poetry: the name of God

[prismaticbleed]

"We don't speak the name of God,"
devoted souls all over the world whisper in warning,
as if the concept itself was enough to engender blasphemy
(as in the way you say my beloved,
knowing immediately the touch of a hand, a face, a name--)

but one night long ago, in bethlehem,
a young jewish girl smiled in starlight and whispered in reply,
"yeshua,"
my son, my child, my beloved,
my Joshua,
my Jesus,
my God.
(we don't speak the name--)

it's unthinkable, unthinkable.

how do you imagine it?
what does God look like?
but no, that's easy enough.
God looks like the dew on a rose, like sunrise on snow, like light in a prism. God looks like constellations and butterfly wings and all those other cherished cliches that pour out of our mouths when we are moved by the beauty of Creation, His Creation, touched by His hands in time beyond time.
that's easy enough. but that's not how god looks when he has a name.
that's not what is so terrible, so beyond thought that we shrink from it like feathers from flame.
what does god look like if he looks like you?

little yeshua curls his tiny fingers in the warm wool of a sheep.
mary presses her soft lips to his soft forehead.
what does god look like?
he looks like---

it's unthinkable, unthinkable.

but there he is, lying in a manger,
and the oxen are thinking about it more than you
and the angels weep with joy in the stellated heavens.

we don't speak the name of God.
oh, but why don't we?
is he not my beloved?
is he not my Jesus, too?


to name is to know.

could your heart be so bold?
what if his heart was, first?