Their Repeated Words

Their Repeated Words

(“So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great exploits. How great a forest is set ablaze by a such a small fire!” James 3:5)

I should have noticed it before but the people I know
who have the most impassioned and bombastic prayers selcom
sought me out for coffee or lunch.
I always wondered at the lengthy prayers of the silky voiced
elder who never said much in the end.
It only took a few words to
sting me in the heart. It only took the smallest spark
to burn what was left of my dignity.

It goes without saying, though, that I have dropped words
like bombs
unaware myself. Did I really tell that poor mother to
try to give a little bit more than she had? Did I really tell
that single father that families are a mom, a dad, and kids?
And all I knew to do was apologize for something that hit him
right between the eyes. My words were lobbed thoughtlessly
and were received as heavenly proclamations.

I’ve learned that silence is the best choice when struggling
with what to say. I’ve recruited the unspoken to speak for me.
And yet, letter by letter, I compose these words on the page and
wonder
whether I should restrain my forays into streams of consciousness.

More than once people laid their hands on my head and tried to
drive away spirits and demons that caused my depression. But
no one imagined the harm of constantly leaving the impression
that I should just get over myself and submit to their graduation
of spirituality. They had answers for everything and nothing changed.
They had words to describe every eventuality but no time to
spend in exploring the world right outside their doors.
Our bubbles, our echo chambers, brought more shame than
healing. Our words were swifter than wasps and landed
with their stingers between our eyes. No one modified their
language. They only excused it as an attempt to make me
feel better.

I’ve sprinted far away from the run-on sentences that tried
to enforce voices that could not hear the damage their repeated
words had done.

Windingly I Will Arrive

Windingly I Will Arrive

I apologize for coming so late,
the traffic was schismatic, and, as has
always
been my custom,
I did what I was told right up until now.
I promise, though,
I will be there by the day after tomorrow;
I swear I will make up for the time I spent away.

The blame does not lie outside me,
the choices were all mine. And everyone who
knows me
can stipulate that I never meant harm to anyone.

But looking in the mirror, seeing the headlights on my tail,
the tears of my ambitions were wiped from the windshields,
and fell on the highway behind us all.

The thunder clashed with my intentions,
the storm wrecked every itinerary on the way.
My father used to say that shortcuts were only
the longer road to get somewhere fast. I never found
one.

But, windingly I will arrive, pennies in my pockets,
pebbles in my shoes, gravel in the tire treads, and,
slightly embarrassed and more amused that
I could have walked across the street 40 years ago
to see you the way
I see you
today.

I Don’t Mean to Question You

I Don’t Mean to Question You

(“Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s pleasure to give you a kingdom.” Luke 12:32)

I don’t mean to question you, but I will.
Where is the flock, the kingdom, the pleasure, the joy?
Where are the carousels that once made me dance?
Where are the voices that used to elicit my laughter,
where is the treasure I thought my heart sought after?

I’m locked inside my body again,
my brain refuses the sun. The sentences I used to underline,
now are gibberish, a language from another time.
The songs I waggled on keys of black and white
pass through me like icicles of steam. The spark is
dead,
the embers are
cold,
and I waste time like I had years
that will never end.

All my mistakes are on repeat,
all my joys are dead weight,
all my complaints are deaf,
my thoughts squashed by rules that
that I’ve broken and paid for, from curios to
curiosity. I’ve shackled my words to avoid
conflagrations.
I’ve handcuffed my sentences and simply hope
that someone can read my moods. I’ve muted
so much
that I forget half the alphabet. Do I overstate it?

No

Even as I write I edit. I apologize, but days like this
feel like
dying. I hate sleight of hand; I would never deceive you.
But I can’t reveal too much for fear of driving yet another
beloved one away.

Don’t promise me heaven. Just stop with that shit. Don’t
promise me
no more tears
like I need a baby shampoo.
I want a garden here in my back yard,
not a paradise in the clouds.

How can anyone understand when my own
thoughts defy translation? Pain is a trap,
a snare in the forest.
Pain is a mind like a cauldron
boiling with an iron lid around its neck.

Did I say I don’t mean to question? Did I lie?
Pity is not the antibiotic I need,
tranquility is overrated.
But as people have been subtracted from me,
no one has been added.

I’m locked inside the pain again,
and chained to all my secrecy.
I am not finished.
I shall write again tomorrow.

I Will Not Eulogize

 

I Will Not Eulogize

(“And the people were shouting, ‘The voice of a god, and not of a man!’” Acts 12:22)

I apologize; I have been
talking to myself.
I saw the advertisement about the
anointed one
coming to town. I hoped to avoid the
crowds, knowing how loud and insistent,
how proud and consistently the hype was played
on guitars and purse-strings.
But I rode in the backseat of a preacher’s
Lincoln
for reasons I will lay aside for now.

I will not eulogize; I have been
thinking for myself.
I saw the lines after the show,
wrapped around the building twice and
then again,
just to have the prophet’s hand placed on your head
to heal what wasn’t broken
and learn to soak in the personal and private
word spoken like it was god.

Before dawn the next morning the faithful
gathered for private prophecy, a token musical recording,
and banking information so the prophet could receive
your donations deposited directly. I did not care that
he told me not a hair of my head would be
harmed. I knew the grandma who went before me.
Promised long life, with her heart pried open,
she penned the number with ease and went home
coughing from her unhealed pneumonia.

And Jesus hid from the crowds. Herod wanted the masses.
The Anointed One stayed on lonely mountains.
Herod reclined at banquets in Herodium, his
palace and fortress, once the masses turned to mobs.
And Jesus walked upon the water, and Jesus’ feet touched the ground,
And Jesus opened his hands and feet and heart to
wounds
so the love would flow out.

And still Herod gets all the press.

There is a common theme; rallies political and
revivals religious,
that promote big sweat,
dire threats,
fear that remembers debts insisting on
their payment.

And still Jesus meets those who travel on
deserted and dusty roads.

I Had to Apologize Today

I Had to Apologize Today

(“We trust in the living God who came to save all people. He makes a way for those who believe in him.” 1 Timothy 4:10b)

I had to apologize again today.
Sorry, more than once today.
I don’t mind making amends,
don’t mind much admitting I’m wrong.
What tires me is taking the barbs,
tiny snippets of arrowhead offense
and, backed into the corner again,
I admit I could have rephrased my comment.

But like storm clouds that crash without warning,
they want me to change my opinion too. Few are
triggered by the sunshine that warms their own garden plot.

But, I did have to apologize today. And then the silence.
Some who have never met me face to face,
or had an hour of music together,
or have forgotten the gentle frame that
borders our lifetime,
walk away burning and may leave the planet,
escape the gravity we both obey, and further from earth,
slung into outer space,
they are unreachable by phone, text or
a simple embrace.

Don’t we all have the same birthplace? Not the same
town or country, but the soil on which generations stirred
to drink the air from trees, breathe the one sun that bundles us all,
nurse from the fruit of earth, and sleep in the cradle of footprints
left by offspring who grew up before us.

So I offered another apology. And my chest is lead.
My fingers are shivering in the summer wind. My feet are chilled.
We kill each other, then kill back. And our hearts still beat,
but retreat more quickly the next time someone sends
a message in the mail. We used to like to open envelopes,
sneak the stationery slowly from its womb. But too soon
Some letters are just more darts spit toward the one
The author thought had broken him. And now no
safe place
exists between send and receive.

But I apologized again (I am a master of penance)
and I enter the space as I decelerate my engagements
with those I’ve offended, and hope their aim is off
just enough
to let quilt and rapture stitched by God
wrap us both inside.