Holding Peace

I’m trying not to say the wrong thing
to my oldest son in his twenty-fifth year—
the same flaw-riddled age as Joseph
when he translated the plates.

He too is a man of limited education
and less means. He bristles
and fidgets when I counsel,
glows from within when I praise,

shivers in the night
at visions of the future,
and wakes with the surety
that he’s forgotten something important.

Little wonder such a one might deliver
his trust to the undeserving—
such a one who cannot always tell
the wicked from the righteous.

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