Ready for the City

Ready for the City

(“The glory of God made the city bright. It was dazzling and crystal clear like a precious jasper stone.” Revelation 21:11)

No more dreary within, without;
sunlight minus the star, moonlight just as bright,
and the faces I’ve missed that open the sparkle new like then,
will stay and not leave, play and conceive every note we imagined
sung again, impromptu again, collaborating lately like once upon a time.

Right now I barely face the day,
and the faces I remember are much too far away to cheer
the movement in mud hope has become.

I am ready for the city, buzzing like Christmas eve downtown,
without the pushing, the panic, the gravely grab for one more
gift wrapped late. Only the Salvation Army bells, the carols over
cheap boardwalk speakers, the children giggling over what is in the
sacks, the boxes, the trunk and closets. Just the seventh-grade disciples
dressed in white, singing joy to the world down a nursing home hall
out of tune, dropping words, shy but loving the attention.

I am ready for the city dressed like a jewel,
the color of air, the taste of sunrise,
where every friend is the same face all around,
every face genealogy, heirs together without a moment’s deliberation.

I am ready for the Throne, my tears the prism seeing the
rainbow river that embraces the dais. And I am shattered in
a moment unchanged, shards frozen midair before Perfection’s height,
and I see the cracks I hoped had held together, I hoped to hide in the
par-light of a shadowy sun.

Before the Creator who fashioned me well, every crack was now a crater
and I stood, could do no other, in the face of such glaring inspection. Jesus

i cried

Son of God, have mercy on me.

I am ready for the city, dressed like a jewel,
and cannot remember a smidgen or minute when
dark spoke its half-face or chips ruined my value.

I am ready for the city, all has been made known,
the cover-ups disrobed, and, not alone, I and we,
surround the throne, light, air, water and quantum waves
off Love’s pure reign.

In the Neighborhood

“I heard a voice thunder from the Throne: ‘Look! Look! God has moved into the neighborhood, making his home with men and women! They’re his people, he’s their God.’” Revelation 21:3

It is the Thursday after Christmas, which fell on a Sunday this year. Because this holiday is so centered around family gatherings, it is probably the most evocative time of the year. Emotions can range from the thrill of young children ripping open multi-colored paper to a couple sadly alone because family is so far away. Highs and lows are punctuated like staccato notes in the middle of soft ballad.

Established

“Jehoshaphat stood to say, ‘Hear me, O Judah and you residents of Jerusalem! Trust in the Lord your God, and you will be established. Trust in His prophets, and you will be successful.’” 2 Chronicles 20:20

We would all love a handbook that gave us 10 easy steps to success in whatever we endeavor. You want to make money in retail? Just follow these instructions, practice them daily, and you will never lack for money. You don’t care about money, but you would like the ladies to fall madly in love with you? Read about the fool-proof method and you will never have to worry about a lonely Friday night again. Money and women don’t do it for you; fame is your thing? We have boiled down everything the Beatles did into 10 unfailing principles for “knock them dead” repeat radio play music.

Where Upon

Where Upon

(“When God created man, He made him in God’s likeness; He created them male and female.” Genesis 5:1a, 2b)

Where upon the mountains, the names of things are airy,
only in the homes are labels plastic attached.
To save a bird from extinction, we give it the distinction
(classifying by name wing-style and beak)
and pin a note to the forehead sky, hoping it will
notice, male and female, to mate, fly and procreate
littles and much until the name is ubiquitous once more.

Where upon the memories, the names of faces are blushing,
only on the meadows is laughter’s echo holy.
To save more hope from obscurity, we remove its impurities
(drinking at the river run pebbled stream)
and fly another kite high in reflection, knowing it will
capture, male and female, to live, love and honor
bigger and focus until
the

Name is heart and marrow once more.

Drop It!

Drop It!

(“God told the serpent: ‘Because you’ve done this, you’re cursed, cursed beyond all cattle and wild animals, cursed to slink on your belly and eat dirt all your life.’” Genesis 3:13 [The Message])

What is that burden you carry?
What is the callous shoulder to shoulder?
What is the “I” that takes every word the world makes
as an arrow sent to tackle your balance?
What is the line drawn across your forehead more
permanent than a tattoo?

What is your lineage; the snake, the sin?
Your heritage; weight and chagrin?
What is your birthplace, the cabinetry predating
the old stands back of your home?

Why do you pace like curse when curse is dead as
dirt; a hill-full of criminals built for One raised above
raucous, surrounding the sound of menace that
lost its legs over wages of stealth and trickery.

You do not live in the old home,
the lines were erased, your burden is misplaced upon your shoulders.
You were born instead, you were chosen ahead

Of the frowns you drop upon the floor
and pick up to wear again
proof in the packaging you are oh so devoted
(more than all the smile light and heart phrases bumped from
wall to wall)

What is the secret you forgot?
What is the memory, warms and grin?
What is the final blow, the ebb (silent grief)
the flow (holy breath)
that remembers the death blow to every serpent
that tried to raise its head above the Human Prince’s heel?

Why pay taxes on the old snake’s wages,
You’ve got miles ahead (age to ages)
and do not need to show so pious
that you carry a knapsack of stone.

Drop it where you stand,
cry and let the sand swallow the grief
until the life you’ve tried to tame comes screaming out
in full relief…the joy that knows a snake is just a snake
and no one asked you to wrestle the legless creep.

In Fashion

“See, I come like a thief. Blessed is the alert one who takes care of his clothes so he need not go around naked and people see his shame.” Revelation 16:15

One of my recurring dreams as a youngster was going to school and realizing I was still in my pajamas. Sometimes I was even naked in the dreams. I hear it’s a fairly common theme, dreaming of the embarrassment of showing up somewhere either with the wrong clothing, or none at all.

Keeping Them on the Road

“He taught the truth and did not lie. He walked with me in peace and uprightness. He kept many out of the ditch, kept them on the road.” Malachi 2:6

Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament, deals with, among other things, the corruption of the priesthood. They had forgotten their divine responsibilities, and used their position as a method for personal gain. This made the susceptible to bribes from the rich, leaving the poor neglected.

King Over all the Earth

“The Lord will become King over all the earth in that day; the Lord shall be One and His name One.” Zechariah 14:9

There is no greater dream than the prospect of God’s final rule over all the earth. The kingdom of God will finally be completely fulfilled, and all will be summed up in the singular goodness and holiness of God. In other words, all evil, all destruction, hatred and violence will come to an end and God’s kingdom, with Christ as King, will reign with all peace, righteousness and justice.

Where the Joy has Gone

Where the Joy has Gone

You’ve asked where the joy has gone while
life lingers, a sliver, a thread, and leaves so slowly
you barely see it depart. You want her home, your love,
your friend, your life, your heart.

You pray with tears, and say with words; anxiety’s
hope has exposed each nerve while you wait,
wait only, while other lonelies walk down the linoleum halls.

She is fragile, a stick-figure filled with decades together;
her bony hand still reaches for your face, your knee,
your hands to keep company her shallow breathing.
There are still stars in her eyes.

You eat less, (the nurses microwave your
frozen foods supper), and drive half a hundred to her
and back home each day.
Her remedy and your love hold sway over
your own health or hunger. How can you
contemplate
better care when she whose life you share
is shrinking beyond human aid.

You’ve asked where the joy has gone
while your friends wait with you,
and nothing we say can pull you away
from grief none of us-smile or frown-
imagine and only close our eyes and look away
at the question about joy today.

Prayer is sloppy, holy comfort puddled crusty,
answers senseless and God is untamable even

By the countless buckets our tears may fill.
Exotic, not domestic, we sit together while
God-in-heaven roars; God-with-us so close
we do not comprehend Him at all.

You’ve asked where the joy has gone
on a day of cloud curtained pain, while
sorrow remains sharp; joy hides and also waits
a more appropriate day.

A Suite

A Suite

(“Say to all the people of the land and to the priests: When you have fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months even these seventy years, did you really fast for Me—for Me?” Zechariah 7:5)

Like a guitar trying to pluck its own strings, we sing to prove,
we dance to earn, and spurn the free embrace love created
when it invented our shape, our tone; space our scales and
semi-tones to pleasure’s hearing.

While You freewheel good, we invent exact,
we bow, surrender, keep the balance black;
while You give prizes, first to last.

Had we missed a note in our songs
(over and over, like dolphins being trained
we push it to the edges, synchronizing our best efforts
with our best ideas of what You want)
we slop our cry and drag our imperfection around
like we think it is the cross You asked us to bear.

Had we hit each note in our solo
(only and only, like daredevils flaming
we push it to the edges, being sure the blaze and
thunder are big and best enough for Your approval)
we straighten our spines and never look back
like we think it is the position You now owe us.

Like a guitar created by a lover of wood and sound,
skill set against skill, passion for the painting ignoring the frame,
we wait for You to play (not better than we have attempted)
the music that shifts there to here and then to now
in one laced movement; a suite that tells the story
we had been trying to hear.

Humble and Meek

“But I will leave among you a humbled and poor people, who shall take refuge in the name of the Lord.” Zephaniah 3:12

Humility and meekness (the intent behind the word “poor” in this passage) have rarely been seen as desirable character qualities, and understandably so. If a person’s world-view includes getting the most out of life, making the most money, advancing yourself to the highest possible pinnacle, humility simply isn’t the way to get there. Qualities that appear much more active are required; such as perseverance, courage or confidence. But meekness? No, that is for monks and nuns. Humility? Forget marrying it with a career in big business.

Memory the Book

Memory the Book

(“Meanwhile the earth fills up with awareness of God’s glory as the waters cover the sea.” Habakkuk 2:14 [The Message])

To walk alone, the woods, the foothills,
and see the nodding leaves left on the barefoot floor
is less inspired than to be tethered to another soul
who sees the beams between the trees while you
feel the cold shade of winter’s shadow underneath them.

Though full of lessons around every bend, solitary
bests my attempts to take it all in.

So I wrote a good initial stanza, the words are lazily out of reach
for the rest. I think I gave my heart to more than one friend who
took it with them and moved out of town.

Pieces scattered, old cinder block ash, across the map,
an x and y axis of time and place. I spend too many days alone
to write well anymore.

I make up forests from my memory, old trees waking
I once tried to photograph trunk to canopy before my father told me
it would never work, taking pictures that way. I never tried again.

I’ve made too many mistakes to trust myself
to write from my heart anymore. Laughter forsook me
with the last piece of trust placed in the hands of a man
who cried with me at lunch. His wife of youth gone
too soon cancer. Owing to my weaknesses shared
(too soon as well) the friend couldn’t help but
clumsy my soul. It wasn’t his fault, we mostly
trample like fall our opportunities.

To walk alone in the woods, the foothills
unshared with another, soul to soul, is an
ingrown blindness; though swimming in
a Sea of Glory, we depart and dry.
Divide the ramble, eyes doubled four,
is a holy panorama; sloshing in the
Sea of Glory, more wet and head to toe,

Whether smile or cry, the day is meaning
and memory the book to read happiness by.

A Chatty Meander

A Chatty Meander

(“Look to the mountains—the feet of one bringing good news and proclaiming peace!” Nahum 1:15a)

Why we pick up kaleidoscopes to distill our images
and write them down to tell the truth in words that agree,
sentence and syntax,
is a bother of childish nations. Bits of glass cut from
broken art
fall, sounding like sand poured onto hardwood floors,
and refract away the terms of armistice. We would
rather play with bent sunlight than face reports that
reflect poorly upon our character.

I was never a ruffian, not quite a scientist either;
gangs would not have me…short and lightweight,
labs always puzzled me…mix these and those and
hope for explosion.

I had hoped to be a mystic, fighting angels who saw me clear,
or mocking demons for my career. But my fingers never tingled
just so, and dreamwork was shoddy leftover fears and lunch.

I had hoped to be a digger, finding potsherds in the strata,
or explaining remains and copying data into contexts of finds
not yet considered. But I only dug with tablespoons and
found worms to hook a crawdad or two.

I hoped to be a singer, a writer, a voice commanded attention
even when I whispered. But I only wrote in secret, afraid to
step outside the well-scored boundaries set by rules I
had not written…no, not the rules, but my fear of them.

And what I heard at each junction was I did not sing three notes well,
could not afford the room, the board, the academic unrewarded premiums.
My words were too skeletal, my repentant handwriting still illegible,
despite every attempt to clean up the erasures I should have burned instead.

At the end of the road now, too late to restart, cornered by time and excuses,
there has to be someone behind me to do what I should have done.
Speak to the ones who treat the unalike like simpletons. Declare peace is
better than shallow pandemonium (where demons rule the world we thought
we finally had understood.)

Go to the name-callers who use their high-chairs as babel towers
pretending a better view. Brave you instead of weeping me. Face you
unlike hidden me. Love you lest breaking me. Go second now that
I’m too far and far too foolish to think

My

Words

Have

Meaning this late in the day.

Only let the piecework, the quiltwork shout what I
meant to shout from the beginning.
Only let the workshop, the worksheet manufacture
the focus I knew I knew from the calling.
Only let the mountains where the giant telescopes
point to the sky
proclaim to the blind (I, and we, big and bits, whole and
holy, destined and undefined)
peace, Peace, PEACE

In the valley (unless you’d like to pay another dime
for the kaleidoscope’s rhyme-plastered lie.)

Peace, Peace, PEACE

In the valley (for you and me I pray).

O Little Town of Bethlehem

O Little Town of Bethlehem

(“But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, are only a small village among all the people of Judah. Yet a ruler of Israel will come from you, one whose origins are from the distant past.” Micah 5:2 NLT)

Each year we are reminded that something extraordinary took place in a small Jewish village over 2000 years ago. Though it is fairly evident that Jesus was likely born in the spring, our winter date for the celebration has taken hold over time, and here we are; twinkly lights, the crunch of snow, bundled up carolers and all.

Stuck in My Head

“Each of the four living creatures had six wings, and their bodies were covered with eyes. Day and night they never stopped singing, ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord, the all-powerful God, who was and is and is coming!’” Revelation 4:8

Are you a person of habit or routine? I know I am. You could set your watch by my regular trip to the Post Office when I pastored my first church. I would drive the half mile into town, go to the PO Box, smile and greet the others retrieving their mail and head back to the office. On the way I stopped at a convenience store to pick up my second cup of coffee for the morning. Tuesday through Friday that was my routine.

Opening Night

Opening Night

(“And the men, in great awe of the Lord, offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows.” Jonah 1:16)

Unsuspecting of anything sacred among us, we set our course
as if we have rehearsed each unmet morning promised by evening. Only
upon when tossed like eggs for an omelet upon surges higher than our
expectations
do we look in the holds and find our hopes have been sleeping wingless
upon our customary passage.

We play the causes like actors trading ad-libs, making up line upon line
from goodwill to malevolent behind the transom, behind the curtain,
and wait for the applause to validate our one-line wit with which
to wrap up the world.

They keep telling us the music is in the rests, and the magic is
in the pauses, the drama in the unspoken moments when breath
sits like haze upon the frog-pond; but we are quick to the trigger,
uneasy with a world enriched by our erased dialogues.

By now opening night should have passed, the clapping, the laughter,
the happy timing we were after, finished and set before the chosen few
like a child’s drawing on the fridge. But too few knew what it took
to finish (starting so brilliantly) a study in hard work and cake frosting.

Rest and depressed, sometimes we are left with only the pages
of the script
left in our hands. No one to read all the lines, 6 actors reading 9.

Stepping foot now, I hope the silence means sacred, and even the
exhaust fumes from the highway behind me, remind me, holy. The
script reads the same today.

On Replacing the Images and Shadows

On Replacing the Images and Shadows
(“Are your ears awake? Listen. Listen to the Wind Words, the Spirit blowing through the churches. Christ-conquerors are safe from Devil-death.” Revelation 2:11 [The Message])

The metaphor looms behind me, rising over my future,
casting its shadow into years one or two, multiplied ahead.
The analogy was not pretty that pretended my language,
nor the simile like anything that would dress up an unshaven day.

Days went without new words to replace the ancillary version,
secondary visions pretended the whole. (Weaklings cry and
you cannot trust anyone) and I refused to cry around anyone
who could not cover my losses.

The shadows follow, they are what mothers muttered and fathers
replayed
until we knew nothing of the mountain breeze, and drank only
of mirages.

But You, Metaphor and Meaning, replace my images, the
gray men and women who populate my ethic,
and literally, one soldier at a time, they are dying,
replaced, line by line, by the paradigm of a Word
fleshed out, hungry like me, and bruising just as easily.

I cannot ignore the poetry, the verses unrehearsed perfection;
the humanity, the divine unrefined connection
between a hill in time to my present unrhymed attempts
at following something better

Than a previous shade; death remade (ha! Unmasked
pretender) breath unfrayed (HoSanna
uplifted) life arrayed (He’s undone
our afraid)

Seek Good

“Seek good and not evil, that you may live; so shall the Lord, the God of hosts, be with you, as you say.” Amos 5:14

It seems like the simplest thing. To stop and consider the question, “What would make a better world?” Wouldn’t we all answer with something like, “People doing the right thing in every circumstance, as much as is possible.” I know that people may disagree over what may be the “right” thing in some circumstances, but those differences don’t seem to be the chief source of our world’s ills.

The Center

“(Stay) right at the center of God’s love, keeping your arms open and outstretched, ready for the mercy of our Master, Jesus Christ. This is the unending life, the real life!” Jude 1:21 (The Message)

It takes true skill to stay within the circle of someone’s love. We may continually question their motives, or doubt our own appeal. Either way, we find ourselves setting traps for the person, testing whether their care is genuine. Or we push them away, as if to prove we were never within the reach of their love.

And Most Remembered

And Most Remembered

(“These are the stains in your love-feasts, as in your company they shamelessly gorge themselves; rainless clouds they are, carried along by winds; fruitless autumn trees, twice dead and uprooted.” Jude 1:12)

It was true, the banquets often lasted too long,
but not from verbose speeches and lengthy awards;
it was the people who would not leave for love of
a place to call their own. Their own homes damp,
their kitchens ravaged by dust that settled upon their poverty.

It was true, the banquets never solved the source of heartaches,
but they reminded (the bread with the wine) each diner of
the better time now within the refuge, inside the comfort
of unlocked protection and embrace. Their own faces
showed the joy at the tables and bounty in their voices.

It was swift, the aroma that switched from pleasure to scorched,
but the beginning of the overdone courses was slow to come out of the dark.
They hugged as well as they had at first, smiled the same gritty teeth,
but hazards implied their overheated eyes lusted authorship,
(their songs, their recipe, their work, their cutlery)
and might take the whole kitchen home unless applauded properly.

It was true, there were fewer at the tables after the fruitless left,
the clouds that mimicked showers, the dead pretending life;
but the joy rose higher, the wine flowed freer, the bread was
shared unhindered

And most remembered why they came.

The Wilderness Hard Times

“I took care of you during the wilderness hard times, those years when you had nothing.” Hosea 13:5 (The Message)

Ah, the wilderness, the place where another human soul is days away, either by travel or because of broken relationships. The place where there is scarcely food or drink and where, though depopulated of people, creatures like scorpions, serpents and beasts have made their home. This is the literal wilderness to which God refers. When Israel was in the barest and most barren place, God took care of them.

pragmatism

pragmatism

(“Dear friend, don’t copy the evil deeds of others! Follow the example of people who do kind deeds. They are God’s children, but those who are always doing evil have never seen God.” 3 John 1:11)

Pragmatists hollow the riverbed the quickest way,
one slope-bank to the other. Years to follow feet will tread the
earthen dam eased dry and accessed free, proving their peninsula.

Downriver of the earth-pile, the styles have changed,
fish aren’t fried, and likeable souls furrow their brows
that an apex undebated, such a clear focus unabated to everyone
could finally benefit, imagine that, only the upper half.

Without Knocking

“And this is the confidence we have resting on Him, that if we petition anything in agreement with His will, He hears us.” 1 John 5:14

Communication is the key to most important relationships. Most family counselors and books about marriage focus on communication. Knowing how and when to say the important things are crucial to relationship growth. And, giving time to honestly listen to each other is equally essential.

Give it a Rest

Give it a Rest

(“Think how much the Father loves us. He loves us so much that he lets us be called his children, as we truly are.” 1 John 3:1a)

We know how hard you’ve worked,
and how loudly you run that vacuum machine
careening into the table legs to make your point.
No one has ever noticed food on the floor like you do.

Give it a rest, son, let the best give way to the
love that’s done more than your chores (duly noted)
will finish today. We hear you put the cleaning brush away,
the cabinets close loudly, your exclamation point.

Give it a rest, daughter, let the mess whisper like a
pile of dead leaves God let sit months until the following spring.

We know you know much, how much you know is punctuated
by your opinion pressed against the best ideas, even when
you came into the conversation one breath between a comma
and the final question mark.

Give it a rest, brother, let the silence attest to how you
and two or three, know less than cement opinions that
wall out hugs and empathy. You know we know that
you don’t know it all. We know less than we know and
still are blessed.

We know how frightened you’ve become, and loud words with
concrete argumentation stone you silent or sting you
to grind your teeth with words you’ll take back later.

Give it a rest, sister, let the decibels suggest your distress
is full of woodpecked holes you never asked for; meet
the agony with less anxiety recoil, instead let the silence

Within the loved child that you are, let the dust settle and
the words fall upon the floor. You are more than their agitation
and your itch to set everyone straight. A child of love, the King
has named you; the whisper of the name more certain than
the shouting of the exceedingly sane.

An Unchanging Promise

(“This is exactly what Christ promised: eternal life, real life!” 1 John 2:25 [The Message])

Anyone can make a promise. There are promises of health if you just drink someone’s juice product. You can lose 50 pounds in 2 days if you use the most recent weight-loss gimmick. Men and women promise to live together as husband and wife, “forsaking all others”. Friends graduate from High School, and, before moving off to college promise to make sure they will stay in touch.

No Fooling

“If we say that we have not sinned, we are fooling ourselves, and the truth isn’t in our hearts.” 1 John 1:8

Have you ever struggled with a loved one who had a medical condition and wouldn’t admit it? Perhaps they had constant, sever pain and hid it. Finally, after seeing them grimace time and time again when doing some simple task like leaning over to pick up the newspaper, you realize something is wrong. They admit to you that, not only is their pain severe, but they have actually battled it for more than a year.

All Landscaped with Righteousness

All Landscaped with Righteousness

(“We’ll be looking the other way, ready for the promised new heavens and the promised new earth, all landscaped with righteousness.” 2 Peter 3:13 [The Message])

I never knew all their names, the roses in my North Dakota
garden bed. Five bushes lined the driveway, from the velvet caret
to summer-noon yellow. Each winter I covered their delicate roots and
with three or four making it through the winter, I thought myself blessed to
replace the rest when spring lately warmed their cradle.

I’m no gardener, make no mistake; someone else had planted them there,
left for my adoption. Fed, watered, pruned and gifted; front yard
July mornings urged the new canes to catch up with the few.

The best blooms never saw more sun than a day or two, given away
to my wife, my daughter, and sometimes to an accidental hello;

Plus my kindergarten friend across the street.

Sad, a few weeks later,
that the rose I fetched her had “died”, I’d pluck another,
sweet pink laced with white as milk. I think she gave it to her mother,
(roses are never meant to be hoarded or collected like coins or stamps,
but displayed in ways that say the person who receives even one
floral masterpiece is more beautiful than the gifted blossom.)

Just before winter crumbled the remaining hips on their canes,
sad eyes stared me down one morning again about the previous rose’s demise.

 I could not help it, but told her, no lie, I would bring her a rose,
next summer,
that would never die.

As soon as the frost departed and left its home vacant for warm loam
crawling with life and enrichment, I rushed downtown to where
the local vendor displayed spring’s best wares underneath a warming tent,
and searched for the best, never-die rose, for a 5-year-old who would
know the difference,

And, paying with my mud-knuckled fingers, hurried to her house,
dug half a hole and knocked on the door. She giggled, her mom smiled,
and my little friend and I planted the best place for a rose to be:

Right out front, for all her neighbors to see.