the invitation

so I see this picture in my mind of children
running, playing, laughing, being childish

I see him in a field, chasing grasshoppers as they hop and fly
I see her eating ice cream topped with every-colored-kind-of-sprinkle
I see endless fun,
boundless energy,
uninhibited joy.

I see one child in particular and I watch as she goes;
without boundary or guidance, throughout her day.

She eats anything she desires, spilling crumbs and leaving smudges on her face.
I watch as she pulls at game after game, leaving pieces where they lay
 and chooses something new to play.

I observe her bouncing, jumping, leaping, twirling on a trampoline.
I watch as she ignores adult voices, disregards insight and correction.
I see her as she grows, becoming more self-focused, less caring,
more determined to feed her appetite for pleasure and for desire.

I see her dirty; clothes carelessly torn, fingernails bit to the quick, I see bangs clumsily cut, hanging haggardly off her face.  She becomes more and more wild, fowl, crude, and disgraceful.

Then, as she explores further and further from home,
I see her approach a gated pavilion with carefully trimmed hedges and beautifully grown flowers.
This place of wonder and delight is like nothing she's ever seen.

Quickly, she approaches the gate and confidently tugs at the latch.  It's locked.
She watches, from the barrier in front of her, as children play and laugh, run and work, clean and weed, sweep and pick up, create and maintain a space more lovely than she can imagine.

She longs to get in.  She tries to climb the fence, but stumbles and falls each time.
She calls out to the children playing and tending the garden,
but they don't understand her words,
cannot make out her language,
do not hear her pleas.

And then, a master gardener approaches;
gleaming as white as snow,
as brilliant as sun,
and as warm as a summer day.

She looks up woefully,
solemnly.

I want to enter, she says.
The gardener smiles.

How can I come in, she asks.
You must become clean, he replies.
How do I get clean, she wonders aloud.

Go to the river below and wash.
Leave behind your wayward and selfish ways,
leave behind your desire to be in control,
to want and to do only what you like, and
choose to come to my garden and follow my ways, he explained.

Uncertain what to do, for she liked her ways and she liked her life, she turned and walked away.

Not today, she called.
My way is better, she cried.
Maybe some other time, she stated and ran.

The gardener smiled as tears ran down his face.
What he offered her was life changing.
What he had would be so much better than her best day.
He wisely knew what she'd choose.
It is, after all, a choice.