I have seen the gentle breeze
sieving through the leaves of a cottonwood tree
as if to count every one.

I have seen the summer wind
sending ripples of motion through an ocean of prairie grass,
each blade bent to the task
of pointing out the direction of passing.

I have seen the gales of winter
splintering thoughts and swirling a stifling stream of snow
as though God himself were angry with the world,
piling up the drifts and sifting out every sin
into piles of cold redemption.

I have not seen a cyclone
but as surely as I am known
I have seen its brutal work:
houses broken apart like a balsa bridge,
ridges stripped clean of standing timber
and wood driven through concrete.

For all that I have seen and dreamed,
for all that I haven’t and hope I never will,
whether in the stillness of a blue dawn’s rising,
the reverence of a red ball sunset,
or in the vast quiet of a full moon on a windless lake,
I will stake that all I have ever known of peace
has come in those moments of release

into the sure keeping of hands I cannot see,
hands greater than the wind,
hands that are surely shaping
the patterns of my life,
the steps of my path,
making sure that all things
work together
for my good.

H. Arnett
6/11/19