Dance With the Runaways

Dance With the Runaways

(“And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.” Acts 13:52)

The time passes like a semi on the highway.
The rain hits like pellets of joy. The wind was from the south
and warmed the mid-September air. There was nothing foolish
about spending the day outside.

Words were scarce as he searched for enough to fill a page or a pail;
his appeal was heard though, more thoroughly than he knew.
The wind turned for a moment and blew the lid off the
neighbor’s trash can. It flew like a frisbee across the warming street.

I won’t be remembered for keeping my mouth shut.
I can sing the joy, I can speak the prophecy, I can hum the tune
that calls for freedom to flow from the surrounding hills.
I can, in a word or two, remind you of redemption,
the song that is meant for everyone.

Can you hear the echoes, can you feel the rejoicing of those
who feel the vibrations and have set the captives free?
Have you listened long enough to dance with the runaways
who have fled the dirges of the day?

Come, leave your vitriol behind; find a new word to terminate
the sentences you have imposed. There is time, though it may be
running fast,
to catch up with the jubilant sound of every voice freed to
sing the day away while others are blindly following their own
scripts into dark and silent caverns of gloom.

The Circle Widens

The Circle Widens

(“Let me tell you, it’s easier to gallop a camel through a needle’s eye than for the rich to enter God’s kingdom.” Matthew 19:24 [The Message])

The circle widens as we look toward the horizon and see
the way we waste our efforts in converting 400 people to become
just like us.
The night darkens while we light another lamp to create
some smokey brightness to break open the faces that are
just like us.
The private jets whoosh past above the timberline where the snows
stays trapped from middle Spring squalls, captained by people who are
just like us.
We never expected to be such consumers of black plastic bags and
thousand dollar bills. We had only hoped to have enough to eat tomorrow
and to have a little lunch for later in the day. But billions landed
next to us, from a suitcase in the sky,
and what could we do but spend it like a black-tie dinner.
Some, I heard, spent their earnings in little bits at a time:
a power boat, a jet ski, a Mercedes or two, an indoor tennis court
and spices that come all the way from china. Money made us think,
money made us lose track, money made us turn black what would have been
the brightest of skies.
The rich point at the homeless and refuse to listen to their stories,
and accuse them of not taking advantage of programs made for them.
One fool says we should take their lives involuntarily. That is what has
become of pursuing Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.

No wonder it is nearly impossible for rich people to enter the kingdom,
they are so bloated, so overfed, so obese they cannot fit their
fat asses through the gates to the kingdom. We wonder how to remember
people that were once
just like us.

A Pretty Good Day

A Pretty Good Day

(“Then he said, ‘I tell you the truth. You must change and become like little children. If you don’t do this, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.’” Matthew 18:3)

Splash is a sound that slaps the salty sidewalks on
summer afternoons. Children take the water seriously,
pointing the hose at the nearest victim. Giggles turn the
corners round the houses of everyone who has come out to see
the joy that fills the street.

They were mostly grandchildren dancing like fountains,
toddlers tasting the sunlight as they hugged the water
spraying over them. They had not learned

(Like so many adults do)

That it feels so much like earning the days that
are given for free. They invite us to misbehave for just
a triangle of time each day.

Children take what is offered, unabashed liberty.
They point the water hose at each other and the liquid
looks like diamonds bouncing off the sod.
The day turns late, the shadows grow long and parents
whistle for children to come home. One more slide down the
wetted grass, one more mouthful of water from the hose,
one more dousing of your crush, and one more towel to
dry everyone off

All in all, it was a pretty good day.
No of a certain age needs to be taught to play.

The State of My Brain

The State of My Brain

(“The Lord makes our human spirit like his lamp inside us. It shows us what we are really like.” Proverbs 20:27)

I’ve got enough time to read a chapter or two,
to turn on the overhead lamp and see what the words say.
I’ve been reading from the day I knew that one word and
another
could take me to world without moving a muscle.
A man down the street asked me what kind of books
I liked the best. I was eight or nine and I said “adventure”
though I wasn’t entirely clear what the word meant. He gave
me two books, one about the thirteen original colonies and
I don’t remember the other one. Maybe a Hardy Boys mystery.
I made weekly trips to the library; its front steps were marble.
Sometimes I walked since it was only six blocks from home.
I would take a volume of an encyclopedia and start reading articles
in alphabetical order. I wondered who wrote all this candid information
and how they knew so much stuff.

Reading captured me as a teen. I read all of Shakespeare in one summer and most
of John Steinbeck. The next summer it was Ray Bradbury along with the
poetry of Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Rod McKuen got an occasional look.

I read early twenty century playwrights and imagined their words in
my mouth.

Ten years later I was a newly formed follower and read books on
prayer and spiritual gifts and how to manage your emotions by concentrating
on Christ. Truth? I found myself falling woefully behind.
There was a method to pray an hour a day. I managed 15 minutes.
There was a way to speak in tongues, and I mumbled them well. I
never got my mind swept clean from thoughts that invaded constantly.

Today I read memoirs and liberal theology. Today I quiet my mind
with music before I read. Today I talk slower and less certain.
Today I am not sure of my purpose, but I do not shame myself
for the state of my brain.

Follow the Messengers

Follow the Messengers

(“The name of the Lord is a strong tower; the righteous run into it and are safe.” Proverbs 18:10)

Beyond the borders there is a square of
safety for me. I had studied the rural forms
for nearly 20 years and found the remains of
remote islands on the run. The tables were turned,
the tallest cedars burned and returned decades later.
All I could see from miles around atop the largest hill
on the grounds of a dozen acres of refuge, were angels
winging their way to me.

I discovered my identity in the motion of their wings and
the song of their mouths that echoed like childlike giggles
up and down the face of the canyons and the depths of the
muddy river running candidly.

I started listening to the way the wind blew through the
narrow windows of the tower and I could swear the birds
had stopped their chirping so I could hear the way the sun
made the grass grow. So I could hear the leaves inching out
toward the sky.

There had been trouble outside the fences,
there had been blockades keeping the stockpiles empty while
the children starved. They insisted it was legal the way
they turned away international aid. They imagined they
owned the soil where the tears of the mothers watered the dust
where innocence fell.

The angels moved past me. I was not their project and now I know.
They were moving me to move with them;
they were sent to melt the hearts of so-called kings who devastated
tens of thousands for an incomplete retribution. They have
nowhere to run, so let us run to them and leave our watchtowers
behind. Let us follow the messengers whose words are peace
and whose ways are love.

The Next Page of the Book

The Next Page of the Book

(“Depend on the Lord in whatever you do, and your plans will succeed.” Proverbs 16:3)

So much depends on how we carry our load and how
heavy it sits upon your back. There are some who would
steal your soul
to upend the work you’ve done to wake up where you are.
The mistakes you’ve made only take you closer to
learning what is no longer needed. The image of God you have
needs to be erased so only the naked reality remains.
Half of it was prayer, half of it was doubt,
the day remained misunderstood whether cloudy or bright.
He was sure there were few who knew or understood the
ransacking his brain had endured or how late the scars remained
after the pain.
He wasn’t sure about healing, or what it meant. Too many
wounds
were self-inflicted, others were done by those practicing their
religious vows. He wasn’t sure what was worse, or whether faith
was still part of the picture at all.

He understood little the longer he contemplated what remained
and the change of scenery hadn’t paid off anyway.
He was distressed it came to this; he was silent about
all the rest.
He had been depending on divine intervention for so long
it felt like his breath in winter, vapor vanishing in the air.
He had been hoping for renewed inventions but his hopes
were too high
and they seemed to fly past his field of vision.

And yet anyone looking at his surroundings would conclude
the plans had come together full. He knew that. It was
all in his head. And he knew that now as well.

He decided to turn the next page of the book he was reading.

Above the Weakening Waves

Above the Weakening Waves

“Jesus said, ‘Come.’ And Peter left the boat and walked on the water to Jesus.” Matthew 14:29)

I’ll be the first to admit the whipping wind almost
was too much for me. The day turned on a dime and the
evening screamed like a child with a lost toy. We were
afraid

we would never get home. Once the storm hit, we
threw out hope like a lifeline cut in two. We could not see;
the waves crashed, and the wind was a banshee. No one
predicted this, no one had it on their radar. The radio scanned
for boats nearby but all we heard was static etched by lightning.

Fear rose like a monster from the waters. Our throats were tighter
than the rigging we hoped would hold.

We thought he was a ghost. The tempest tainted our vision.
But we heard the words urging us toward courage and we thought
we knew; it was so familiar. I steeled myself, shivering in the wind.
“Could that be you?” And then insanely I said, “If it is,
tell me to join you on the water.”

All he said was, “Come”.

I cannot explain it, or why I asked. But putting my feet over the side,
I touched the water, and it was solid under me. I was dizzy with
wonder; my breath escaped into the waning storm. I could see
him
as I had seen him so often before.

Then the wind whistled, the waves spit, the boat still rocked like
a jazz band warming up, and I saw it from the corner of my eye.
My feet slipped. “Help” is all I knew how to cry. And “Lord, save me!”

I felt my hand in his, the strength grasping me. He told me my
faith was small, but I thought
I had endured pretty well. It was the storm that spun me away.

But his presence calmed me and calmed the wind and waves.
Like a morning after thunderstorms our hearts were overcome,
believing, hoping, wondering, stuttering a new faith
that danced above the weakening waves.