Between the Rooftop and the Name

By: Nathan Fletcher

I did not ask for fire or sign,

Nor bargain sight for borrowed proof,

I only stood where silence thinned

Along the ridgeline of a roof.

The world was still its common self…

A chair, a road, the ache of days,

Yet something stood above the frame,

An outline drawn in lifted praise.

Not flesh, not voice, not weight nor will,

No trumpet split the evening air,

Only the sense that worship lives

Where height and watching overlap prayer.

They did not speak. They did not point.

They did not crown me seer or friend.

They only were…like hands held still

To say: This moment does not end.

And I did not kneel to what I saw,

Nor chase it down the line of sight,

For faith is not the act of grasp

But walking on without the light.

John whispers: Let the image pass,

Do not be fed by borrowed flame.

I answer softly: I did not cling…

I only learned the weight of Name.

Teresa counts the truer signs:

Not thrill nor tears nor lifted breath,

But whether love survives the night

And kindness outlives fear of death.

I tell her: Yes, it humbles me…

Not special, chosen, raised above,

But sober in the gift of choice

To answer truth with acts of love.

Eckhart breaks language like dry bread,

Says: God is not what eyes can keep.

I smile, because I did not stay…

I saw the mark and moved my feet.

For God is found where hands are worn,

Where mercy stoops without a name,

Where someone gives what cannot last

And calls the losing holy gain.

Theologians sharpen tidy lines,

Fence mystery with careful creed,

As if the Infinite requires

A ledger to defend His speed.

But faith…true faith…does not demand

The final word, the sealed decree,

It holds the ache of I don’t know

And calls that space fidelity.

Calvin pours tea with furrowed brow,

Afraid we’ll shrink the Holy One.

I nod and say: I share that fear…

Which is why I refuse to run

From wonder, or from silence too,

Or from the God who will not stay

Contained by systems built of words

That beg the dark to go away.

If God could write His story down,

It would not start with power’s throne,

But with a breath across the dust

And love that learns to walk alone.

The book would swell with ordinary names,

With losses held and promises kept,

With angels standing where we build

Our roofs…and guard the tears we wept.

Not there to prove, not there to rule,

But there because all things are seen,

Because the Holy never sleeps

Between what is and what has been.

So let them rise along the edge

Of vision’s thin and trembling seam.

I will not chase, I will not crown,

I will not trap them in a scheme.

I will live kind. I will stay small.

I will stay open, unafraid.

Emptied not closed, made less to hold

The gift that love has always made.

For wisdom walks with quiet steps,

While knowledge builds a louder throne,

And God remains…beyond our reach,

Yet closer than we’ve ever known.