i.

run! run to beauty!

 

ii.

 

a silhouette couple

stares into the distance

phones up – in sync –

an instagrammable moment.

phones down – together again –

perfectly petrified pixels,

but not at all like the real thing.

 

they can’t turn away

and neither can i

the orange and pink

keep reaching, reaching towards infinity

and i almost reach back . . .

 

instead, i too reach for my phone

a 3×5 disgrace of a copy and—

i turn and run for home.

 

iii.

my rebel t3i high-definition could capture this but the futility becomes apparent when i realize my camera was left at work undeterred i bound up stairs past sister and friend in a frenzy ask where my sister’s camera is but she doesn’t know so i shout i must capture beauty my friend replies you can’t capture beauty but i barely hear and the camera is found and i grasp it in victory turn it on the battery is dead.

at this point i just need to see it again so i run down sidewalks i’ve walked a hundred times the colors retreating from pleading eyes, darkening behind Nashville’s own Giant’s Causeway at Dragon Park and my heart sinks as i

r          e          a          c          h

as blazing sky-fingers

turn back into sun’s palm

yet from the horizon, a lingering song:

iv.

run! run to beauty!

the fleeting makes it fair

old age, cancer, shootings, fear

the fleeting you can bear

stop running, mind, towards what you hate

start running, heart, towards greater grace

oh fragile feelings, fleeting too,

beauty one day will stay with you