The Sage

The Sage – Melissa Eva Miller Was the sage left there for me? Tucked in a tight bundle of pungent leaves at the bottom of the basket with the other odds and ends. A little reminder that all is not right with my world; maybe just not completely balanced. Like the way the tea packet marked “joy” refused to open until I bit it hard and forced it to rip. But isn’t that what faith is? A bit of a struggle here and there to help calm the exuberance that threatens to bubble over in the blood and spill out wastefully? “So,” the sage tells me, leaving a velvety residue in the whorls of my fingertips, “That’s the fun of it, baby. And just think, you’ll do this for the rest of your life … just like I have in the hands of the faithful all over the world.” The sage sighs, letting off a tiny plume of omniscience. “Faith is all about figuring it all out and then realizing you left one shoe on a porch somewhere along the way.” “Well,” I tell the sage, “I can take it. Next time I see through something clearly, I won’t be surprised when I blink and the pane is replaced with a wavering piece of hand-made glass that I can’t make heads or tails of.” The sage chuckles a puff of fragrant smoke. “That’s what I’m talkin’ about, baby. That’s what I’m talkin’ about.”