Then We Shall Know Fully
On a January night I saw stars, roaring lanterns, thunder in the massive silence of an echo-holding sky above a fragile world, half woven of frosted roots and grasses; and the cold field swayed, glittered vaguely, oblivious to the universe’s swelling scale of sounds, never apprehending the unheard noise surging over the mute and thousand throngs. Fire beyond lightness, sound beyond voice, speed beyond time, You smolder in each fragment of my being, and each moment I cannot not grasp You. But You burn, and You flare, and Your blinding riddles sear my senses, You shatter the shell of my stubborn dullness, stun and irradiate my unawareness. There is the breath of a murmur, and I listen for the fierce and avid voice of distant stars: Saints, sparking and shimmering in the lightest glance of God; and marveling, adrift on the insentient sea of grasses, I see the awesome beacons of their love and passion; watchful for flickers of their wild discoveries, marks of their outlandish strides, and strains and trails of their blazing song.
—Maria D. Byars
Maria D. Byars studied at the University of St Andrews, Scotland for an MA Hons in English Literature, and then completed an MSc in Development Studies at the London School of Economics and Political Science, England. She works for a charity called Scottish International Relief.
