I press my palm against the bark of ancient oak
and feel the pulse of centuries I'll never know
each ring a secret whispered in the dark,
each leaf a letter written in a language
that dies before I learn to read it.

The sky bleeds gold at evening's edge,
and I am small beneath its vastness,
a child with cupped hands
trying to catch the ocean.
Light travels ninety-three million miles
just to break against my retina,
for reasons I cannot name.

Why must we ache for answers
that crumble like autumn leaves
the moment we think we've grasped them?

I watch a sparrow build a nest
with such fierce certainty,
while I armed with all my questions,
all my telescopes and theories
still cannot fathom
why my heart beats
in rhythm with the tides,
why my breath follows
the same ancient pattern
as wind through wheat.

There is a mathematics to mourning,
a physics to the way grief bends light,
but no equation for the way
morning glory vines
know exactly when to open,
or why their purple faces
look like prayers.

I am haunted by the elegance
of things I'll never understand:
how photons dance themselves
into the green of summer grass,
how my grandmother's eyes
still live in mine.

The universe keeps its counsel
while dropping breadcrumbs
of beauty at our feet
a cardinal's call at dawn,
the perfect spiral of a shell,
the way rain sounds different
on every kind of pain.

We are archaeologists of wonder,
digging through the layers
of what we think we know,
only to find beneath each answer
ten thousand more questions,
each one more tender
than the last.

And maybe that's the point
not to solve the mystery
but to be worthy of it,
to let it break us open
again and again
until we are nothing
but grateful light
scattered across
the infinite dark.