The Recovery of Curiosity

Where, is a necessary word for those of us who need guidance.
When, is also critical should we desire life’s rich, hot, savory soufflé.
Who is almost inestimable in its value for us as relational creatures who
supra-consciously mimic our way into becoming human.
And if these three are crucial, imagine the gold mine of How.
But if I were to pick winner-most-essential it would have to be Why.

That’s because losing your Why
(and the longing to find it),
is like entering a flat dry wilderness without
language to name it or make sense of it.

And while I’m here, consider: there’s no noun
for the way a childhood,
of isolation or humiliation,
can break and carry a weight for so long, for so far.

There’s no verb for accidentally dropping a confidence,
and betraying a friend.

And can anybody find the particular expression
for a receiving a predawn phone call from police?

or for seeing your lover — the one you knew would last —
laughing with another
after a still-fresh separation?

or for the way your brother tried to say what it was like
sitting with mother on her last night?
how time swelled then collapsed in a single sigh.

But then, (wondrous paradox!)
there’s no idiom for resurfacing —

no line for how the sun can peek over a ridge
part the mist and inch along the rug beside your bed
to climb those few remaining feet to your covers,
which you lift, set aside and rise to your feet —

no participial phrase for noting the kind eyes of a counsellor,
friend or partner; and the way a fresh narrative can flood
the body’s millions of cellular rinks
to where a lowercase Why begins to form
on the far banks of a veiled lake.

No clause or even colloquialism for ordinary new days,
and the way a fledgling faith takes you out walking —
returning home with a growing list: colours
of arbutus trunks, white water reappearing from a cracked culvert,
a mix of rain and sun on your tongue,
a conversation in Safeway with a custodian named Joan.

Clearly, there’s no accurate adjective for what seems like an accident:
the strengthening of a heart
through the gradual recovery
of curiosity.

And permit me to add, there’s no one word
(in this fear-fuelled world of loss and aggressive indifference),
for deep listening —
and for a tough devotion to speaking —
to knowing when —
even if few are listening.

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This was inspired by Tony Hoagland’s, Special Problems with Vocabulary, and by a course in ‘deep listening’, and a conversation with my wife Deb. 

The photo was taken this summer on some corner of a mid-western American city.