A Sturdy Life

A Sturdy Life

(“So ask the Lord of the harvest to send workers out into his harvest field.” Matthew 9:38)

Wonder meets wonder in the eyes of
the downtown walkers habituating themselves to the sun.
It was the same as it had been the day before,
warm on the sidewalks of lazy ambition. The storefronts
had been blinking themselves open for the mid-morning rush.
Eyes to eyes the morning warmed on to the apex of the day.
Many believed the dream was just around the corner,
other had not given in a moment’s thought.

Meanwhile in the neighborhood nearby a man returned
the dogs he had been watching for his friend who returned
from another state on a week-long vacation. She walked out
the door to meet him in black slippers down the steps
and onto the concrete walkway with grass planking through
the cracks. He drove away and u-turned at the end of the block.
She waited for him to pass by again so he would
remember her waving goodbye.

What is the greatest number we can enliven; where are the
rulebooks that instruct us in the gardens of our incubation?
How many friends do we carry from childhood; how many
still fascinate our minds? Do we still remember their
phone numbers, or at least the area code? Can we still feel
the slatted stoops where we listened to Peter, Paul, and Mary
and comedy records in the afternoon?

I wander daily through current applications and past
evaluations of joy we left half exhausted. We found
ourselves filled, though, the next time we renovated our
restlessness again. Hope against hope, we believed that
behind someone’s eyes, we might see the promises
we daydreamed about.

All in all, it’s been a sturdy life built on words we fashioned,
images we sculpted, and the cities we founded in our brains.
Here’s hoping the sacred music that spun our days opened the
light for each other across our spatial habitations.

Our Perfecter in Pain

 Our Perfecter in Pain

(“Seeing the crowds, He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and downcast, like sheep without a shepherd.” Matthew 9:36)

Scattered like rain-soaked ashes they
dotted the landscape with their bodies aching.
They had tried to do it all on their own, they had
run so hard that they were almost wasted away. Now
they were etched in silence where their wounds were newly
opened for everyone to see.
They held up cardboard signs; they were their hearts they
silently advertised.
Some were broken, torn in two. Some were perforated and
almost split apart. The day had been strenuous
on the
anniversary of their discontent. They blamed no one
and were the same during the day as they were through
their straining nights. They refused to change their tune
even if no one listened. They did not change to a
happier key
but kept insisting that something had caused them harm.

They had not come to play, though the notion had crossed
their minds. It was all too magnetic, this melancholy that
settled uninvited upon their buried hopes. They were just
as alive as ever, but every movement was an ache that
threatened to split their humanity down the middle.
It wasn’t subtle, but it had been easily ignored.

Oh shepherd, our sheep-gatherer, stitch our dreams with
your story of healing. Can our heartbreak belong to you,
can you unfasten our sorrow for just a day? We live
but are weary; we are not fashioned for this daily
slicing of our minds. We are victims of the seasons
and love out of time. Candidly we would like to name
the captors of our dissatisfaction.

Oh healer, our perfecter in pain, see us again
and remove the blame we carry too high upon our
shoulders. Join us as the center of our multitude;
remind us with crossbeam love that all suffering
belongs to you, belongs to you.

Belongs to you.

Sharing Our Pillow

Sharing Our Pillow

(“Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of the gazelle grazing among the lilies.” Song of Solomon 4:5)

If I knew it wouldn’t wake you I would
lay my head between your breasts to hear your
even breath circling our bed. I would listen
to your heartbeat, so much steadier than mine.

Your skin would be soft like satin beneath my
ragged mane. Your body moving to the rhythm of
late night slumber as the room filled with our
body lotion and sweat.

I am safe here, with your body next to mine;
I have always found the way you desire me makes
me desire you more. Our kisses are memories
of sweet music and daily sweat.

When we were young, we explored each other
and fascinated each other and fulfilled each other
like wheat stalks in the wind. We were sated with
love and played in the night breeze where no one could find us.

That was 50 years ago, and you still fascinate me.
Your child-like sensuality makes me long to laugh
myself out of the doldrums I feel. You turn your lips
to me every time “Kiss Me” is played.

I have always found healing in the warmth between your breasts,
found uncommon release when sleep so often evaded me.
Your caresses reassured me when confidence fled my mind.
We blazed sometimes, like fire, and burned the bonds
that knotted our captive hearts. We made love like
we were brand new and I learned to listen for the
whispered moans that told me I would sleep well sharing
our pillow and intertwined until morning.

The Company of Middling Folk

The Company of Middling Folk

(“Be not overly righteous, and do not make yourself too wise. Why should you destroy yourself?” Ecclesiastes 7:16)

Did they remember your name those days after
you told of all your conquests and had knocked out those
demons and unclean spirits with merely a word?
Did they pay attention to you when you outlined the
hours of prayer you spent over the weekend and all the
food you refused to eat while everyone else was dining?
Did you think you were dying to exhibit that your best pal was god,
and that everyone knew you to be one righteous brother?
Did you run a popup prayer room where your power petitions
buried everyone’s nose in your pious practices? Did you think
that would raise your esteem among the ladies and gentlemen who
never encountered someone of your holy fame?

And those sayings of yours, those pithy sentences that sounded
convoluted but you said were so simple a child could understand them.
You told parables, but they wound around themselves like condiments
hid in the back of the refrigerator. You pronounced stories you insisted
were heavenly blue, heavenly true. Only a few wondered about their
origin, and among them one or two who considered they were lifted from
someone else’s anthology of folk wisdom.

I’d prefer the company of middling folk who know a joke and tell it
knowing we have heard it before. I prefer the camaraderie of men and women
who carry food so quietly that no one in the neighborhood hears them
ring the bell at the old widow’s door. And they don’t stay for long,
just enough to make sure she doesn’t need anything more. I prefer
the company of people who never outline their acts for the big wigs
to hear. They may go to coffee after their excursions but never brag
about their respectability.

When we boasted to each other of our exploits, we found our appetite
for goodness had taken a dive. When we pontificated about words of
wisdom
loudly in the ruckus room, they turned their backs to us and left us
standing alone. We learned the lesson quickly. We learned the ways of
kindness without announcing it to the world. And we were far more
satisfied, our righteousness and wisdom, quietly showing up the next
time someone needed them. And quietly we would respond, do what
we could do, and apologize there was not more.

I Let My Hands Hang

 

I Let My Hands Hang

(“But I say to you, do not resist the evildoer. But whoever strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other to him as well.” Matthew 5:39)

The long dark night gave way to the
floating sun and the light of day.
And I remembered why my sleep was so restless,
why my breakfast was so careless
and the memories of a singular slap to the face
replaced the peaceful dreams I could not recall.

I woke restless but the perpetrators were long gone
and all I had was a bruise below my eye.
I was proud (is that the word) that my hands
stayed at my side, that I did not answer back nor
threaten with stinging reprimands. I was not a
wholesaler who bought my offenses at bargain
prices to sell and release my hold on them.

The bruises quickly fade; the memory reaches
so far back it is ingrained like a limestone cave.
I should have counted to ten more slowly and then
back to one again. But the picture is finally floating
down the shallow rivulet toward the deeper water where
it falls below the waves whipped by the wind.

I cannot control my dreams. I have sometimes allowed them
to control me. Some I have dismissed with hasty fear,
others I wish had come true throughout the soundless breeze
of the day.

I would learn a better silence in the face of mistrusted words
that flew toward my mind. I let my hands hang.

The Canceled Acclaim

The Canceled Acclaim

(“Pride lands you flat on your face; humility prepares you for honors.” Proverbs 29:23 [The Message]

The days were stitched together like fibers
on a loom. It was daylight too often, it was
late in the afternoon. I couldn’t predict what the
day would become; I only envisioned a few moments
when the light would favor my imagination.
I longed for something created to ease my mind,
something I could point to that broke the rules I
already patterned to sit me closer to the
heights of power.

Wishing I could live more lowly and still be
acknowledged for my unseen character,
I reminded myself of the notes I could play while
ignoring the fingers that slipped across the black
and white keys.

My patience was tested, my longings more congested
than a winter’s cold or a summer’s scorn. I only
desired something beyond the corners of
hand-me-down
notions that I hid behind the closet doors of
my mind.

I took comfort in numbers; in the crowds I thought
shadowed my measured words. I wondered if
I could pacify the spaciousness that my depression
deserved. I confessed it all, this addiction to
connection, and wondered which way I could turn.

Above or below, I could not decipher what the
final judgement would mean. I had lifted more
weight
than my peers had attempted. And yet I was
still questioned my mental health. It was
daylight I craved, and a handful of accolades I thought
would restore my attention to legal details
that never let go of my mind.

A Silver Set

A Silver Set

(“Good words that hide an evil heart are like silver paint over a cheap, clay pot.” Proverbs 26:23)

I know you hoped that we would see you shine;
I know you wanted to be redesigned by bowing and
scraping and ordering every word around the perfect
incantations that sounded like speaking in tongues.

We had a silver set when I was growing up, sterling
silver I believe. We brought it out on holidays and scoured it
with the cream we kept hidden for just this purpose.
We burnished and polished until they reflected the sun
back to our open eyes again.

But we are all just silver plated, thinly wrapped around a common
lump of clay. I watched how you would get discouraged and then
call it depression and exit to watch it run its course like runoff after
the deluge. You agonized over hoping to reach another level but
your humanity seemed to be to blame.

I’ve laminated my own life scores of years over. I’ve wanted
to find
someone who didn’t care that all they saw was much. But
the crowds I ran in demanded prayer and perfection. They
expected a performance that looked like a faith-healer trashing
crutches and wheelchairs. But I always saw the healed person
limping around the same echoes again.

Touch me and you touch dirt, dust to dust, and ashes to ashes.
Hold me and your fingernails will get smudged with mud.
Talk to me, bring the wine, and I will open myself up
one last time. I am slow to show the slivers in the silver
that protects my ego. But for you I will try it one more time.

And perhaps we will find a better connection than thinly
disguised silver can ever deliver.