118 - Signpost

Signpost
By Kevin Hadduck

Like everyone who walks
In the dark along a low road
Leading into town, he comes
To a crossing and no moon
No star shows him where to go

So he stands like a signpost
With no words no direction
No pillar of smoke for guide
No bold woman competing
With monotonous harlots
No one-in-a-thousand preacher
Calling 'young man come away'
No stones whispering
A prelude to his praise

So he stands at two roads
Hoping for a revelation
And knowing this
If he could justify one step
And all the alterations of the world
That step would bring
He could explain the intersection
Of Heaven and Earth and the why
Of a body hung on a crossing
Of two timbers at the end of all roads
Leading to Jerusalem

So he stands like a signpost
At the meeting of two roads

Kevin Hadduck is Assistant Professor of English at King College in Bristol, Tennessee. His poetry and essays have appeared in The Christian Century, The Other Side, the Journal of the American Medical Association, and other journals.