The Burden of Measure

The Burden of Measure

(“Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness.” Romans 6:19b)

The weight of years can never be unloaded,
Laden with stacks of misdeeds restyled as mystery,
all the labels are yellowing around the edges with
the glue losing its power of attraction.

I know what is behind every shadow; the clues
are useless in the light of the sun. Those who think they know
should watch the reruns closely. I have carried
my vagabond baggage much further than they know.

I started to divide my life, and store each story in silos;
one for the acts of light without disputation,
the other for darkness (no matter my reputation at large).
I started last week, weighing each work from one to ten,
nine and above were sterling, all agreed.
All less than two were darkness (greed, lust, judgments and the
lies to divert discerning eyes).

I scanned my past, peering through the hazy tunnel of time,
and filled my second silo well before the first was a quarter complete.
Like the farmers when harvest is beyond expectation, I stored
my dark deeds in piles on the ground; stacks and stacks of deeds
and thoughts, false opinions and battles fought to escape the stares
that turned my face red and my hairs bristle like the cold.

I knew the older I become, the greater my debt, and silo one
will become simple seed for a small plot while the true harvest
overflows on the ground and silo two. Time has bound my
hands and my heart, the days left to me are far too few
to regain the best of me.

I’ve written a letter with the truth, to half a dozen I know,
though disturbed, will not take measures to disown me,
to stone me; they all know how prone we are to measure
another man’s storage with load groans of disapproval.
So, honest and loyal, they will die with me together
as the letter is opened to country air and truth.

We together, my hope, my trust, will dispose of counting
at once. And live heaven to man, land to mouth, past
unwritten and future bidding us renewal. Slaves once
to the past, slaves always, first to last, we offer our days
attached to the Master who passed over both our overflow
of darkness and mad attempts at
fullness. He has snatched our sad look backwards that
tore our hearts.