I don't feel particularly focused today.~Journal entry, August 13, 2025

I'm about to go meet my husband in Italy soon. I realize that looking toward travel brings a need to be more alert, to notice things more aptly. I won't have the comfort of my mother tongue, so must sharpen my focus on foreign words, foreign signs. I must rev up my trust in God, walk toward my opposite from anxiousness to following the clear-voiced command from God not to fear. I couldn't quite get any words around an essay to write, so turned to poetry, rather an unfamiliar communication style, not unlike my limited Italian. Another author, Ericka Clay, has encouraged me to start trying my hand at poetry. You will love her work at erickaclay.com. She is a talented, prolific writer and Christ follower. She even offers many of her books for free.

Here's my go at encapsulating my thoughts and feelings in a different genre. Thank you dear readers for being here. I appreciate you. 

CONTRAST

Unfocused.

My vision blurred.

Some days I'm comfortable allowing the indistinct, the myopic perspective.

I don't want details.

Let me relax inside the indefinite, the sketch.

Yet this place has me trapped with its invisible edges.

I crave sharpness, the fine dark relief of your pen outlining my heart.

I don't want the obstruction of tears.

I need the contrast of clear-eyed vision.

Permit me to see beyond the mist, view the mountain in the distance.

Help me ascend.

I'll grip that vintage, torn map and trace the curved route with my fingertip upward to you.

I'll move from the shadows into the sunlight.

For without you, there is not even the contours of the trees in my line of sight.

Without you it is midnight.