a place for you

New baby as analogy of Heaven: sweet thing gets to leave the hospital today. Still brand new, she actively searches with her eyes all around her when alert. She recognizes the faces by now, probably; the voices, for certain. But the hospital environs as well?

Perhaps she thinks the stiff bassinet is what will contain her every day. Perhaps she thinks the tiled ceilings her only cover, fluorescent squares her only light. Perhaps she thinks those hospital flannels her only swaddling, only warmth. Perhaps she thinks all those big faces and hands poking and prodding and measuring, all of them parts of her ongoing existence.

If she only knew.

She will soon trade stiff for downy soft; tiled heights for painted smoothness; lighted squares for glowing circle. She will soon trade standard-issue flannel for chosen coziness; investigative movement for loving embrace. She will actively search home when finally home.

All this around us? All we know? Even when familiar and comfy and safe it will pale to the reality of our eternal home in ways only our active seeking when there will make known. It is what it is, this current existence. But if only we knew.