The maze is beautiful
Lush deep shrubs
Seven, maybe eight
Feet tall
The path is smooth
No sign of rocks
To stumble me
Or crevasses
To sink me

The sun is warm
Not hot
Warm and bright
Not too bright
Right bright


Why can’t I move
What are these cords
These invisible tender tight
Cords
That hold me in place


What was the name of that child’s game
Indian something, I think
That strange small
Accordion tube
Soft and colorful
You put a finger in each end
When you pulled
To free your fingers
You were stuck

The harder you pulled
The harder the tube resisted
Fingers stuck
That sweet panic started
Titillating almost scary
Almost arousing
To be stuck
By such a colorful playful
Bit of nothing
But to know
All you had to do was relax
Stop pulling your fingers apart
Pull one while the other pushed forward
And the stuckness vanished
A magician’s illusion
Your fingers were soon free
So you did it again


Relax
Relax again
And the binds will loosen
Relax and you will
Walk through the maze
Enjoying the challenge
Until the worry binds again 
And you forget to relax


You forget
Again
To remember 
The loving Family
Mother God
Father God
Brother God
Bound together
With Holy Loving Spirits
Waiting
Just outside the maze
Knowing
You will find your way
Sending
Confidence and love
On the warm sunshine
Laser cutting those invisible
Binding
Ropes 

Above the ground
Not very far
The swing reaches
Two long arms
High above
To the first strong branch
But can climb no higher

Until the child comes
In the twilight
As the sun hangs
Reluctant
To leave entirely
Painting the clouds
Rose and gold

The child sits
But not to stay
Quietly in one place
No 
Hands grasp, holding 
The swing’s long arms
Feet stir, scraping
Earth as
The child swings

Up to the rose and gold west
Back through the brown earth
Feet kiss the ground in passing
Back up to the ever darkening east
The child swings

Back and forth

And the swing shouts
For the joy
Of its long arms
Swinging, singing
Free

I remember
Letting my toddlers choose their own clothes
Even when the choices were absurd
Because their growth
Was more important
Then their looks
Or even their comfort

So sometimes
They wore rain boots
On sunny days
Shorts on snowy days
And always
Were colorfully mismatched

I think of my grown children
One has not spoken to me in years
I have a granddaughter I have never seen
One is more comfortable texting than talking
One I see regularly but not often

I think of the years I spent
Becoming comfortable with that
Reality
Not the fairytale of through the woods
Over the hills
To grandma’s house
Smelling of camphor
(what the hell is camphor anyway?)
And homemade cookies

I think of my pleasure
That each of my children
Enjoy their lives
Never trouble free
But less troubled, perhaps,
Than their own childhoods
Now with their own
Families
Their own
Stability

I think of my prayers
Every time I am tempted
To be envious
Of the Facebook stories
Of other grandparents

I think of my prayers
Affirming my love 
For my own children
Praying my gratitude
For their happiness
Enjoying my accomplishment
In three wonderful adults

Then I half remember
Jesus’s parable or story or something
Ending in a question
Something like
If an earthly parent would do so for their child
How much more will your heavenly parent do for you?

And I wonder
Is God perhaps less interested in world peace
Than in my own peace?