Teach Me Silence

Teach Me Silence

(“Those who want to be rich are falling into temptation and into a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires, which plunge them into ruin and destruction.” 1 Timothy 6:9)

Can I learn more about you, the silence between
the commercial rants and conversational winds?
Do I need to listen to every interview with the next
entrepreneur hawking what I never needed but want
just the same?
Can I conquer this need for occupation,
can I slow down my mind?
What of the hands on the clock that mark my hours
more slowly than the day? What of the tremor I feel
just wanting to get out of my skin? If I could
buy everything (retail or closeout) how much
quieter would I seem? I don’t say much, but my
brain unsteadily steams like the iron wheels of a train.

I’ve never had much money,
don’t know where I’d shop if did. Maybe the
minutes would tell me how to satisfy these desires.
Maybe the hours would empty my treasure chest
buried closely to the line where land and sea meet.
Maybe my heart would beat to the rhythm of the waves,
and maybe I would be still long enough to know
I have everything that I need.

The fingerprints of the world are whorled on
my transparent brain. I never wipe them clean. They
inform me of everything like rafts
carrying pelts from northern excursions. I inspect
every one but leave them for someone else to purchase.

Take me silence, teach me stillness. I’ll lay my
yearning aside for an hour of solitude, though I barely
talk
to anyone all day. Is there a word in the center of me
that can define my cravings? I’ve run out of energy
and no longer pursue them. But they still occupy my
thinking every day.

Meet me, find me in the middle of my sentences that
trail on for hours at a time. Unpack my density,
my destiny seems to be wound up and tangled like
vines in the middle of a rose garden. Meet me
finally where I can hear only silence waiting for
me.

You Tend Your Garden Well

You Tend Your Garden Well

(“Do not oppress the widow, the fatherless, the sojourner, or the poor, and let none of you devise evil against another in your heart.” Zechariah 7:10)

Did you offer them bread from the loaves
decorating your kitchen? Did you pour them wine
the moment it seemed the time was right?
Did you hear them knock on the door and
did you happily open even though you knew
they would leave you more weightless than before?

I know you’ve ached before, haven’t you?
I know you’ve slaked your thirst, didn’t you?
I know it’s been years for you, but for them
there is no setting sun to disappear their cravings
for necessary food. I think you knew that chapter
before you opened the book.

I hope you believe their stories, I hope you listen well.
I hope you believe their inventories of pain. I hope you feel well.

But what do I know? People call me political when
I make any noise for the hurting and neglected, and
they aim for my head telling me it’s not my place.

The moment you close your heart you dismantle the possibilities
that could feed the starving at least through tomorrow. Fire up
the hearth in your heart, let the liquid warmth of the sun behind your back
take you tears and make them heavier than you can bear.

You tend your garden well so that no red rose petal
goes unaccounted for.

I’d Like to Buy a Thousand Angels

I’d Like to Buy a Thousand Angels

(“God desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” 1 Timothy 2:4)

Your retail price for a thousand angels ($1000 dollars check or cash)
is far more than I can afford. Incidentally I already know of nearly
a thousand
that surround me day and night.
Some have faces I recognize, some have names I have forgotten,
some are invisible, some as small as butterflies.

Why do you take the money that belongs to individuals,
why do you charge for blessings that are free?
Incidentally, I have wondered how my cash increases my
angelic horde, how they surround me, just based on your word?

I’ve walked in the rain enough times to know
that the range of angelic protection each day does not include
a promise to stay dry. It’s not their fault,
I need the rain to wash away doubts and inhibitions.

You promise an enemy to my enemies,
and I gasp that you call it gospel. You have
drastically raveled up the beautiful story,
the one that gives enemies our love.

The story is plain, the position insanely more pleasant
than prying dollar bills from an old man’s hands.
I’ll keep my angels, thank you, and move my offerings
to someone who refuses to make insane promises,
to someone who has no idea I gave them anything.
I’ll keep my angels, I’ve known them too long now
to start new incidents and replacements for those who
have hung around long enough to put up with my
doubts, suspicions and desires to visit the donut shop.

So, here I stand, with messengers who have walked
with me through swamps and deserts, through inhibitions and
oppositions. But never did I ask them to become an enemy even
to my most ardent foe.

Like Paving Stones

Like Paving Stones

(“The disciples then began to argue about which of them was the greatest.” Luke 9:46)

You’ve laid out arguments like paving stones spaced
so far apart that mud is inevitable. You stood up in front
of dozens
with your toupee tilted toward the side. You took
swipes at ones you deemed dangerous and inconsequential.
You thought you were talking for God and
you couldn’t hear
how your ego was louder than anything that came
out of your head.
You never questioned your certainty and
that is why
your faith was insubstantial. You thought you
were a high-wire act, but we saw the
rusty chains that held you up. We would rather
go for a walk in the sun.
You meant well, but you weren’t on the level.
You dreamed of hundreds following you to heaven.
You imagined what you should have examined,
you measured your life by how many were wowed
by your words.

I read a pageful of numbers, a long stretch of
dimes and dollars. I listened for the crisis others
ignored. I longed for larger spaces between the
stated and the questioned.  You were taller and
several covered their heads as your words shot
out like hailstones without warning.

Let’s sit on the back porch, let’s wait in the sun,
let’s allow the neighbors to speak, let’s quiet ourselves
like babies falling asleep. Let’s listen to their music
though we have never heard it before. There are cadences
we can learn
if we stop our chatter for a while.

The Storm Threatened

The Storm Threatened

(“Then He said to them all, ‘If anyone wants to come with Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow Me.’” Luke 9:23)

The storm threatened more than mud and slime,
it continued to mock both function and design.
It was predicted,
and we evicted the plans we had for a picnic
afternoon.

It drove us to pray for promised deliverance,
It captured our imprisoned intelligence.
It was so sudden
there was hail in the garden
and conversations were muddled well into
the evening.

We watched and wondered at the thunder that
drove so many home. We woke later than usual
with eyes red from dust and distrust as we ached
over the mockingbird’s song that repeated the
false charges, wary accusations, and verdicts
made of sand.

(Crucify)

And we breathed the air that was burning plastic,
acrid and across from the garden torn up by
the onlookers in their rush to ridicule with words
the prisoner nailed to lumber. Why won’t he
come down? No one wanted to see that, of course.
No one wanted to spend more than half a day
glaring at the sky stripped of everything that
would open their eyes.

Everything turned black, every sign was
beyond belief. Every person felt that pain in
their chest and their minds found no rest as they
wondered why he ever was called a king.

Before the storm we heard him say they might

(Crucify)

Him. But that day was sunny and we never imagined he meant anything more than some days would go slower, that some days might be over later than we imagined.

Now the storm, the thunder, the pounding drops of rain
so thick they kicked up the dust all combined to confirm
our hope was gone. We could not let this night go by

(Crucify)

We did not know the storm would pass, at least not
that we could predict. But women found the
garden in the morning sun and surprised us all with
something we hoped was a new dawn,
a fresh beginning, a new ache that makes us
want nothing more than to follow, storm or sunlit days,
the trajectory that disengages us from reliance on
various changes in the wind.

He Sent the Mourners Away

He Sent the Mourners Away

(“But he took her by the hand. ’Get up, child,’ he called.”) Luke 8:54)

They had been wailing outside, the
mourners
who came to grieve for the dying daughter.
Barely catching their breath before the next sob started,
the took their place along the mudbrick walls.

A stranger approached, escorted by her father,
the stranger spoke, “Don’t cry. She isn’t dead, she’s asleep.”

That’s when the mocking laughter began.
How did he know? Had he been here with the family
from the first moment she fell ill? How did he know?
How dare he give false hope, how dare he
talk such myopic nonsense?

The father waited expectantly; one ear tuned to the wailing,
one to the stranger’s confidence. But she was dead.
How could a father believe? How could he expect what
had never happened before?

But the girl heard only one thing, deep in the sleep of death,
“Get up, child.” Slowly the stranger raised her up, his hand around hers,
while bedside they brought her food.

Oh for the hand that reaches through the curtain of death,
for the voice that speaks even when laughter mocks with its hired breath.
Oh for the touch that extends through the doldrums,
the words that speak costly sentences for no charge.

The father was silent, his daughter in his arms.
And tears mixed with a new sort of disbelief. He
touched her face, her warm and flushed face,
laughed to himself a new sort of mirth
that looks death in the eye and renews his joy
on the day that seemed darker than all others,
for a gift that seemed so delayed.

And he sent the mourners away.

Daffodils

Daffodils

(“Those on the rocky soil are the ones who, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and yet these do not have a firm root; they believe for a while, and in a time of temptation they fall away.” Luke 8:13)

It smelled like mud where the excavator was working
building a new road into the new subdivision. Five
houses in all have been built, or are nearly ready.
The trusses pointed to the morning star until they
closed it all in.

The smell of mud is bracing, the smell of mud
invites the promise of spring. The road being built
will hopefully last as long and as well as every measurement
and lined with daffodil quilts, their bulbs warm below the
the winter sod. They wait there, under the surface,
for months at a time until there is more light than dark,
more day than night,
And slowly poke their way through the grass with
buds closed and delicately protected.

I like the ones that stay, that grace my walks with bright yellow
imitating the sun. I like the fences where they flaunt their full display
along a 12-foot section. They are butter and their stalks are made
of mud enriched by the neighbor who owns the fence. Facing west,
his daffodils get the sun for the warmest part of the day. There
are no stones in his flower bed. That is apparent from the joy that the
colors bring and how long they keep their mouths wide open
to the rain.

Would You Walk with Me?

Would You Walk with Me?

(“The Son of Man came, and he ate and drank, and you said, ‘Look at this man! He is a glutton and wine drinker, a friend of tax collectors and other outcasts!’” Luke 7:34)

Would you walk with me along the field where the
yellow daffodils form the border between tree lines
and grass? Did you see this day coming, did you wonder
if the rain would last?

Would you come if I invited you to
a table with common food? Would you let me
fill your glass with wine,
would you be happy with spaghetti and a
slice of bread?

I remember how the bougainvillea climbed the
patio sticks holding up the roof and
made it feel like Hawaii when we danced to the
listing moon.

We were too young for alcohol, too old for
musical chairs;
we were testing the boundaries, we were
choosing up couples and pairs on an
early adolescent summer’s eve.
We waited until the night was over to
dance with the one we had danced with
in our heads. We could not believe it when
she said,
“yes.”

I have to admit these days are split between
wishing to have someone who tells me all their wishes,
and sitting alone watching the news on tv.
I’d rather play in the band than practice
a few moves alone before the black and blueness of
the night wrapped it up for us.

The field will still be here in the morning,
the path winding past the cattle and geese,
and I would extend my invitation and wait
on the corner for a chance to speak with you
about the questions along these streets.

Anyone who will tell me their story has
already won my heart,
crossed the path from unknown to spatial
and relieved my discontent.

I’d love your company, but I fear the conversation
that leaves me speechless when you ask me
what I want.

Sanctuary

Sanctuary

(“Seek good and not evil, that you may live; and so the Lord, the God of heavenly forces, will be with you just as you have said.” Amos 5:14)

You keep moving the target, you keep changing the rules,
you declare some things illegal and others gifts of gold.
When you based your opinion on third-hand
professional gossip you got lost in the crystalline darkness.
While you laugh I cry that you
have held the truth at arm’s length. And you mock
the prophets who speak showers of rain,
not your disdain for what you cannot understand.

These moments are over like the fading rainbow,
and we do well to remember the colors once the
spectrum has gone from our perception. (Does it
get brighter
the longer we stare?)

So they hijacked 700 without due process,
they commandeered them across the skies
without a clue how many were wrong or right.
And then I hear your voice pronouncing judgment
on them all,
making them guilty, making them criminals,
making them subject to your cartoon caricatures
and two-dimensional portraits. You paint them
all the same.

Sanctuary. We hear the mission bells.
Sanctuary. We hear the widow’s tears.
Sanctuary. We wait the summer sun.
Sanctuary. We wait the promised sage.

Sanctuary, we hear their calls to hear their case,
a place safe enough for their stories to be
safely shared over soup and a bed protected from
the managers of messages who lengthen the shadows.
And we hear the babies gently cooing themselves to sleep.

The Same Sun

The Same Sun

(“Therefore love your enemies, do good, and lend, looking for nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be the children of the Highest. For he is kind to the unkind and to the evil.” Luke 6:35)

Stand a little closer so you can see
the eyes that open like a morning rose.
Every sunrise blossoms,
every petal has its day,
every flower offers its nectar
for the visitors who come to stay.

The neighbor boy is outside dribbling his
basketball in the street shooting hoops like
he’s the last one on the court. The neighbor
girl rides by on her bike with the family’s
Labrador mix leading the way.

Listen a little deeper and you might hear
the paintbrush on the canvas
writing a rhapsody from margin to margin.
You might hear the colors, you might smell the warm,
you might realize the hues and shades
are laid down in layers. You might hear
the same song from down the street as you
did on your first day home from war.

Do not panic, but the same sun that seeks the horizon
shines for your antagonist;
the same rain falls for your adversary;
the same rose smells of dew and love the as
it does for you.

I can tell that doesn’t sit well with you.
I struggle with it too. I swear, though, the eyes
of my enemy
are the same color as at least a dozen friends.
And the children haven’t learned yet to
withhold love based on merit.

I think I’d like to learn to live again and find
every thread the has stitched my heart to yours,
every ray of light that brightens our eyes.

After the Hail Crashes

After the Hail Crashes

(“Then Jesus said to them, ‘I ask you, is it lawful to do good on the sabbath rather than to do evil, to save life rather than to destroy it?’” Luke 6:9)

Against all odds the desert birthed life into
the cacti that stored life when the sun dried out the
cracked soil with promises of nothing.
How hard should we work
when life is at risk? How far
should we walk
to find water for the tongues that
feel like sand?

We could never afford the time it took
to repopulate the unfortunate whittlings
that hung from the broken sky. We had
taken the day off, if anyone would believe that story.
We were faithful to set our feet in concrete
and refused to move when the clock marked its
clanging announcement that the day was off by
at least a hundred degrees.

Bring back the daylight;
banish the orders that keep everyone in the dark.
Watch the desert rose;
touch the barbs that keep you awake.

Sometimes the sun grazes the entire horizon
immediately after the hail crashes and bounces off
the sod still awakened. Sometimes the sun
hastens to melt the stones left behind.

It’s all measured on the average,
the mean between the two extremes.
Someone said that balance was the word,
but I think I’d rather be all in than
try to find the middle between up
and
down,
or silly and serious. Work if you want,
heal if you must,
hug without caution and love like
tomorrow is not promised.

Sanity demanding, I’ll be sitting outside your door
waiting for you to return home on a Saturday afternoon.

I Don’t Wander Far

I Don’t Wander Far

(“Let us strive to know the Lord. His appearance is as sure as the dawn. He will come to us like the rain, like the spring showers that water the land.” Hosea 6:3)

I don’t wander very far from home these days;
I follow the path my feet have made looping the same
walkway today and tomorrow, Mondays and Yesterdays
and hold conversations in the late afternoon.
Sometimes I wonder if you hide from me,
or if it is me who masks my existence.
There are hints of perfume past the cherry trees
that have not yet blossomed. It is early March
and they are shaded by apple trees on the sunward side.

I have all day to rehearse the accompaniment
for a dozen voices this week. But I don’t like
the arrangement and my talents are rusty from
like of use.

I’d tell you more about what hovers within
but it would be the same story as a year ago,
the same yearnings, and mostly unmet,
that have grappled with my mind from the beginning
of my certainty that you would speak to me in ways
that would change my disappearing face into something
more beatific. I’ve searched for ecstatic visions just within
my latched doors. I should play my music more.

The trail I take every day is taller on one end than the other,
I arrive home, though, at the same altitude I began.
I should spend more time with my fingers
strumming my guitar.
Or hear words I could pour out in rhymes and
rhythms you could understand.

I pray the day will close with at least a line
of divine poetry as I wait like the trees for
Spring.

I Knew the Wound Had Closed

I Knew the Wound Had Closed

(“After the sun had set, people with all kinds of diseases were brought to Jesus. He put his hands on each one of them and healed them.” Luke 4:40)

How great is your power, your love, and your healing,
to touch mortal flesh like mine and leave me reeling
that I could survive so long without the warmth of you hands on my brow.
You cool the overheated wounds that still burst freely
like the first time they ruptured.

But in your touch, between your fingers, inside the hug
that lasted longer than any other hug,
there I found safety from the ways I only rewound my
wounds in moods of despair; I feared I would never
see the scars that reminded me they had once been healed.

It was under the stars, just as the sun was disappearing behind
the hills,
it was far away from a dark moon, it was dusky and chilled.
It was the time of evening when faces change. It was the time
that it takes longer to recognize friend or foe. That was when
I thought I saw you,
That was when I waited in line.

I never sang the blues, I know they would only cheer me up.
But dirges were on my tongue morning till evening, longer than
I spoke in the day.

I was marginally happy; I sat on the sidelines. I was invited to
parties I could not attend. I was unlawfully blind. But I knew
the touch the moment his fingers found my face and nearly
erased
every malignant nerve and thought. There, where the bats
flit above in the yawning light, I knew the wound was closed,
I was whole, and pain, though not entirely eliminated, might lead
me closer to the dawning sun.

Like a Monument

Like a Monument

(“Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ.” Philippians 3:7)

The stone jutted from the muddy ground and
stood like a monument to a nameless hero
or
saint,
or trouble,
or oration,
or a quaint way of sizing up the history
of a name nearly forgotten.

You can see the arms from here, pointing
down to shield the graveled feet from
umbrellas of rain that threatened to
drown its memory.

And yet, what is gained by chiseling
every victory in granite,
every loss in craggy rock? Would there be
a directory to tell who had visited and
how long they stayed?

The stone was uncut. That was clear. And so,
changed by perception only,
it could outlast the longest tenure you or I
could remain. The stone was massive.
This was shadow.
And obscured the view of the open meadow
unless you climbed it carefully,
kept your footing,
found your handholds,
and looked toward the west where the
golden-eye of the sky shone in the
late afternoon.

So travelers who stop merely to catch their breath
follow the trough that carries the rain between the hills.
Not looking back, the sun beckons
in pink and gray shadows behind the distant cliffs.

The River Kept Flowing

The River Kept Flowing

(“John answered, ‘Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same.’” Luke 3:11)

Fascinated by the reflections of still life
in the pools around the banks of the river,
people gathered to watch who might wash themselves.
Undeterred, some were ready to wade into the deep
to their waists,
wanting the germs cleansed from their ravenous thoughts.

Are you asked to give before your feet hit the water,
are you asked to share what your last morsel of bread?
Did you consider how short the span between birth and death,
did you contemplate the thinnest slice of your life?

What prerequisite did you ask to precede your
turning point? Why would water alone be enough
to baptize your fears and intentions? Did your tears
mean anything as you heard the answer to your questions?

After you heard the answer did your courage fade?
After you left your jacket on the bank did you wish
you had an extra?
After the water flowed over your head did you find
new ways to share your daily bread?

The river kept flowing, didn’t it? Your tunic ballooned
like a parachute. The same sun shone as bright as it always
had been. The same eyes stole into your soul. You
and
everyone else
hoped the changes would last.

The Fat Part of the Day

The Fat Part of the Day

(“I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ.” Philippians 1:6)

Whether it happens or not, the night won’t cloak
the starry hosts that dot the sky. In my mind there is
nothing that is disposable.

The possible lives outside the boundaries of theory
and prediction. The sheets of wind can strip away
every hindrance to creativity. It all grows as tall
as it can. It never throws away another chance to
mix the paints in pastel combinations. It is the
last to leave the party and the first to jot down the
poetry
that had been buried too deep to find with simply
a rational mind.

I did not plan on what to write, though I thought about it
through the fattest part of the day.
I can’t explain where the words come from,
and if I could no one would read, though they
might act like they understood.

Prizes lie on the horizon,
blue ribbons behind the throne,
accolades of innocence just
waiting to be interpreted. The impetus
is unclear.

Today I started with my heart pacing,
my head throbbing,
my memory hoping for another word
of reassurance
before the afternoon waned toward the dusk.
I cannot do what I wish I could,
I do what I wish I could not,
and the
no man’s land
between the two
feels like the stagnant ponds that settle
between the confluence of conscious and
spiritual. I plan to explore this soon.

Peace and its Possibilities

Peace and its Possibilities

(“Glory to God in the highest heaven, and peace on earth to those with whom he is pleased!” Luke 2:14)

The fog disguised the trees as giants,
and made the ashen roof seem like snow.
The horn blew from the river below to
warn the ships and wake the captains.
We did not plan on rising this early.

But the fog lifted as the angels came down,
the stars blinked fire escapes and the moon
directed it beams below.

To be clear, I had never seen an angel.
Never felt an invisible presence so near to me,
speaking so clear to me,
singing with words that drove the fear from me.

To be honest, I have never met a king.
Never stood and bowed before him beneath his marbled throne.
There was a gulf between his pretentious palace
and my pallet beneath the stars.
Working in the fields, we all heard what the angels spoke,
a king born like a pauper, a ruler starting life in the livestock’s
feeding trough.

We told stories once the sun had set, started the fires to keep us warm,
walked among the sheep, feeding and watering them, and watched
as they dozed to sleep.

There was a second of silence. We took one breath in unison and then
the skies exploded; the air crystalized the praises that echoed
across the plain. Angels upon angels, wings stirring the sky and
we heard the words from outside of us and inside of us, we were
one with the song and the singers.

Could this peace free us from tyranny; could it release us from
bondage? Could it build something better than enslavement,
unfetter us from legions of oppression?

We had no choice, given the choreography in the skies,
to seek out this baby king and ponder everything the angels had told us.

We saw him, bundled tightly, his mother lifting him to her breast and
we thought he was unremarkable. And we thought we could be wrong.
And we sought to understand it, and we hoped to believe it for as
long as we could.
And we went back to our flocks scratching our heads but still
humming the song the angels sang about peace and its possibilities
because of this infant king.

Pockets Lined with Gold

Pockets Lined with Gold

(“He has toppled the mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly.” Luke 1:52)

Pockets lined with gold,
people queued for food,
tyrants on the throne,
beggars inhabiting the pews.
Turn around now,
spin out of your cycle,
let the eyes of the needy capture
you by the hands and pull you in
until you understand your
riches are not the blessing of God.

Instead, let justice roll down like thunder,
let your assets account for your deafened ears
and give thought to the ways
the mountains stay suspended as they
send their snows in streams to the sea.

Do you see how humbly God answers?
Do you observe the prayers of the poor?
Have you ever seen the tables turned;
have you given away what you have already earned?
You are not that innocent.
You are not that ignorant.
You’ve seen them cross your street just to
miss the subway on their last day of work.
And now they do not know what name,
or what denomination,
or what currency will ever buy
their dignity back. You have seen them
and have pushed your way through the
crowd to the penthouse with the secret code
only cudgels know. Document your
oblivion and send it down the
U-turn postal service to remind you tomorrow
of everything you ignored today.

I Could Listen All Day

I Could Listen All Day

(“When the king heard the words of the law scroll, he tore his clothes.” 2 Kings 22:11)

The flock of geese flew overhead sounding
like children on a playground. The fog had turned
to rain and
they felt closer than ever, flying under the
misty domed sky.

Don’t stop browsing these pages, they are never
exactly the same. Never assume you know the
answers because the question will be different each time.
The cattle lying in the rain-soaked field are
commentators of the scripts we read.

Once around the neighborhood,
skirting the road where new developments form,
there is a cemetery just north of the edge
of the mudded field where you can see the river from its
its gentle hill. There is little boredom when the
river punctuates the occasional verses testing the
waters,
testing the distance to the end of the day.

Though the sun is not shining there are rays
that pierce the heart even on the most clouded elevations.
There are voices reciting lyrics and faces leading
the band. I’ve heard them before, but today they
sound new, like a baby’s first words: colors, books,
up and down, mom and dad. I know thousands more
but the babble of babies is its own interpretation. I could
listen all day.

Mornings Are the Best Time

Mornings Are the Best Time

(“Don’t panic! You’re looking for Jesus from Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been brought back to life. He’s not here. Look at the place where they laid him.” Mark 16:6b)

Someone left the door open and all the breeze
searched the corners of the room and the dogs
bayed
at the intrusion.
Something swelled from within,
something we had not seen before;
something breathed like an open yawn,
something we had not heard before.

Angels sit on the porch announcing the
sunny morning. Angels, like fierce beasts,
flustered us; angels, like tender rain,
assured us.

Someone was free, someone defeated death.
Somewhere in the raising of the day,
somewhere between my house and yours,
behind locked doors that never kept him away we
found what escaped our perfect reasoning and
we swallowed our tongues at the thought.
Reality was more concrete than our theories
of life and death.

Didn’t our minds spin at the thought of it?
Didn’t our hearts dive at the weight of it?
Didn’t our hearts fly at the sight of it?
Didn’t our minds rise at the grace of it?

We could barely speak at the jolt of it.
We could barely believe, but we caught our words
and remembered that mornings are the best time
for celebrating stones that have been rolled away.

A Pathway Home

A Pathway Home

(“His body, the church, is the fullness of Christ, who fills everything in every way.” Ephesians 1:23)

I think I am ready to go home or
at least meet someone for drinks. The streets
can be so lonely this far down the line.
I think it’s only a couple of miles from here,
I think we could be there by noon.
I’ve been to the wildlife refuge and only found
ducks and crows,
but it’s a good place to be alone.
But sometimes solitude is louder than
a baby grand piano in a starlit shed.
I can hammer the keys now,
I can freeze the melody between
octaves. I can miss my notes more easily
until everyone can tell I haven’t played well for
a while.
I think I am ready for some shalom now
or at least chant the words to pre-christian
tunes.
It is all so big now, so far beyond my reach;
it is daily decreed that my silence will increase
as the hours slowly turn toward afternoon.
And yet I still believe, below the surface,
above the moon,
within the moments, outside the fine-tuning
of string after sting, there is something larger than
the hole I carry within my chest.
There is something closer than the rain
that falls on my forehead and shapes my footprints.
There must be a star that sits above the sky;
there must be a vision that sees dreams like candor.
There must be a pathway home that takes me
past the homes where friends a half-century ago
we had coffee and talked about god and northern lights
and record collections and our favorite bands.

There must be a pathway home.

We Put Out the Coffee

We Put Out the Coffee

(“Let’s not become discouraged in doing good, for in due time we will reap, if we do not become weary. Galatians 6:9)

The evening came wavering like a
toddling baby boy. We knew it was pending
and kept working anyway.
We saw how the moon grew as it rose from
behind the bare winter branches of a walnut tree.
We had been serving the survivors the
food they deserved.
We had been playing with their children
on the die-cut lawn and listened to their
laughter while the pizzas warmed in the
double ovens. We put out coffee,
we poured the lemonade,
we unstacked the dishes for the families
who stayed. We had counted on half as many,
we had planned to be home before nightfall.
But these were our friends, though many we had never met.
These were our family, though this was the first time we knew their names.

We understood each other,
they knew we would stay as long as the food held out.
We knew we could sit with the silence,
or we could sing as the meal began.
We washed dishes and then we put them out again
for the next friends in line and for the next ones after them.
We sweat as the ovens heated,
we laughed as the children raised their Styrofoam cups
like goblets making a toast.
It was always “cheers”; it was always just a moment’s
wink of a day.
Though we worked well into the evening, we only felt
the time was a fraction of what we had to give.
We knew the play, the conversation, the coffee,
the elastic answers to powdered questions; we knew
there was more to do and we would meet again,
we would meet again, like tonight.

We
memorized the conversations and
learned the vocabulary everyone needed.
We invited the foreign language to share our
chat around tables of perspiration, around
lampposts of contentment.
We learned more than we knew,
we listened happily and silent,
we gave food and attention to assuage
the starving. And we went home, weary and
grateful someone had invited us to work
that was rewarded with new names written
on our tongues.

Open Their Hearths

Open Their Hearths

(“I will seek the lost, bring back the strays, bandage the injured, and strengthen the weak, but I will destroy the fat and the strong. I will shepherd them with justice.” Ezekiel 34:16)

Did you deeply believe you pulled the strings?
Did you think you could pull the rug out from under them?
Did you think they were blindfolded and could not see
the machinations and motives in your published screeds?

Where did you come up with such ill-advised plans?
Where did you find the words to push them down the
throats of those who waited for directions home?
Somewhere you decided to cut bait and run,
and leave the consequences to courts you thought
you controlled.

Once you closed your eyes, once you were out of view,
once you were alone, no one but you, only you; once
there was no one to perform for,
once the cameras shut down for the night, did you
allow the cries to reach your ears of all
those you stole from? Did you account for all you stole?

You called them strays, but they were herded away by
your incongruous religion. You called them animals while
you foamed at the mouth and lacerated compassion like
a butcher’s cleaver.

There is a day, indeed it is here,
there is a way that the weak will travel
that takes them inside the heart of all creation.
Your time is up,
your rule is over,
your words are zed,
you’re not so clever.
There is a moment decreed when
all the injured will find alternate phrases
to the ones fed from pompous and penal
pulpits.

You lit the fire, but they will open their
hearths to the sojourners of solace.

Better Than You Think

Better Than You Think

(“Restore all that was hers, together with all the revenue of the fields from the day that she left the land until now.” 2 Kings 8:6b)

Afternoon. The tunes were irresistible, the
thoughts coming sooner than expected. She
had learned how little changes when change is
all you want. Afternoon.

Midnight. The candles were extinguished,
the dreams came thinner than desired. She
went to bed later but was too weary to distinguish
reality and visions. All she wanted was a winter
moon to lure her to slumber. Midnight.

Morning. The warming was unreliable, the
thoughts from the night came swarming. She
had placed an order for peace. All she desired was
a space within where it could all begin. But storming
had taken her best thoughts hostage. Morning.

Annual. And ten times over the trip around the sun
tripped her up again. She prayed, she groaned, she
wrote it factual and substandard. There was nothing
left to do
that she hadn’t
done before. The shore kept receding from the sea.
Annually.

Infinite. And it all feels like it will never end. It was
once all innocence and expectations. Now it is
cold nights and restless days. Her mind stayed
ever vigilant while she wished for contentment.
Infinite.

Invitation. There was one place, one pleasant conversation,
that made a few moments easier. Together was a road
walked late in the day with nothing to say but
you
are
better
than
you
think. They always met at the same location.
Invitation.