In the Periphery

Sometimes 

there is nothing left 

for your hands to do—

and all that remains 

is trust. 

Sometimes 

you are not being carried, 

but steadied— 

given just enough strength 

to take 

one more step. 

Sometimes 

the miracle is not 

the mountain moving, 

but the voice within you 

whispering, 

keep going. 

And sometimes 

God is moving 

where you are not looking—

just beyond 

the edge of your understanding, 

in places your worry 

cannot reach. 

You will not see it 

while you are in it. 

But there will come a moment 

when you look back 

from higher ground 

and realize—

you were never alone, 

never abandoned 

to chance or collapse. 

What felt scattered 

was being arranged. 

What felt delayed 

was being aligned. 

This is how He keeps you—

not always by changing 

what is in front of you, 

but by working 

all around you, 

until even the unseen 

begins to hold you up. 

So look up—

not because the path is clear, 

but because He is. 

© Ron Simpson Jr. 

March 22, 2026 

One Small Flame

If one accepts the biblical account—

(and I do)

man began in an idyllic state,

a literal paradise

where everything 

was within reach.

Only one thing was withheld:

the fruit that would awaken

the knowledge of good and evil.

And man—being man—

desired the one thing denied.

It is in us

to reach beyond 

what is given,

to strain toward 

what is withheld.

This is not entirely a flaw. 

We trade 

the ease of the idyllic

for the weight 

of the meaningful.

Perhaps that trade

is the flame 

that keeps us human.

This is the paradox of choice—

we must leave comfort

to pursue what glitters beyond it.

But what is the limit

of our willingness to trade?

What will we pay

to slip the surly bonds of mediocrity?

To reach higher,

go deeper,

move faster,

be more?

What price do we assign

to transcendence?

Paradise, without risk, becomes a cage.

And we alone, of all creation,

will abandon comfort for meaning—

even when meaning wounds us.

There must be more.

So we leave the known,

face the undiscovered,

and return changed. 

But when the quest hollows the soul,

when hunger becomes drowning,

when speed becomes escape,

when ‘More’ becomes a substitute for meaning—

what then, 

are we unwilling to lose?

And yet—

even the wanderer

must keep one thing unbroken,

one ember untouched by ambition,

one truth that cannot be traded

for height or depth or speed.

For what is transcendence

if nothing of us remains

to be transformed?

What good is the horizon

if we lose the eyes that long for it?

What use is the beyond

if the self that arrives there

is only a shadow

of the one who began the journey?

It is better to arrive 

carrying one small original flame 

than to stand in ashes 

having forgotten 

what it was to burn 

© Ron Simpson Jr. 

March 20, 2026

The Tear

She doesn’t wipe the tear—

Not because it won’t fall 

But because she is not finished holding it 

She doesn’t wipe the tear—

not because it won’t fall,

but because she is mourning

the woman she used to be, 

and grief deserves a moment

to breathe.

She doesn’t wipe the tear—

not because she is weak,

but because she remembers

who she was, 

even as she learns

who she is now.

She doesn’t wipe the tear—

not because she is broken,

but because she is afraid

this version of herself

is not enough to be loved. 

She doesn’t wipe the tear—

not because she is lost,

but because she is searching

for the woman she was, 

unaware that the man beside her

has never stopped seeing her.

She doesn’t wipe the tear—

because she is grieving her old self 

while I am loving her whole self 

She doesn’t wipe the tear—

not because it won’t fall 

but because some grief 

must be held 

before it can be released 

© Ron Simpson Jr. 

March 18, 2026