Most days I wake with hope,
which is to say a willingness
to keep trying. Just tonight
I read the study about rats
where they put them in glass jars
full of water. Most of them quickly
stopped swimming and drowned,
even the wild rats renowned
for being good swimmers.
But with the next round of rats,
the researcher from time to time
would put his hand in the jar
and lift the rats out. Just knowing
such a lift were possible was enough
to make the rats continue to swim
and they survived. And I wonder,
then, whose hand is lifting me these days,
reaching just often enough into my jar?