
His weathered face, turned toward the sky, “All this I have seen, and all this I will relieve.
“I’ve requested your assistance on many occasions, and once you replied with a gesture of your hand. Should I accept the offering or deny the advance?”
Deeply he looked into my eyes, deeply he looked into my soul, I could see then as he accepted my hand, this may be the last chance.
“Come with me, sit with me, and listen as I teach.
You have crossed some roads, and I was not pleased, but I have accepted you because you did reach.
You have tried and failed many times, but I knew all along that you would one day come to me, be it in life or now, after.
I have always been here, through the good, the bad, ups and downs, through all the sad times and through the laughter.
As you sit here with me, I am the judge, but you decided your own fate.
I will forgive all that I have seen; I will not condemn my own family, for you are my son. I have forgiven you and together we will walk through this gate.”


Rick and Pam