Life is a picture puzzle,
but we do not know of what.

We can sit, looking blankly at the pieces,
waiting for someone to tell us how it should end up before we start.
Or, we can get busy, playing with the pieces that are in front of us,
seeing if we can get some of them to fit together.

I know now, after many years
of trying to make the pieces into a picture I was told to be of value,
that the picture is like a cloud
floating across a lazy summer afternoon blue sky…

it is what we imagine it to be,
and only has value if it comes from our own imagination.

The hardest part of this life
is knowing that the puzzle is not meant to stay:
the moment that it comes together and the picture is clear,
it begins to fall apart again.

There is sadness in the displayed frustration, desperation,
of people who fight to keep their puzzle together, to keep the picture clear.
They work to force other to see it, and argue for them to value it.

But there is pride in quietly watching others
take the pieces that fall away from our once complete puzzle,
and use them in building their own…

like cautious, timid little birds
snapping up small twigs for their nest.

From a dream I had the other night.