The End of Your Suffering

The End of Your Suffering

(“And he said to her, Daughter, your faith has made you whole. Go in peace, and be healed of your affliction.” Mark 5:34)

No one could blame you for claiming each
morning was another day of pain. No one could
argue with your hard-edged blues.
It was chronic, there was never a day when
the wrinkles escaped your forehead. There was not
a moment you captured anything new.

Some had tried to disarm you of your complaint;
some had questioned your faith and your explanations
for missing appointments with friends.
All you knew, and had known for a dozen years
was that nothing touched the pain or lifted you
up as early as when you were well.

Your ailment was invisible, your pain a ghostly companion.
It was a crisis unseen and sometimes forgotten by those
who knew you well. Some suggested homemade cures and
were certain their words were good.

But without divine intervention you were certain the was
no end to the rushing illness that had held you alone so long.

Then this morning your neighbor told you the Anointed One
was just outside of town. She had run ahead of the crowd
to tell you the news. Could this be your day? Could he
be the one? How to approach him? How to carry your
pain to him?

You decided to simply touch him, to delicately grasp
a part of his garment, and hope and faith it; and stealthily
make it a moment that no one would notice. You wended
and curled your way through the crowd and seeing him
you extended your arm cautiously. You touched him barely
and could feel the pain leaving like a visitor who had stayed
too long.

You did not want to disturb him, but he turned and asked,
“Who touched me?” You knelt at his feet and confessed your deed.
And he touched you this time and set you on your feet.
And softly said with authority like a king, “Today, today,
is the end of your suffering.”

The Man Without a Name

The Man Without a Name

(“The demons begged Jesus, ‘Send us into the pigs; let us go into them.’” Mark 5:12)

The lackeys waited outside for their turn to enter the tent.
The air was lazy and they turned round and round hoping to
stir the breeze. They MC winked at the doorman and the
doorman swung the stiles open as the lackeys found their way.
The seats were emptied and they scattered in groups of
ten to a dozen around the ring.

The MC was lackluster; he was missing his usual verve.
There had been whispers suggesting that he had finally gone
mad. The lackeys knew his troubles and tried to replace him
or confine him
or define him as an oddity.

As he opened his mouth he fell like demolition in the dirt.
He writhed and quivered, the lackeys shivered, and everyone
wondered
whether the show would go on.

It had been like this for days. Worse and worse as the
year wore on. His words were sloppy, his dress was askew,
his introductions garbled with his jaw locked in place. And
the audiences only came to laugh at his struggles and his
aggravation.

But there was one in the crowd, a visitor to the region who,
seeing it all, saw more than everyone else did. There were
legions
inhabiting the poor man’s life, there was a myriad throwing
him in the dirt.

With a word the stranger dismissed his antagonists. And
the legion left and filled the space and rings, the trapeze and
strings of cotton candy with clowns one after another, more
than could be counted. The MC slumped, exhausted.

The clowns feared the man without a name and begged to
inhabit some new offering. If only they could be thrown to
the bottom of the cliff where a legion of jokers waited like
pigs in a blanket. He dismissed them with a word and they
flew and fumbled down the ridge, taking the jokers and themselves
into the sea. The waves washed over them as they disappeared
from sight.

The lackeys were slack in their duties and left the same way
they came. They filed up and down the empty streets where they
hoped for some novel entertainment that wouldn’t cost them a dime.

And the MC sat alone in the middle of the ring, seen only by
the man with no name.

Find My Way Home

Find My Way Home

(“And he woke up, rebuked the wind, and said to the waves, ‘Hush now! Be still!’ The wind dropped and everything was very still.” Mark 4:39)

It might be the streets alone that serenade my return.
I was tossed and turned; I was unspeakably fearful of
the waves that menaced my journey and the wind that
my hopes for survival.

I tried to shake God awake; I tried to make do with my
wafer-thin prayer. I couldn’t make out the immediate response,
the noise was ineffably loud. I hoped I could be seen like
a dove holding tight against the eaves as the storm
caught the best of us unprepared.

All I knew. All I can tell. All I care. All I can bear
was stuffed into a single hour of tempest. And
fear
was the name I gave for the cancellation of
supposed messages of light.

It was gloomy at noon. It was annoyingly
loud.
I heard nothing like the words that struck me when
I first turned toward the sun. I only knew it was time,
it was soon,
it was daytime at its darkest, it was unfortunate
like the folly of rowing upstream.

I only understood that it was time to
find my way home. So, I cowered with faith
at the bottom of my words and fright frothing
over the sides.

And a voice softer than the ripple of the water
on a still and sleepy night
spoke like it already had been decided that
the storm would pass before the day began.
And plainly watching the shoreline from here
I knew it was time to
find my way home.

A Stiff Fog

A Stiff Fog

(“And the priests were unable to carry out their duties due to the cloud because the Lord’s glory filled the Lord’s temple.” 1 Kings 8:11)

It was all a fog stiff as a northern goat,
and it bid me to walk circumspect and hopeful.
As I came nearer the fence that separated the cemetery
from an open field I counted 15 deer, including fawns
the size of dogs, and my breath slowed down.

And within there is a continual mist where a prism
of moonlight reflects the sun, an inner rainbow on a
vaporous day. I felt the cool haze on my cheeks and my
hands moved voluntarily to stay warm.

I passed a home where the smoke billowed out from
their stainless-steel chimney and could smell the sweet cedar
and pine they burned. They did not cause the fog, no one did.
It just showed up on a morning when the temperatures dropped
and the ground was wet and warmer.

Some fogs disorient you; they send you in circles as you
try to find a recent point of reference. You kneel to try to
walk beneath it, but it is less translucent nearer the ground.
This fog reoriented me instead. It drew me in like a series
of announcements sent as lyrics to some holy song.

Some fogs frighten you, for much the same reason. You fear,
if it does not lift, you will never find your way home. You
stop and consider the turns you’ve taken and think you could
get there
eventually.
This fog drew me home instead. It beckoned me like the
aroma of apple pie baking like a thank offering.

Ah this inner mist, the cloud of unknowing, this uncertain
gyroscope that leaves me sometimes listless, but often is
resistless and I follow its clarion call like chimes from
a small cathedral on a Sunday midmorning.

On this day the arms of love were accessible though
my eyes stumbled along the way. Not seeing, I felt and
wondered at the sacred moments that a morning fog could bring.

The End of the Story

The End of the Story

(“Then he said to them, ‘The Sabbath was made for people, not people for the Sabbath.’” Mark 2:27)

We were in such a rush that when we were cut off
we screeched to a halt and the paragraphs crashed
into the sentences, the sentences occupied new phrases,
the phrases smashed the words. Then the words careened
into the letters and the letters confused the spaces once
separating sense from incoherence.

The question mark ended the fable only feet from
the abyss and we went on our way blissfully ignoring the
end of the story.

One Word at a Time

One Word at a Time

(“When Jesus saw their faith, he told the paralyzed man, ‘Son, your sins are forgiven.’” Mark 2:5)

You felt like a bramble bush and a whirlwind within,
a storm on the horizon, darkness surrounding every
thought and you fought the demons that told you that
things would always be the same.

You used to talk like the thaw of April;
you used to listen like the Spring rains.
But somewhere everything stopped working and
elsewhere things spoke like you were the one to blame.

But this time there were voices more like goose down;
there were offers of hope like the rising sun. You had
no better choice so you entered their hope and
rode their words multiplied by time.

The road was dusty with spots of mud left
from the brief showers overnight. You hoped
you might get through the day without fearing
the gaze that unwrapped your soul.

You didn’t know when it began, or how it
happened
that paralysis had frozen you stiff. You only
knew that if someone looked into your eyes
they would see how dark it all was within.

You arrived together and they ushered you in;
the day was nearly spent and the hour was getting late.
The journey had worn us and we were weary,
yet the moment ushered us in, lowered into the crowd that
surrounded the words you had hoped would be spoken.

You had no idea, no point of reference to
unhear the words that dislodged the shame that
misplaced you at the edge of every crowd. You took
them in

One word at a time.
And you learned that walking was another way of
discovering grace.

Still Smelling of Fish

Still Smelling of Fish

(“Jesus said to them, ‘Follow me! I will teach you how to bring in people instead of fish.’” Mark 1:17)

The day started with warm breezes wafting in from
beyond the hills wading in the shallow waters of the lake.
We knew the fishing would be good. Our nets were mended,
our food was stocked, and we were ready to stay on the water
for the whole day,

And it exceeded expectations

We were about to dock on the sand after a few more casts
of our nets. We were ready to head home after
sorting the fish by kind and size.

Then they heard words that did not register. There was the
noise of the freshening breeze plus the crosstalk of fellow
fishermen asking about each other’s haul.

We heard him say “Follow me! I’ll teach you how to catch people.”
We were not clear we had heard right but we looked toward the
voice
and recognized him immediately. We had heard him teach the
last two days at the beach. We lined up like birds on a wire and
were awestruck by his words about God’s Dream for the world.

We had little idea what catching people meant, but he was
magnetic
and we were ready charged for a change of venue. But my
brother and I
dropped our nets where they were and decided to take the risk.
We followed still smelling of fish.