(Today I am born again. Today I remember the journey)
Except from my journal: When I saw his eyes I knew it was the end. I saw those eyes for the first time and knew there was no life. The white of his eyes were yellow: pupils wondering aimlessly about them. The sockets might as well have been hollow. There was no light in there. I was looking at the place where God was. The place where a familiar spirit once resided, capable of stealing glances at me getting dressed for bed, seducing me when our eyes locked through the bureau mirror. Those empty eyes told his story.
I don’t need that picture of Jesus anymore hanging on my wall, around my neck, inside my head. That image of your invisible God can’t contain me anymore, with his long golden hair and his blood stained white skin. There is no curtain to blow open, no secret to unveil, no static to clear up, no smudge to clean of, no light to turn on, no form to take foot, no obstruction to clear, no conspiracy to unravel, no mask to remove, no myth to retell, no story to construct, no book to read, no dust to settle. I saw God this morning looking out my window at the rain falling over the city. I’m looking at him now in the reflection of my computer screen. I saw him last month in a hospital bet.
I was sitting at Steele’s bedside staring into his eyes. Steele was not there, but God was and he was talking to me in sign language. I couldn’t understand his form. I just keep seeing those eyes that weren’t like eyes, that stare that wasn’t like a stare. Steele’s eyes were empty. They were still jaundiced. His pupils were still black and shaped like pupils, enlarged by the sun, but they were empty. There was no one looking at me. There was an empty cavity and inside that cavity was God fully exposed in the light of day. It was as though Steele had to look away in order for me to see inside of him; to see beyond the intention of his vision, beyond the desire of his heart, into the root of it all. I was looking at Steele, but I was seeing God.