Paradox – a poem by Tina Williams

Paradox

Flip over and float, 
she said after I confessed 
two-thirds into Deuteronomy
that I wasn’t sure about God
and that my mind was tortured.
She was a Baptist
in a Methodist house,
I was a doubter 
in a room full of faith
and there in front of God 
and five witnesses
with their Bibles open to the part 
where it says you may eat any animal 
that has a split hoof divided in two 
and that chews the cud,
a miracle began.
I closed my eyes.
I flipped over and floated.
But after a few months
of God holding my 
bobbing soul up 
till belief returned, 
he let go, gently pushing 
me to the shore
where I’m as certain today
there is no god
as I am that nothing less 
set me free.

Tina Williams lives in Austin, TX. Her poems have appeared in Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, the New Verse News and Concho River Review.