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 33 Embers Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action. And by this we will know that we are from the truth and will reassure our hearts before him whenever our hearts condemn us. John 3:17–20 Chasms hidden between words, volumes resounding, the only presence steadfast as midnight leaves, present as the hours of the day—a man’s body beneath a streetlamp as the photo negative of despair: the stain on the camera, not like God’s insight. He burns off embers of his life as his cigarette slowly extinguishes itself, his gray flannel suit a hypocrisy of fashion as he stands in front of Mount Carmel Hospital waiting for the test results of a friend at twelve in the evening: as his life is not as straightlaced as it seems. He could look at me forever, sorry to say, because even in times like these I may appear attractive. I have a sadness which breaks as God’s light across a bay, the only space left to us the one which we keep—that loss the only light from the ember of a cigarette in His presence, leaves crinkling in the easy breeze, within the loose shadows ringing the perimeter of the parking lot. ...

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