On Insomnia

On Insomnia

(“I lie down, sleep, and wake up because the Lord helps me.” Psalm 3:5)

 

There was a time that sleep eluded me. Head on the pillow late
at night and there were locust raises buzzing through my head.
I tried to quiet them, prayed the Name, confessed my bowlful
of sinning, and hoped that was enough to unwind my untidy mind.
Or, nights when I fell asleep nicely, I might wake with a start when
the occupants of my dreams made sure to embarrass me. They
would call me out in front of everyone; they would mock me for
being less tidy than them. Early on it was my parents, the ones
I thought had raised me like love. But I constantly dreamed I had
done something entirely unforgiveable. I locked myself in my room
of that dream and woke up crying.
Sometimes I dreamed I was to lead worship at a large function,
using my keyboard, the instrument that draws forth praise from
my fingers. Five minutes before it was to start, I realized I have
zero music, and the singers have none either. I streak to my office
and look through the files. But they are no longer in alphabetical order
and my face is red with embarrassment. I grab what I can and the
singing is flat and lackluster. I had that dream more time than I
like to recite.

Anxiety haunted me. The hissing in my head never went away.
I carried it during the day with hunched shoulders and hope that
no one thought I was home, or in the office. Men were ready to
argue the least likely doctrines they had read from the latest writer
who claimed he knew it all. There were a handful of kind men,
but they had no power. No one ever asked them to be on the
board of directors or become an elder. Sometimes I think
people gaged them as weak in the faith. Some even tried
to force me to admit sins I never committed (although I had
sinned so much more).

It is no wonder that sleep eluded me. But then I took a huge
step back and outward. I retired and no longer stand in front of
people to try to convince them what God has said. Well, a couple
of times a year to small gatherings of people who know me.

It is the relief of the ages that sleep is now my therapy. I no
longer expect to be woken in the night and driven to the couch
to kneel with my face in the cushions acting like a first-class penitent.
Last night I slept from 11 until 8. My daily headache still ate through
my silent barriers. But I walk, I take an hour, and I see children who say
hi to me first;
I see dogs who want to meet me and lick my face.
I see a family of deer deciding if there is enough to eat in this
new small development. I see a friend drive by who smiles
and waves at me. My bucket is slowly filling for the day
and that leads me to whisper praying and quiet reading.

And I slide into bed, my wife beside me, our dog
between us, and fall asleep with no anxiety leftover
from the days when it felt for sure that my head had been
vised and then told it was all my fault. I repented fairly well,
not enough for some people, but that is for another day.
I just know the nights no longer frighten me, and the mornings
greet me with moments of contemplation. I can say I awake
because the Lord helps me.

Remedy for Shame

Remedy for Shame

(“So let us boldly approach God’s throne of grace. Then we will receive mercy. We will find grace to help us when we need it.” Hebrews 4:16)

Shall we bow in grateful devotion;
shall we never take it all for granted?
Stubbing our toes or shooting our foes,
we used to feel like we had to beg for
exoneration. We would make it all up,
we would make it good if only we could.

It used to be debatable and I would cry like
I had caused the next apocalypse. I would hide
for fear
I had caused the end of the world. My missteps
still sting, they are mottled needles filled with
regrets and dull anticipation. I walk miles treading
the ground everyone else has covered.

But now, at the end of the day or the beginning of
rain, I can find a balm that calms the breezes that
used to freeze my soul. My resolutions are seldom
solid, my promises sincere but weak as decaying wood.
I have discovered…no, it has landed upon me like a
remedy I never dreamed. There is a hand that, firm
as fire,
reconnects me to the might of mercy and grace’s
brightness that subdues the dark of the night.

The remedy for shame, the medicine for shivering regret,
we find a throne occupied by fiery love. We do not
shrink back for the flame bids us come closer and
learn that the burning that once consumed us whole
is now a glow larger than a super nova. We are infused
with grace, a blaze that ignites us to discover we have
been family all along.

Nearer than Forever

Nearer than Forever

(“Jesus told them, ‘Truly, I tell all of you emphatically, before there was an Abraham, I AM!’” John 8:58)

Nearer than forever, closer than eternal,
behind the distance beyond creation,
surrounding every moment of time and engulfing
every shard of energy and silence of matter
You Are.
I find you in each leaf of grass,
I feel you in the cool morning breeze,
I miss you when my mind wanders, I
sometimes wonder how You can be
All Things.
Do my thoughts mean anything;
Do my fingers fidget on the shelves of nothing?
Does my brain lie dormant like sleep like a listless
boat on a windless lake? Do I know
Any Thing?
Do I own anything; do I owe past due rent?
Does the light outside my window come from
the same flame that ignited the sun eons ago?
Will I learn that every single breath breathes because
Of You.

But I am numb sometimes even with you so near.
I am short-sighted though you have always been
located in each quantum wave and particle.
If you inhabit all of space and time, the I bow before all
You Are.

Once and Now

Once and Now

(“But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.” Hebrews 2:9)

Once and now sometimes, hollow is my
experience of daily rain and fog. Then and
here sometimes, empty is the word that
flies in and out of my mind.
Like underneath the rocks and mud there
are moments that disconnect me from golden sayings
I want to know.

But your love filled the fellow passengers who
glide rotating on sacred places. Every step we take
is an Edenic memory. Every day another awakening;
a rising sun to replace the dirge of dragging night.

Some days feel like decades, some hours like slow
motion riders. Feeling the mainlines through the years,
casting cares across the centuries, waiting became my
posture. I struggled for clarity, a calendar with appointments
full of destinations I would never visit. Come to think of it,
most of my travels were time-bound, turned around placements
of carousel dreams.

But in a single point of time, you met me stripped of
your glory
and walk the dirt I walk, weeded the ground I weeded,
breathed the late afternoons that had me catching my breath.
You capture me with a glance; you showed me your humanity
that carried your divinity and I was amazed. Your hands, like
my hands,
You are a king in peasant garb, a royal in old denim jeans.
I am astonished with a meteor bursting through the atmosphere,
and I release my doubts, realize my jump-starts, and restore
the opening sentences that tell your story broad.

From Slave to Free

From Slave to Free

(“So if you consider me your partner, welcome him as you would welcome me.” Philemon 1:17)

It matters like the dust from stars falling into themselves,
it matters like the dust that comes from those final implosions,
from those super Novas spraying elements of carbon, helium, and hydrogen
into open space.

Surrounded by uncountable machinations and
propelled by undeniable afterthoughts we should not
hesitate
to call each other partners in a world full of unexplainable
light.
We kept accounts and hoped our tempos would synch up
before the end of the day.

We sang the same songs when we were together, and now
apart
let us sing them again, listening for the straight beats and
the syncopation. I am sending you back the one who could
only talk out of tune until I taught him the hymns you and I
both knew intimately. He was glad to learn, the runaway child,
and anxious to know if he could sing them with you.

So we set the tempo and worked on the temperament;
he has been found to be quite useful to me.
Shall I send him back to you with the song, he has
the lyrics fully internalized but he does take some liberties
with the tune. He is freer than I am, I think, in this regard.
And perhaps freer than you expected. But he is overjoyed and
ready to pay back anything he owes you. And what he cannot
I will cover. Imagine with me, this miscreant, this fugitive,
returning to you with a heart full of the same delight you heard
from you at night. Laying on his bunk he ached to learn the
songs of the spirit he heard from your house.

Having them now in his innermost being, he longs to join the
chorus as a son to you. Receive him, if you will, as a member
of the chorale. You won’t be disappointed, his tone is rich,
his tempo heavenly, and his visage is changed from slave to free.

The Instant that Shifted

The Instant that Shifted

(“I smiled at them when they did not believe, And they did not look at my kindness ungraciously.” Job 29:24)

It was an instant that shifted nearly everything.
He glanced the moment the mouth and eyes sparkled
and never forgot the embrace. It felt like water that
seeped through the silt and sand, purified by
seconds of time. It was a glint like diamonds,
a simple flash and he wondered if anyone else
had seen it. Was it simply and only for him,
and if so, what would the day bring if he tucked it
away like gold coins saved like time.

It was a sideways look, brief and accurate as a
laser pulse. It was barely a grin, that would be to
determined. This was more reflex, the way a baby
nearly laughs at funny faces over and over again.
It was pinpoint, entering his soul, pore to pore,
and saturated his tethered heart. It had not been broken,
but was too connected to mishaps of the past.

He wished he could capture the moment and turn it
around and around in his mind like a recipe for
cake he had eaten as a child. But the moment was enough,
the instant began to fill something deep just because
she had smiled.

I’ll Greet the Dogs

I’ll Greet the Dogs

(“To people who are pure, everything is pure.” Titus 1:15a)

The old black dog sat motionless on the grass still
wet from yesterday’s rains.
He did not move to meet me. He merely lifted his
head and eyed my silently, too weary to move.
The air smelled like honey.

Sometimes my mind hurts, sometimes my vision is too narrow.
Often I remember the stabs of yesterday. Or hurts a decade
old intrude into my silent strolls.

I’ve spoken to the dogs along my route,
to the ones who bark like I am their enemy. After time,
as I call them aside, they bark once and then follow me
from behind their fences. They do not know my name
and I don’t know most of theirs. There is one
fierce chihuahua though that insists on biting
the seam of my jeans. I should bring treats for that
tiny adversary.

I have rounded the corner a dozen times every year;
I have sounded out the consonants of pain. But my
dreams are less fearful these days, my thoughts turning
to unconstrained moments in the sun.

A deer and her fawn ambled by my front window
a week ago. I think they were heading to my roses
for a midday snack. My flowers lack their blooms from
Spring to Summer and I think I should protect them from
those gentle creatures.

The quiet days sometimes tax me, I want to hear a human
voice, even a stuttering expression, even a conversation
filled with question marks and compliments. About half
the time, though, the solitude soothes me. The loudest arrows
are a thousand years behind me; they have died down across the
prairies and no longer find me faltering. My body carries
pain apart from the static harm that ebbs and flows. It does
not befit me to grab yesterday’s hurt. I’ll greet the dogs
and maybe a deer on my next venture around the town.

Of Feasting and Wine

Of Feasting and Wine

(“Jesus said to them, ‘I am the Bread of Life. He who comes to Me will never be hungry. He who puts his trust in Me will never be thirsty.’” John 6:35)

Nourish my soul again like an apéro in France to enhance
my waiting for the later feast that would fill us until deeply
slumbering.
Brighten my eyes with refreshment like waters from the
mountain spring that set my mind to waking refreshed.
I feel hollowed out, not listless, but unsure of where the
next step should go. I feel ready to meet a dozen questioners
who laugh between bites and sometimes sing when the
meal is over.
I never wanted to take my meals solitary, but avoided
the call to ordered
groups
that met over stir fry and casseroles to revisit their
latest protestations about everything they thought was their
proper use of their locked up Spirit of God.

Their meals made me blush, my face, sometimes red
with hurt and anger held back, wishing I had not joined
their buffet. I found their sustenance wanting,
I found their repasts repeating words that had already found
their targets with arrows sharper that truth. I arrived
late
to avoid as many of their scattered incantations as I could.

If only I could find some, even merely two or three,
who would share a meal in joyful reverence, in laughter
that is
invitational,
in stories told about stones overturned while preparing
their flower gardens.
We knew their roses were the most fragrant in town.

Even the rain outside my window cannot muffle
the water being poured out over our wounds. Even the
clouds could not cover the waiting in our hearts for your
eternal food. I can taste it on my tongue, this new dish
served that never runs out. I can feel it running down my
throat, this new wine that revives the weariness that weighed
heavy in the air.

Full, complete, revived and ready to meet the
path I will walk today. The new energy caught up with
me and pointed me to the next banquet of joy.
I’ll show up early and hopefully hear another
traveler’s tale
of feasting and wine.

Unexplained Lunches

Unexplained Lunches

(“So they collected them, and filled twelve wicker baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves that had been more than they could eat.” John 4:26)

We wondered and pondered our way around the fields;
nothing escaped our pierced view. Cannily we knew that
just a few moments ago there were unexplained lunches
on the lawn.
We walked the aisles between children and easily
saw the sun in their eyes, never going down too early.
We were unprepared to serve the crowds sitting on the lawn.
Voluntarily we moved among them,
we had read the books before, memorized the scripts
and repeated them like expanding ideas etched on the sand.

Some were meager, some were scarce, some were simply
the median expression of daily hunger. But all showed up
to hear something like an invitation to the biggest dayclub
ever known. We sat like sundials measuring the time across
eventual horizons. We recognized our names in the
phasing of everything we remembered and some of what
we should have forgotten.
We thought of antique monuments erected while we
waited for the closing prayer. We wrote poetry in the mud.

Every basket was filled; every mouth was smiling.
We noticed the atmosphere had changed and so
midair
we promised we would gather without waste;
we would serve without fainting and would remember the
stories that fully adorned the day.

Concrete Creations

Concrete Creations

(“Even before time began God planned for Christ Jesus to show kindness to us.” 2 Timothy 1:9a)

I woke up with nothing to do and stayed that way
till far after noon. I sip my coffee; I drink loads of water because
my physicians are making sure I do. So, religiously I put ice in a glass,
pour the water and drink four or five glasses a day. If you read this would
you be kind enough to attest to this with my favorite practitioners?

It is not entirely true that I have nothing to do,
my fingers are tapping out these words, aren’t they?
But I forced myself to sit here today although there seems to be
little of the artisan words I desire to punch out of my brain.
And perhaps grace covers that. Perhaps grace fills the starved
and closed quarters in my mind.

I’ve written about these things for 25 years now and I seem to
have less to say the farther I go along. I had it all down pat,
I knew how to write a riddle or parable. I knew how to turn
the ending in such away that you wanted to stay all day, or
sometimes
you wanted to simply run away.

But I never wrote wanting you to be bored, or to scratch
your head
wondering why this word was glued to that one.
Like the disciples locked up in a room after the resurrection,
I have become a hermit, talking to no one for hours at a time.
I confess my words sound hollow because they come from a hollow
mind. I once
knew what I believed,
and now I am not sure. The pendulum has not swung for me.
Instead I find myself in the middle where it has come to rest with
no movement at all. I wait for the breeze to shift. I pray for breath
I can hear. I wait for the Spirit to be bestowed even though I have
no point of reference to know full I can become.

Truth? I feel empty. Other truth? I feel full. Have I been on a diet
that of so much fast food that I slowly make my way to what would
otherwise, have been inevitable. I must fast a meal or two to open this
place meant to be filled renewed. I must open wide the doors for the grace
to flow through. I must not puzzle over nothing to do; perhaps that is the
best way to receive. Yes, I will breathe. And breathe. And welcome the
grace of the Spirit to fill me complete. I will tell you what these moments
create once they pull me into the reworking of the words I use for art,
even when I am listless.

So I hope to become full of concrete creations that paint sacred
landscapes where holy places can be found.  

Technically the Timing

Technically the Timing

(‘Those who are at ease have contempt for misfortune as the fate of those whose feet are slipping.” Job 12:5)

The timing could not have been more perfect,
technically it should never have happened.
But you find him near the cliff’s precipice and could not
refrain from words that pushed him over the edge.
You had no taste for his tears and so your imagination
ran wild
finding tenured reasons for his downfall.
You thought you could burst the final thought bubble
of peace
he held on to.

You should have known the signs that pointed toward
an uneasy reckoning for careless words without ears.
You forgot the destination he was heading for,
forgot the fate that pointed away from your unsanitized claims.
You tucked it all away like yesterday’s insanity and
quietly went home to your candlelight suppers.
It was too easy for you to ignore the pain so apparent,
the grief so transparent. You purchased your tickets to
calloused hearts and hands.

You only had one thing to do; you had no excuse for
your ignorant betrayal on the sands of indifference.
He hoped to hear hope like a distant waterfall but
all he knew were your uncorked opinions. You poured
out the canister of iced indifference. Your cold
decisions froze him in place while you left him
aching for relief like the rising of a midsummer sun.

You could not have timed it better,
he slid on the icy judgments you left and,
once he fell you could tell how right you had been
all along. You were certain he was guilty of every
heretical handheld encasement. Otherwise, he would not
be so bitter when you ignored him purposely while you
tour the country in your cadillacs of champagne.

A New Place to Listen

A New Place to Listen

(“Do not neglect the gift that is in you, which was given to you by prophecy when the elders laid their hands on you.” 1 Timothy 4:14)

I heard you crying like a child who cannot wake up.
We cradle them until the brightness returns.
We wait for the sun and forget the rain,
we talk until 2 in the morning, we drink coffee
until the same.

Our tears were distilled and run through the mill.
Our weariness overtook every plan we had made.
Could I tell you one more time how it means so
much to me
to have you fan into flame what sometimes disappears
beyond my fenced imagination? I fear sometimes
that insulation has hindered my brain and I’ve forgotten
the exact, the point, the meaning of it all. I want to give
it all away
again.

When we reach so distantly, insisting there must be
a way to discover something new, we play some jazz
and memorize the patterns that improvised over our heads.

I took a bottle of wine to my friend who had cried
for days. He could not put his finger on it, and I knew
less than he,
so we poured our glasses and reminisced on better times.
We recognized in each other’s eyes the questions that had
hemmed us in like concrete. He told me he never imagined
he would turn solo after so long. I was silent, I knew what
he meant.

We once understood the steps in the dance that brought
the delight of heavenly joy. We were players, we were
instrumentalists, we were singers some of the time.
But now we couldn’t find a venue to play. We hummed
a few tunes while we finished our wine and decided to find
a new place to listen to the music we missed and find
one or two who would learn them through like children.
We were ready to be useful again.

Sit With Me Awkwardly

Sit With Me Awkwardly

(“To him who is ready to faint, kindness should be shown from his friend; even to him who forsakes the fear of the Almighty.” Job 6:14)

Your lectures were limitless as you gazed at my pain.
You consulted your books and diagnosed my improbable suffering.
You discussed it amongst yourselves and came to conclusions
no one could understand.
You never sat in my chair but just stood on the porch
launching your next catapult of guilt my way.
Did you ignore my tears
or just think them unmannered as hell?
Did you assume
I forgot heaven’s kiss and turned away far
longer that allowed? Or did you argue with your friends
assuming I had overstayed my grief? You could have spent
more time saying nothing and
I would have sat with you all day.

Who taught you about misery? Whose prayers did you
assume should have healed me? What cures did you offer
before listening to my list of hundreds I have tried?
What courses did you prescribe for me that you left
untested? Did you taste the bitter medicine yourself?
Did you ever cry for companionship while being schooled
like children?

Turn on some music to soothe this ache of mine.
Make it instrumental, make it maximum. Make it
wordless so the notes themselves fill in the spaces
between us. Or just hum a tune,
I don’t have to name it or recognize it.

Or just
sit silent
(awkward, isn’t it?) Just sit silent and let our
breathing synchronize to prove we are still living.

Can you find your way to bear my pain, to shoulder a
handful of the granite that weighs me down? I fear the
absence of God, but your presence and your words only
push God farther away. Will you learn the agony that
burns my brain and then silently be the Christ I need?
Sit with me awkwardly and let us never question the
power of flesh and blood mortality.

To Be Seen in Public

 

To Be Seen in Public

(“May the Master of Peace himself give you the gift of getting along with each other at all times, in all ways. May the Master be truly among you!” 2 Thessalonians 3:16)

 

Veils of asbestos keep us apart in the way that words
remain unheard. All we remember is the last conflict and
how we had been proven right. The judges consulted briefly
and crowned us correct. We stopped talking after that; after
one win
we did not want the chance that we might miss the boat.
So beside the cry of the doves cooing, I hear no more arguments
from you.

It is an uneasy peace where no one talks and everyone thinks
there is nothing wrong. I doubt the Prince of peace ever imagined
we would hang a blanket between us to unsolve any future conflict.
There was a time when we walked together through a torrent of rain
and we shared the one umbrella we had. We were still soaked, but
only strategically.

But we forgot the words somewhere along the way. We left and
went our own path after the rain. We ran into each other downtown,
just a block from a mega million-dollar church. We greeted each other,
the obligatory hug, and shared updates since the storm. Then
we walked away again.

I heard you had lost your beloved, the one of your dreams, the one who
clung to you in every challenge of conscience. You were both in
a scrappy sort of love. There was no perfect picture way to describe it.
But love had battled hard and it hit you deep and sharp when she
lost the last battle of life.

I reached through the blanket that separated us, I tried to find your heart.
I spoke words of sorrow, wrote odes of remembrance, but there
was no sound from your side, no response to the offer of consolation.
It is an uneasy peace the relies on silence. It begs the questions
we never asked.

I am still here, and you are still there. Who knows how much
longer we have. Let us walk to the coffee shop around 2,
let ourselves be seen in public, and recount the ways we had
walked together so often we knew the route by heart. And
if the silence is because of me, I will beg your forgiveness. And
If it is due to you, all I offer are my hands outstretched to
the same friend I knew those many years ago. Our
lattes were hot, so we took them outside and walked along
the river. And there, the blanket was blown away by a
swift breeze that caught us by surprise.

The Fog was Ankle Deep

The Fog was Ankle Deep

(“Jesus said to Nathanael, ‘I can guarantee this truth: You will see the sky open and God’s angels going up and coming down to the Son of Man.’” John 1:51)

The fog was ankle deep as the sun
warmed the wet morning asphalt. It slunk like
snake tracks and spoke of something that wrapped
us all up like common denominators, like children returning
from exile. It hinted that we might all have wings if
we only inhabited the thin places where heaven seeps
through.

It makes us doubt our own significance as if the breath
was taken out of our lungs at the very thought that
there may be more than we imagined going on within us.
If the sun can coax land-locked clouds on the ground
why can we not linger while spirit breathes a presence
we had only guessed at until now. What if the very place
we stand
is also an anteroom to the throne? What if we are invited
to enter in like Spring coaxing the cherry tree blossoms?

I’ve stood here before, thinking I needed to knock down the door
and crawl on my hands and knees to prove my piety.
What if the throne is unoccupied? Or what if, instead, it
is filled with the author of nurture? What if every blade of
grass invites us to sing around prayers like maypoles
and mumble inaudible but well-intentioned alleluias?
What if our morning walk is just the start of
the very heartbeat we had been waiting to hear?

Can’t Quit you Jesus

Can’t Quit You Jesus

(“The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” John 1:29)

I can’t quit you Jesus, though
heaven knows I’ve tried. I walked out
of your house where the whoops and hollers
overshadowed the Spirit flowing in living streams of love.
I left behind every edifice where people name
the anti-christ time and time again and call for
armageddon to be fought to prove the fat-armed
god
they serve is ready to return with an ax and sword.

I can’t quit you Jesus, and I
wish I hadn’t waited so long. Disabused and
enlightened by the primeval light I walked out
to hear a quieter persuasion like daffodils smiling
for the sun. I lost you in the sanctuary; my heart was
famished for love. But you vanished from the place
I had always expected to find you free.

I can’t quit you Jesus, and I
know I am not the only one. We were enchanted
by the lover of our souls only to be bowled over
once we wondered how universal it had to be.
Stones were politely thrown at that heresy that
could not see the divisions between A and B.
Borders were drawn so precisely that we knew who
had to be in or out.

But I just can’t quit you Jesus, though I wonder
what the warriors in the pews must think. They
make it so distinct,
like weeds among the rye they are ready to clear them
out to protect their perfect lawn.  I was angry with you
for deceiving me to become such a fool. I started at only love
but the occupants of your house have retuned every chorus to
sound like marching orders. They ran out of time.

I remember dancing with you, Jesus, and my eyes wet
with tears at the thought of your touch. I remember simple
homes where circles were enlarged to make room for the next
outcast to come in from the storm. That’s why these memories
that inform me there must still exist some way that insists
holy kisses can begin a passing of the peace that
leads us to follow a now unfamiliar path. We walked
out and woke up reborn. And usually without a hint of
your permission. But we walked.

I can’t,

I simply can’t,
I cannot even quit your Jesus. I cannot.

Wide Open

Wide Open

(“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was fully God.” John 1:1)

Wide open is where I want to stay,
walking on the paths, laughing daffodils and
seeing your Lyrics in every passing cloud.

Every missile launched rewrites the history
that divine language has conceived. Every
reference to war
erases the First metaphor written in
holy DNA; the life of the Beloved.

Every day is a rehearsal and bids us
memorize
the Song we first heard that caused us to
swoon at the mention of the Prince of Peace.
Every moment bids us to come closer to the
Sound we might have rejected had we
shut our ears to the Song that carried us
from a single spot of dirt on the earth
you created in Artistic collaboration.

Every piercing remark leaves a scar on
the hearts that were meant to dance at the
invitation to war-no-more.

We are curious
and want to hear more. We throw ourselves open
and listen for the beginning from the end,
for the Message you sent from front to back,
around the utter reaches of universal stars to
the patch of earth occupied by two simple feet
learning to Dance anew.

Firstfruits

Firstfruits

(“We will bring the firstfruits of our land and of every fruit tree to the Lord’s house year by year.” Nehemiah 10:35)

We took it all and laid it in piles,
treasures of golden wheat, bushels of dates,
apples round and red.
We gave away as much as we could and heard
the answer from heaven. We were only taking
what we were given from our fields and sharing
them candidly. We remembered how it all looked
like ruins,
the walls leaning and falling into the ground.

We captured the evening sun as it drew the shadows long;
we sang the ancient Psalms we had learned from our birth.
We stood together in the pleasure of bringing the firstfruits
of our fields.

We laid the sheaves side by side like open doors to the
interior of the house. Children ran between them, in and out,
side by side, chasing each other and giggling as the parents
paid little attention. There was safety in the air and amity
along the dusty paths. Everyone imagined a renewal,
everyone captured the revisions the sun cast upon the
exterior walls.

We held back nothing. It was our privilege that sent us there.
We felt no reluctance, we were so joyful for such a hearty harvest,
and the chance we possessed to twirl like dancers
and bring our best this time of year.  

The night grew cooler and we gathered around campfires,
warming our hands and finding new ways to rejoice.
We told our storied history, our deliverance from mediocrity,
and thanked, hands out and up, the One who supplied what
we had brought.

Ready to Announce

Ready to Announce

(“We had the courage through God to speak God’s good news in spite of a lot of opposition.” 1 Thessalonians 2:2b)

From the moment I opened my eyes the only
conversation I wanted was the one about grace.
And wider than I imagined, deeper that some friends
unknew, I awoke to speak more coherently than I ever had.
There is a lot to say that embarrasses me now, so many
stories halfway through their happy ending.

Threatened with hell, the sensitive hearts cry like God
would soon send them to the fire, to the everlasting flames,
to the torture of ages over a simple lifetime of missteps.

Threatening hell, the whitewashed tombs harden up
and put a Halloween mask on Jesus to scare the aching
hearts into catacombs of shame. No one showed them the
Father’s smile.

Peacemakers belong as children of God, but big-hair
and butt-hurt purveyors of steel grip doctrine don’t
waste a minute to imprecate anyone they think has
eyes too wide open. They see anxiety as evidence of
demons in crying eyes. They yell that depression
belongs to the devil and a dozen more people hit
the floor begging for some sort of change.

What if we woke and sat next to the dejected,
What if we took the hands of the anxious and,
without a word invited them into our space.

This is what opened my eyes. This is what made me see.
People needed more than fiery proclamations. How
can we reflect the father when all our affectations
pain him angry and ready to smite with wrathful fury.

Woke, I see the wrinkles from constant agonizing prayer
that pled to take every misstep away.

Nothing will keep me from being the Good Story
no matter how many take me as the original heretic.
I am ready to announce the world-wrapped hug
that God calls us to embrace. People, your doctrines
may be strangling you. Christ meant for you to
be free.

Kids Playing Giddily

Kids Playing Giddily

(“Here there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all and in all.” Colossians 3:11)

The lenses I used to use only saw the unabused
and kept the battered in the dark. I could see them
if I wanted
but only to point out their obvious flaws.
Did hide them or did they shrink from my view?
I could not help but think their invisibility was their own failing;
my blindness was sanctified by voices from emperors and pulpits.

Then yesterday I was wondering where all the lonely people go
when I refuse to see them in their fully grown human glow. Then yesterday
the light broke in and shattered the mirror I had been primping in.
I looked again and saw the cracks and splinters that had hindered
my access to the truth.

I thought I might be pulled into the uncrafted classrooms
that taught
nothing but invented stories about the minds behind the
eyes of the people I never wanted to see. But yesterday I
sat down in the back of the room and heard languages I
did not understand.

But the cadence was familiar. The emphasis on the third syllable
of a sentence or the rising of a voice after a question. My pilgrimage
had led me here so I decided to stay. They gave me a name tag
for my shirt and I wrote as plainly as I could. I learned these were
all graduates from a school just down the road from the
block I grew up on. Now I heard their voices and they sounded
like my neighbor’s kids playing giddily in the yard. I had to admit
I missed the playfulness and changed my lenses to see

Everyone who was different from me. And I joined them,
learned their language, and sat in their circle learning the
inclusive invitations of the spirit’s voice.

Enfleshed

Enfleshed

(“For the full content of divine nature lives in Christ, in his humanity, and you have been given full life in union with him.” Colossians 2:9-10a)

I once thought you were so elusive that
I needed to deprive my body to find you.
I wished for hours filled with supernatural encounters
and only found silent noise. I heard so many stories
of weeks spent fasting to find epiphanic endings.
I only found
my hunger increasing opposite to my bold resolutions.

I collected invisible souvenirs; I deposited hours of
agony and fears. Why did I ever think you demanded
so much of me for so little return?
I ached for visions and enlightened dreaming, only to
wake from stops and starts that halted my sleeping.

Now I think I see you in every grain of sand;
I taste you in every sip of water. I remember you wore
skin just like I wear skin; your feet ached like mine do
at the end of a day.

I was afraid to be alone; the emptiness frightened me.
I bargained with begging chips and cried in ways so
hard to explain. I expected to hear voices in the dark,
and see angels singing with words I could understand.

I still hate loneliness, I still sting from too much solitary time.
But I am finding you wrapped around the scars that, if I
may say,
were entirely self-inflicted.

Embodied, you are. Human and fully. A habitation
wholly enfleshed. Sacred flesh and blood.

You were never obscure, were you? Though I thought you
demanded I catch up with you, you singled me out
and found me in the middle of my unanswered questions.
Filling me before I asked, embracing me though I thought
I was a myriad of miles away.

A Cup Poured Out

A Cup Poured Out

(“Father, if you are willing, take this cup away from me—nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” Luke 22:42)

It looked like the wounding of a heart,
a cup poured out of grief and passion.
Are we your children that you could
hold us so tightly it hurt?

What would I say to you
watching your pain strewn across the
garden floor? How could I intrude
on a moment of intimacy and separation?
But how could any of us leave you deserted;
how could we be so close and you be so alone?

Every moment in time converged in fervent questions;
each self a smaller self than the one we had spent a lifetime
mastering?
You took the world’s weight upon your shoulders;
you loved us better than a brother. Yet we grew weary
and left you dangling with our desecrated punctuation.

We failed. We floundered. We sounded like worn-out children
thinking we understood it all. We thought we could capture
a place beside you on the heights.

And how did we overhear such a prayer that set us
to dozing? Still we slept uneasy while you emptied
your dignity to grab hold of nurture and boldness.
But you let loose of anything but love. You induced
a painful delivery. For who? For us?

We had come dressed like we were going to a party
while you donned the servant’s garments and
sweat like blood hit the ground. And then we woke
from our slumber to find them taking you away. And

We panicked.

We were outnumbered and outmaneuvered,
leaving the imprints of your pain still wed on the ground.
We could not wait for angels; we could not measure
the weakness that transforms human foibles and
finally found us afraid for our lives.

How could we ignore such a cry from
a friend who asked only that we stay awake?

Empty but Filled

Empty but Filled

(“I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.” Philippians 4:12)

I am empty but being filled,
I am full but not slowing down.
I am flowing but not reckless.
I am thankful and that sits sweet upon my
tongue
like chocolate and mint in the afternoon.

There is a presence that inhabits it all,
a weight that does not burden,
a strong power that lays across my shoulders
like a yoke shared in joy.

Cancel my subscription to constant pleas
for more. I will dine in the dark, or I will
feast in the light, but I will be fed, nevertheless.

Disquiet my constant apprehensions, invade my
anxious silence. Fill it, oh Holy One who comes to recover
what was stolen, to redeem that which waits to be seen.
Take my shadows out of the caverns I’ve carved and
turn me around to face the light, to feel the warm and
nearness of the pleasant rays upon my body.

I have been without,
I have been within,
I have stolen moments,
I have them back again.
I picture the perfect from my
uncertain soul. But I find,
loose or windy, that the words of peace
can settle into the crevices between my shadowy self,
and bring me to him alit and gracious for all I lack,
for all I discover, for all I’m given, for all I return.

Just two hours before dawn on a late winter night
I felt the gravity quilt
enwrap me slowly.

I have learned, for now, that empty and full are
only words,
and that the Only One can inhabit it all.