God, who not often does this sort of thing,
swept down one day from invisible heaven
in front of a fourteen year old boy.

The question—which?

The answer—none.

Now, if this had happened at a White House
press conference, or at the Super Bowl,
you'd find camera flashes, a dozen microphones,
seventy-five million viewers, Peter Jennings,
and a Nike commercial (during which God would pause
to sip a soon-to-be-popular brand of bottled water).
Within fifteen seconds all wars would end,
teachers would get paid what they're worth,
ten thousand corrupt politicians would resign and join the Red Cross,
and the Red Sox would win the World Series.

But it happened in a New England forest—
an average spring day, partly cloudy,
highs in the mid-sixties.
On that same day, somewhere in Delhi,
a man smoked his last cigar before a British firing squad,
two thirteen year-old newlyweds met for the first time,
and Gandhi's great-grandfather
meditated before a statue of Brahma.

It happened that God came down in a New England forest
right in front of a boy and a cliché of singing birds,
and in translucent white, with a straight face,
said, Go change the world.

It happened that the boy walked home,
said nothing to his parents,
and planted an acre of corn before dinner.

It happened on a lovely morning.