Puzzles That Teach

There’s a sense of perfect timing

when you just suddenly see

the fitting and the belonging

of things you thought mystery.

Picture puzzles have taught me much,

especially patience and humility.

You can know the Picture as Whole,

as One, with such joyful clarity

while piecing together its mystery-

pieces staring you in the face

as you wonder and search for answers-

as you ponder their pattern and place.

Sometimes right answers are wrong-

pieces that fit but don’t belong-

clues of frustration and futility

when feelings tell you something’s wrong.

Those are the times to step away

or look at them another way.

Turn it around and upside down.

Be like a little Child at play,

free and willing to be wrong

until answers truly fit and belong.

Then you’re ready to move on

to new challenges of the mind-

of mind and heart and soul-

Life’s own puzzles of every kind.

Whenever I’m ready and willing

to leave unworkable truths behind

or choose to really look once more

at puzzle pieces I might ignore,

then I surprise myself to find

what I just didn’t see before.

Whenever I face an a-mazing wall,

like a Child, I question it all.

Patterns of strife in our life,

human histories that so often repeat-

aggression, conquest, defeat-

such answers don’t belong

in the Picture of a World at Peace.

Those walls that bar Peace and confine

must puzzle us all from time to time.

The Child within us wants to play,

happy and healthy in every way.

January 11, 2022- Shelley Wilson