Embrace My Soul

Embrace My Soul

(“For those who enter God’s rest also cease from their labors as God did from his.” Hebrews 4:10)

It is true,
the trailer won’t unload itself,
the house will not build itself.
But what if the soul grows in one
single embrace?

I get it,
the dishes won’t wash themselves,
my room will not clean itself.
But what if love is the effortless act
Of simple dying?

I cannot work,
my body won’t allow it.
I can barely write the words on the page.
Not that my fingers are stiff or crooked,
my mind has been seared by pain like a desert
and words like arrows telling me I just need more
jesus.

If just once they would sit in a chair next to me,
if just once they would share a bottle of wine,
if just once they would keep their mouths shut,
if just once they gave no advice this time.
Do I live too far away,
does my countenance frighten you?
All I know, I was just a stamp away and no one
ever wrote to me.

Are my tears too heavy for you to lug around,
do you fear my doubts will somehow undo you?
Are my words now too concrete for you to swallow,
do you pray for me while I cry invisibly?

I never stopped working and maybe I should.
My body will allow it no longer.
I no longer work, hear no voice on the phone,
no tone that enwraps my soul. “I love you” rings
more true than
“you need more jesus”
or “I will pray for you.”

Do you see my words, how artless they’ve become?
When I write in the middle of the pain
how can I ignore the silence I never heard from
Just one visitor, one victim of my hard labor,
or (maybe this is too crazy) one person who spent
a whole day imagining how a body like mine
could still house a healthy soul. 

I want to point to Jesus,
the suffering he took, the dying he imbibed,
I want to think of him with eyes that enliven
my hope again. But is it too much to ask,
too much to explain, that I wish his followers
bring him by when they came?