The picture, speaking of itself,
not shaping something else we know;
imagines mystery makes it glow
beyond all earthly sight can show.
Immersed within this mystic scheme,
we fathom hidden depths and dream
at one with all unseen, unheard,
beyond the frame of human word.

Perhaps some music might reveal,
enable us to sense or feel,
beyond our fabled view or skill,
this something other, yet unreal,
the vision that we strain to reach,
this truth evading human speech?
Unknowing cloud you hide from view
embodied beauty, light and true.

We feel that once we caught a glimpse
that dancing melody or art,
that tumbled language could not phrase,
could not contain, the least impart;
and so remembering we pause
outside what seem like shuttered doors
until the clouds disperse and fly,
till love and beauty hear our sigh.

© Andrew Pratt 8/5/2017
Responding to words of Marcus Borg