The Pockmarks of War

The Pockmarks of War

(“He brings an end to wars throughout the earth. He shatters the bow and breaks the spear; he burns the shields with fire.” Psalm 46:9)

I don’t need to think about it,
I don’t need to start again. I’ve heard the cry
of victory that savors peace like an early supper.
I’ve heard the mothers begging for skirmishes
to cease. I’ve seen the pain melting from the faces
who swore to study war no more.

Throw the spears into the forge, remake them into
garden rakes. Throw the guns into the furnace, remake
them into gazebos where the only invasion is music
on summer evenings.

Heed the voices who are crying. Heed the babies
who have been dying because you had to avenge
everything that ever pained your land.

The refugees hover inside whitewashed tents,
they take cover when they hear the missiles whistle
overhead. The children know the drills too well.
I’ve watched them huddle, leaving behind every
vestige of nationality. Sadly, the vileness of violence
followed them to nowhere home.

Why do we use words like love and caress our bombs?
Why do we mutter syllables of peace and prime the fuses?
Why do we pray and send away for more munitions?
Why do we hug it out and then paint targets on people’s backs?

Do you see creation? Do you see the children’s songs?
Do you hear the sound of tomorrow? Do you hear the robin’s song?
Can you feel the beauty of lands where pockmarks of warfare
have ceased? Can you feel the daylight that opens the door
a self truer than military salutes and slogans?

Perhaps a Doppelganger

Perhaps a Doppelganger

(“A man named Jesus made a paste and rubbed it on my eyes and told me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash.’ I did what he said. When I washed, I saw.” John 9:11 [The Message])

Another long day placed him near the pool where
jokers and religionists, housewives and jesters,
would was their vagrant sins away. He was certain
the waters could heal his blindness; he was just befuddled
as to which sin had taken away his sight.

Had had to resort to begging, not being able to look them in the eye,
I suppose his coffers grew more slowly than the sighted ones who
could coax some mercy and a sliver of shame from the passersby.

some were wearing turbans, some were wearing fedoras.
He could not discern their readiness, he only could listen and
hope
their voices told their readiness to contribute.

But then a man approached and said not a word. He looked at him,
this Jesus, and spit on the ground. Making clay with the saliva,
he rubbed the paste on the blind man’s eyes. The blind man
shivered; what could this mean. Then he spoke, this Jesus,
and told him to go wash in the Siloam pool. He sent him there
directly.

The man went. The man washed. The man could see.

Scattered across the portico the people held court and could
not believe. Perhaps there was a doppelganger who had alwayscoul
had his sight. Perhaps they merely mistook him for the man begging
at the gates.

inally, he spoke up, “I’m the man, the very one.” His voice was
happy but shaking.

How did this happen? The clowns asked from the circus motif.

I can see. Does that bother you? A man named Jesus made a paste
and rubbed it in my eyes. Does that offend you? He told me to go
to the pool of Siloam. Does that confuse you? I did what he said.

When I washed, I saw.

Does that make you want to follow him?

Instead they marched the man to the religion experts who
dressed finer than cocktail tuxedos at night. They knew it had
to be a fake;
it was done on the Sabbath. He was healed on the Sabbath.
Jesus did work with mud and clay on the Sabbath. The man washed
it off on the Sabbath.

And every adjudication contained a clause that insisted miracles
cannot happen on the Sabbath. They take too much work. You cannot
rest and restore sight at the same time.

All the man knew is that he was once blind but could now see.
Jesus could have healed every blind person that day, including the
clowns posing as experts, if only they knew they could not see.

I Sweep my Emotions

I Sweep my Emotions

 

I was tempted to lie about my status,
to tell you I felt loved and whole.
It’s not that I’m left alone, or misheard,
or disrupted by delusions of my late afternoon words.
I was even questioned in the friendliest of ways
about my plans for the afternoon and weekend.

There are dozens of friends I could call on,
there are maybe a hundred that know my name;
there are scores who have witnessed my wounds,
and fewer who blame me for my forgotten moods.

Even as I sit down to write this, I question every
word or phrase,
I sweep my emotions out the front door and do not know
if they will return in the morning to
remind me how stolen I feel. I remember the voices
who said I drank the Kool-Aid,
who told me to get over it,
who said I shouldn’t feel any sort of way. Even the sun
feels foreign on this summer afternoon.

I’ve asked, as if anyone is listening, if it is dark yet.
I’ve wondered how long the days can be. I’ve wasted
my days with endless talking heads and tried to write when
all I knew were tasteless odes to disembodied heroes.

I heard it was a five-year-old’s birthday in the restaurant
I retire to when I want to read and sip a beer. I gave her a dollar
and loved the way she giggled and smiled. If only I knew
every child’s birthday.

Someone said I was obsessed with politics when all I
wanted
was for a few believers to love the Sermon on the Mount
more than their pet projects that canceled the hopes of
thousands. When will love be the answer? When will
devotion look like another helping of soup without
questions for the hungry ones who only needed a
spot of daylight to create unconscious acceptance?

I won’t lie again to be more accepted. I won’t
support your rebuttal of good science. I’ll stand
up every day for the unassuming immigrant who only
wants to find a new place to call home.

To Confess My Loneliness

To Confess My Loneliness

(“The priest shall burn all of it on the altar, for a burnt offering, an offering made by fire, of a pleasant aroma to Yahweh.” Leviticus 1:9b)

I’m so tired of confusing every emboldened cryptic answer
to the questions I send by test balloon. I’ve kept my eyes open.
I’ve even shut my mouth.
I’ve waited for the reply that would set all my doubts aside,
but all I remember is the smell of grilling from next door.
I had hoped the breeze would bring more voices,
would open up the choices I had that could make the day
feel sooner that later. I’ve been told it’s nothing personal
when I get no answer,
it's just the delivery system that is broken. I do not believe
that silly response no matter how well it is spoken.
I’ve been taught that loneliness is not a big enough
reason to cry.
“Isn’t God enough?” they ask. They walk on down the road
while I scratch my head about what they said.

I used to be embarrassed to confess my loneliness,
the result of silence I never asked for. Everyone had
an opinion;
everyone laid down their advice like directives from a
commandant. I was born in a room full of noise,
of laughter and crying. I live in a room of silence so
I turn the music up loud. I could relax so much better with
someone to talk to who didn’t have the answers full of
conclusions. They want me to put it all on the altar,
to let it burn up every part of me. They do not understand that
I have so little left to offer that the smoke from my altar
would barely be seen.

I’ve walked this pathway before. I’ve humbled myself in words
full of self-loathing. I’ve let it burn until there was nothing left of me
except bones blackened by the flame. I left one ceremony early
because my baby was tired and getting restless and others
shot their eyes at me like I was a heretic or transgressor,
when I was just a father with an exhausted toddler.

I wish someone would draw different conclusions. I wish
they would sacrifice for me the way they think I should sacrifice.
I wish I had something left to burn. Maybe it’s because I’m old now,
maybe it’s because I remember for so long the screeching sounds
of cars suddenly breaking outside at midnight. Maybe it’s simply
me who has been wrong, maybe I spent too much time in the moonlight.

Maybe I need one person holding back their well-intentioned advice
and revising their presumptions about me. Maybe a single voice,
quietly whispering its way into my heart would inject something new
into the dreams that cause my heart to ache in the middle of the night.

Everlasting Springs

Everlasting Springs

(“Let the one who believes in me drink. Just as the scripture says, ‘From within him will flow rivers of living water.’” John 7:38)

We had been patient, waiting for the day to begin.
We had approached from below, finding the hills where
we could look out across the river, shiny and silver,
no wind, no wind, no wind.

We look to the east toward the mouth of the river some
200 miles away. We wondered how many had sent their
best wishes toward us standing above the water today.

We walked down from the hill to feel the river on our skin.
We approached from above, finding the ledges that edged
five feet into the rivers running torso. Fishermen slung
their line across the lapping waves, stirred by a late breeze
in the afternoon.

We look to the west to the foot of the river, some 50 miles
away. We wondered how many ships turned from the sea
and followed the river to upland ports to unload their burdens
before the tugboats turned them round to the sea again.

We sensed this lane of passage was something within.
We determined this was a picture of something more tangible
we could carry like canteens. We drank water to refresh
our parched tongues; we shared water to brighten the eyes
of the solitary ones. We might practice solidarity with
those excluded from the river. We might lead them by the
hand to hear how the Spirit pours herself into us like
everlasting springs.

From watching and waiting we learned to listen well,
and we were more certain now at the end of the day that
the river was our mother, always ready to share her affluence.
The river was our mother, always ready to show us the confluence
with every other stream along the way.

Summer Solstice

Summer Solstice

(“The cherubim had their wings spread upward, covering the Mercy Seat with their wings and facing each other. The faces of the cherubim were turned toward the Mercy Seat.” Exodus 37:9)

The room was dark, but their eyes were bright
like cats caught in the middle of the night by a beam of moonlight.
Imprinted, their space was inhabited by curiosity and
mercy; their timing was perfect, their projections
silently filled the place with awe and dread.
It took time to become used to the shadows cast
upon the curtains hanging like fluid waterfalls.

I had fallen asleep and assumed it was a dream.
I saw my younger son as a child pretending to ride
our Australian Shepherd like a cowboy.
He liked to journey across the earth, ticking the
boxes
of every planet he visited. He logged his progress,
and I leapt conclusions. He always preferred to
visit somewhere new until his card was completed,
until enough time passed to make its memory dim.

What would I see within the tabernacle,
what would I write after seeing angels in stone?
What answer could I give to the silent room where
no one could visit, except for high priests and novices
in dreams? In my enlightened imagination sunrise and
sunset inhabited the same moment and place. I could
breathe without pain;
I could speak without forgetting the refrain that echoed
relief from the unanswerable contemplations I had piled
in the corners of my mind.

The cherubim, heavy with the weight of glory,
unshadowed the primordial imprint that stained
my preconceptions.

It was a chilly and cloudy summer solstice with the
rain occasionally painting the hills. I remembered what
it was like to dwell with the ancient wings buffering
my descent and holding me mercifully from the moment
I stumbled on the steps to the temple. I was frozen
in fear
until the images of forgiveness played like light
from the sun a minute before it goes down.

Of Bread and Music

Of Bread and Music

(“I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever, and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” John 6:51

I didn’t know it at the time, but I had been asking for a rhyme
to bring me closer to another soul like mine. Recent years have left me
frightened of conversation and forays into the depths of contemplation about
God and sunsets and music and the proper tempo to play a hymn.
My abilities have wavered as my fingers bend and tremor. Not
that anyone can tell, but I know my fine motor skills are no longer
fine and have left me with less skill.

But the trio invited me to join them as I walked into the bar
a midday Thursday afternoon. Two women with voices of angels,
one husband, a kind man, buys me a beer. We sit and talk music
and I’m invited to join a group of ukulele students with me on
keyboards. Recent years have left me skittish of forays where my
mistakes can be readily discerned. I’m a music reader and have
never played by ear well. I need to see it and from there it transmits
to my fingers. But they have been left dormant for so long they
miss the keys and come down between them in discordant half tones.

But the urge still moves me, while anxiety pumps the breaks.
To gather around picnic tables and share bread and wine,
steaks and beer, or anything else brought by the few who
(I hear) are as anxious as me.

Could there be angels surrounding us as we pass the
food down the line?
Could there be divine messengers listening in to our
musical etudes and attempts? Could our small talk be
a tactical vest to protect us from blushing at our inadequacies?
Whatever it is, and whatever we hear, whatever we eat, and
whatever we drink,
let’s let make music of heaven sink into our closed-mouth
inhibitions.