Got a text from my angel, on the move these days.

“How R U?,” she asks. “In LA. Auditioning for American Idol.”

How is it going?

“Grt. Good on high notes.  Randy hates me. I miss Simon.”

My angel is on the way to see her father, across that river,

taking that train a’comin, where faith is all you need to get aboard,

you just have to thank the Lord.

I’m nervous, she says. My annual evaluation.

I have not performed to expectations. Mine or his.

He will ask me, she texts,  why so many people

have forgotten to give the poor some joy, or to laugh,

or love much.

The world has forgotten, her father thinks,

that love is the reason for everything, the point.

The poor and the animals are his children, she says.

He is not happy.

Should I tell him, she asks, that some people

can no longer hear the magic and the music?

And she signed off. “XXOOXX.” Sorry to be so distant, she said.

The angry and the fearful and joyless drain me, she says,

and I am tired. “Thank God for my Ipad. Enuf of me. How R U?”

My angel is turning pages, clicking away on her browser,

reading the blogs faithfully. Keeping relevant, like everyone else. Looking for broadband. Hard to keep up.

Suddenly, she is offline.

“Call Customer Service,” her return reply says. “Angel Support. Your pleas and prayers are important to us.

If we are unavailable,please contact your nearest agent or lawyer.”

And I text her back and try to help.

And I suggest that she understand,

on the road to the promised land,

that Satan wears a suit and tie, and sells fear and war

and warnings and medicine,

and health insurance and IRA’s,

and has made the world an argument, in disguise as a Good Samaratin and  seer.

I told her that good and evil sometimes look the same,

but love and light can never lie.