Who Am I?

What a hard and tricky question!

It’s obvious that I am Paul,

but let me offer this suggestion:

A name, alone, cannot be all.

I could as easily have been

Carlos, Friedrich, Piet or Abel.

As who I am, that’s mighty lean.

A name is but a label.

Should I cite my occupation,

scientist, software engineer,

provider of education?

But identity’s not career.

From other cultures comes a clue:

To state your true identity,

say whom you are related to;

tell stories of community.

From that expanded point of view,

I come to this conclusion:

To think I know completely who

I am is a delusion.

For now, I have it but in part,

a fractured piece of who I am.

But on the day when stops my heart,

face to face with the great I Am,

I’ll know.

Copyright ©2018, Paul H. Harder II

This poem is licensed under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND 4.0 License.