Bio: Ian David Clark is a senior at Peninsula High School in Gig Harbor, WA, and works on the school newspaper. His essay "Poetry" is a personal account of a mission he took during the summer of his freshman year

“POETRY”
By Ian David Clark

I: Travel
On sunny days I used to watch the dust spiral up from the road and drift skyward back toward home. I was traveling far away and sometimes I woke up in the morning when the dawn was dark and I had forgotten where I was. When I watched the dust rise from the road, sifting and stretching into vague shapes, I knew that the wind would carry it along plains, over mountains, across streams and into the woods where home lay.
As I recall, the road was long and stretched to white when it met the deep horizon. It meandered along as if it had no idea where its destination lay or if it existed. It extended past houses and stores and wandering farmers until it came to the Gateway, the place I called home for the summer.
For five weeks I lived and worked at a mission base in Mexico. I was on a work crew that took care of the base, and every morning I woke up before sunrise to fill plastic barrels with water for the missionary teams. After prayer time and breakfast, I helped the rest of the crew clean bathrooms, prepare food and generally keep the base running smoothly. It was a new world, and I didn’t know where I was.
On some mornings I woke up when insects fell from the ceiling and landed on my chest. When this happened I would send the bug flying into the humid gloom of the dormitory with a violent jerk and then fall back onto my cot to think.
I thought about home. I was missing lots of good mountain bike rides and by the time I got back home, school would control most of my time. I didn’t want to be responsible or work or do anything, really. More than anything, I seriously doubted that I was up to the task of growing up.
While these thoughts flipped and somersaulted in my head, I sat and waited until the alarm clock announced the arrival of morning.

II: Philosophy
Ron had the strangest habit of always driving slightly off the road. He never veered completely from the safety of black asphalt, but he always strayed close to the edge of untamed gravel. He was fond of rolling the window down, dangling his hand out into the open air and listening to loud, blaring country music. He loved high speeds and the Holy Spirit and he was one of my best friends.
Once a week we walked down to Nena’s hamburger stand to grab some food. After ordering, we propped our feet up and philosophized grandly while watching chickens scurry around the local farms.
“What are you going to do with you life?” Ron asked me one day.
The question caught me off guard. “What?” I asked.
“What are you going to do with your life?” He took a sip from his soda and thumbed idly through his leather bound Bible. “What will you do? Will you continue walking with God, or will you go back to everything you knew?”
I didn’t know. I was fifteen, restless and clueless. I glanced up at Ron, and my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth.
“What will you do?”

III: Sin
My friend John once told me that he saw his sin, and he was actually being serious.
He told me the story while walking in the village after dinner. At night the road was pitch black except for the feeble glow of a few sickly street lamps. The darkness formed a wall in front of me, and I was unable to see a thing.
As we walked, hands thrust deep in our pockets, John began his story: One night he awoke when he heard his door open. A man, dressed as a priest, slithered through the crack and stood watching him. A sinister gloom grew in the room. John collapsed in fright and woke up the next morning bewildered.
John said that he didn’t know whether the incident was real or a dream, but the story put me on edge. The dark night seemed to close in around us and I felt like a hunted animal in the forest. Every shadow hid a sneering devil and the pallid glow of the street lamps sent sickening feelings of dread darting up my spine. The world was primal, predatory and brimming with danger.
Back in the dorm, I stared at the ceiling and wondered when I would see my sin. I shuddered and tried to sleep.

IV: Prayer
In the morning I walked to the prayer garden to watch dawn spread her fingers across the flat landscape and paint life into it. As I sat on the bench and listened to the stone fountain chatter incessantly, the mission stirred to resentful consciousness and hazy heat grew over the wandering road. It was the best spot at the Gateway and I went there to be alone.
The organic silence of the prayer garden was a therapeutic medicine that carried me through each day’s chores. My routine was simple: I sat and studied delicate petals of light sweep across the rose horizon.
Being outside when the world sleeps soundly under a starlight blanket is unlike anything else. The time before dawn is mysterious, powerful, confusing and awful. It’s a time for brooding, a time for questions, the only time in the day in which you can seriously search for your soul.
The prayer garden was the dock from which I could sail to dark and forgotten corners of the psyche. Sometimes I set out on a calm sea with a fair wind. At other times I weathered storm-tossed whitecaps etched by explosions of lightening in the sky. No matter which, I always let loose the lines and readied the tiller for the morning’s voyage.
That’s all prayer really is, in any case: a long, sometimes dangerous journey followed by a swift and reliable sunrise.

V: Building
We raised the walls of the house in the middle of a forgotten village on the outskirts of the city. The day was hot and humid, and sweat rolled down my back as I helped the missionary crew drag cumbersome wooden structures through the dirt. Hammer strokes echoed through the heavy air as nails wedged themselves into plywood fibers and ragged coughs broke through the dust.
We were building the house for an old woman. At even intervals she came to check up on us, a smile wrinkling her leathery face. The house consisted of a single room, but she was grateful nonetheless.
The village was a small and simple place. Palm trees guarded the road and stretched upward to meet the spotless sky, their wide leaves expanding like fingers. Dirty and squalid homes nudged up against one another and children played in overgrown yards. The largest building was a stone church with peeling paint and muddy walls.
The heat of the sun beat on our backs as we labored. At noon we broke for lunch and retired to a grassy expanse to eat. After our meal, we returned to the work site.
Now that the walls stood steady and secure, the next step was to paint and put up rafters. I helped another missionary hoist the heavy beams to the top of the walls, and then climbed up after him to begin nailing them in.
We had to tread cautiously as we moved along the walls, securing the rafters as we went. The spikes were thick, several inches long and a formidable foe for any mallet. My companion and I worked quietly, losing ourselves in the solid rhythm of our hammers as they pounded the spikes home.
I wiped my forehead and looked up at the great blue sky. It was closer than I had thought and it seemed to open like a hungry, searing maw. The heat of the sun was violent, rugged and unforgiving. I returned doggedly to my work.
We finished installing the rafters late in the afternoon. My companion and I leapt down from the walls and surveyed our work. The house was a silent skeleton standing amidst the squalor of the village, but the old woman was grateful.

VI: Friendship
Rafael lived in a tiny house in the village surrounding the Gateway. He was a skinny, smiling kid, and his gap-toothed grin spread across his face in one big fluid movement. He wore floppy red sandals and he liked to eat.
I was supposed to teach Rafael English, but we spent most of our time goofing off. I didn’t speak a word of Spanish and he couldn’t understand English, but laughter filled our language gap and it was more than enough to communicate with.
Every day after our English lesson I gave Rafael a piggy-back ride home. He slapped my shoulder and giggled helplessly as my feet pounded the dusty road. When I reached the house I collapsed and caught my breath while Rafael tumbled onto the soft grass.
Then Rafael got sick. I remember him sitting on the toilet, his hands clasped in his lap. He raised his head, and his eyes were glazed. He staggered out of the bathroom and vomited on the floor. I remember his mother hugging him tightly, her tears dripping into the strands of his black hair.
Rafael recovered the day I left the Gateway. When he regained his health, I regained something as well. As Rafael said good-bye, I realized that he taught me far more than I had ever taught him - he taught me the beauty of a piggy-back ride.

VII: Home
My childhood ended there. I continued to grow and mature when I came home, but I wasn’t a kid anymore. The frivolous activities of youth no longer satisfied. Slowly but surely, restlessness settled over me.
I still didn’t know where I was. I had thought the trip to Mexico would result in an epiphany, but it left me with a jumbled mass of memories instead.
I remember Rafael, smiling and laughing and running along the road in his floppy red sandals; Ron swerving in and out of traffic while discussing the intricate history of classic country music; John confronting his sin as the night obscured his face; the prayer garden under the hot summer sun; the toiling backs of workers building a house.
Mexico taught me that life is for crazy, untamable sons of the wilderness. Life is something elusive that disappears one day before you appreciate it. Life is a beautiful woman standing at the ocean’s shore, watching the tide roll in.
It’s all poetry, really. That’s all it ever is.