Our Comfortable Borders

Our Comfortable Borders

(“Nothing is secret but what will be known. Anything that is hidden will be brought into the light.” Luke 8:17)

We assumed we were seeing well,
the light was bright,
and our apostles were speaking truth.
We were aligned and everything seemed righteous.

But the corner we occupied was filled with darkness.
Our eyes had dilated to let in the
limping bit of light that was left. Our prophets
were hidden with us, calming our souls
and caressing our egos. We sung it all
so well
that people outside patted us on the back for
our stellar harmonies.

But one of us woke up.
One of us ventured a few feet away from our
comfortable borders. One of us
happened upon the rays of light that could have
dispelled the dark side we had taken for granted.

Our egos had swollen in the dark, our narration
memorized to keep out the loudest voices of transformation.
We had become accustomed to every patch of
ground we stood upon. We were blind in our
stupor, we were stained by our hiding place.
We were constrained by our habits and lowlights
behind the scenes. We had locked down our faith
and configured it to fit our biases fashionably.

But one spoke from the outside, from the light that
unsighted our darkness at the first look. But soon,
accustomed to the rays and particles that filled space
like the facets of a diamond
we were confronted about our preconceptions.
We were no longer protected. We were no longer
accustomed to arrested proclamations.

We turned away from the darkened corner and
listened to the ones who had brought their
shaded self into the light. We saw the
unambiguous recitations of truth and were
confronted with our own contributions to the
darkened minds we once called sane.

A piece at a time we climbed out of our
cavern and, taking a backward look we were
astonished at what we had assumed. We
wept over our misapprehensions, over our
staggering domination of the narrative that now
seemed to be a pinpoint star fading into the background.

We were changed by the light we had shaded. We had
worn visors that hid the corners of our hearts.
The songs now were of resistance, of revolution,
resolution, and renovation that uprooted our attachment
to a few square feet of surety. We had crowded into
corners and thought the world behaved in predictable ways.

It was grace that created the new perception,
it was vast prairies full of sun that called the invisible
dawn that deleted our defense of a few square feet
of certainty.
It was a noise like bluebirds,
it was motion like rainbows rising from the plains.
And we left that claustrophobia that turned us into
inspectors of the imperfect and embraced the light
that led the advance of a new prophetic voice that
brightened the darkest acts of our religious wars.

Like Picking Up Fall Leaves

Like Picking Up Fallen Leaves

(“He told her, ‘Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace and be healed from your illness.’” Mark 5:24)

She had heard the stories like picking up
fallen leaves from the lawn. She had wished for
them
and turned her face to feel the sun.
She knew the sweet fragrance of new cut hay.
She gave away every resemblance to her younger days;
she tried to remember them like sunshine before the rain.

But the day it all began, she cannot remember the date,
but she still knows the moment when her body betrayed her,
when it gave way to a disease so chronic it threatened
to become her. The walls closed in on her isolation
while she heard the accusations that she must have failed
someone along the line to carry such a persistent haze.
The day it became and this day were connected like a
seam of blood-red thread encompassing everything.

She longed to sing in the choir again, her solo voice
had torn her up and down. She wanted the voices beside her,
resonating with her own alto altogether.

But she had heard the stories, and then she heard the throng.
Was it him? Would he walk though her neighborhood?
She listened as the airborne mixture of mere humanity
floated through her window. She caught a glimpse of him
and, hope for hope, she halted, seconds waiting like a
statue coming free.

“If only” she thought. And she continued to wonder as she
felt her feet leave for the front door. She must move stealthily,
between the bodies pressing in to see him. It would be easy to
be silent
while the crowd shouted and murmured for attention.

“If only” she decided. And walked between the narrow
lanes of bodies. She moved with purpose, her fingers
tingling with possibility. Within a couple of steps,
she reached our her hand to touch just the robe along the hem.

She turned around to return home, her sickness destroyed in
that single contact, but he spoke. “Who touched me?” Before
he even spoke shoe knew she as well.

And so this daughter, on a day of grace and faith
went in peace and found a few devoted friends to share
coffee in the afternoon.
She was once wooden clogs and now is
Cinderella’s slippers.

Wait for the Green Breeze

Wait for the Green Breeze

(“He told her, ‘Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace and be healed from your illness.’” Mark 5:34)

You cannot carry the crowd upon your shoulders.
You cannot lay down the law and expect everyone to obey.
You cannot walk through walls, you cannot dig to China,
but we can hire the verbs together,
watch the sky untether,
and wait for the green breeze that makes
the rocks hum.

You cannot dictate the future from your comma.
You cannot lay down a straight line to curve gravity back.
You cannot always run, you cannot cook without fire,
but we can rent the day together,
question hymns together,
and wait for the tide to turn that
takes us home.

Are your feet cold today, this February,
has the ice stained the impulses that leapt like fawns?
There is a melancholy that fills the spaces,
there are hard stops and soft memories that
fill our minds with faces that once kissed
our silences. Some have gone too soon,
and it feels we may never stop mourning.

How you fill my heart departed loves, how
your laughs and questions marks sit upon
the opening of the day

And mark it with smiles, tears, and
a longing to replay walks through courtyards
where we manufactured words to fit between
our cobbled dialogue.

We wait for the touch that makes
all whole again.

Give Me the Biggest

 

Give Me the Biggest

(“The Lord replied, 'If you have faith the size of mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, “Be uprooted and planted in the sea,” and it would obey you!’” Luke 17:6)

Give me more, give me more,
give me more faith so I
can rip the trees to shreds,
bulldoze the mountains, then send them both
to the sea, to the sea, to the sea
for eternity.

Isn’t that what you meant? It is clear enough, I think.
The syntax is explicit, the images concrete,
the only think I need is more faith to defeat
the stubborn bushes and burning mountains.
Although, come to think of it,
I have heard no reports of flying hills along the
beaches with a dying trajectory.
Nor have I seen mulberries like roman candles
fleeing the gravity that holds them in place.
I have not noticed a single neighbor
backhoeing the hole where the flowering trees escaped.

We always want more,
we always want the meter to read above redline,
we always want the single cure for everything.
Give me the biggest, let the fire spray from my fingers;
give me the fullest, let the blaze be felt from my eyes.

And so, you undo me when you decrease me, and
invite me to
want much less, so much less.
And I am distressed after having uprooted
peaks and shrubs so many times
in my dreams.

Give me, then, the grain that cannot be seen from
across the highway,
upon the pulpit,
and is nearly invisible for those with higher vision
from people-length away.

Forgiveness is more an obstacle than
Everest or the Great Sequoias.

I Wish You Would Walk with Me

 

I Wish You Would Walk with Me

(“And he said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has made you whole. Go in peace, and be healed of your affliction.’” Mark 5:34)

I wish you would walk with me, I wish you knew me,
I wish you would walk to the unseen city with me.

I cannot see it yet, though the crowds chant its name.
I have watched for its gleaming alabaster piercing the sky,
I have heard the words shouted like a hundred spears
to drive demons away.

And twelve years with the same unknown pain has
slowed my pace while others went ahead on their own
pilgrimage. My courage sinks as I see them disappear
across the hill-spotted margin of the trail.

My face is not disfigured though my brain is tangled like pasta.
My eyes are not darkened though they burn like fire.
My music comes slower, my voice has no power,
my days are on rewind, my nights project images
of ghostly winter trees, fingers snapping when the ice
weighs them down.

The detours are as lonely as the singular path I have walked
for decades. I bring up the rear, or turn back, or aside and
can only be reminded that I have cried in wishes, sometimes
in faith that misses the point. And the pain stays; one of
the few companions
that are not afraid of the unheard words I long for.

I wish you would talk with me, I wish you got me,
I wish you would listen to the silence in the dark with me.

I wish you would hear me or heal me. I wish you would
keep me company.

I Have not Departed the Faith

 

I Have not Departed the Faith

(“Truly I tell you,” he said, “unless you turn and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 18:3)

I have not departed the faith;
the faith has departed me.
Once I was a fool and did not mind,
learned love this time, that time, all others love
excelling.

Eventually though I learned the ropes and pinned my
every hope
on ladders I thought were strung to the sky; a
rapture of sorts,
but disconnected from affection or creaturely objections
to environments where mud was excluded.
(Believe me, a little dirt never hurt anyone.)

And so I called this globe earthly and fleshly,
saw the human race erased from dignity and
mortally injured. The fences kept my senses
always suspect and my inclinations always setting
like the moon a hangnail away from nothing new.

I hated tomfoolery and simplicity, though I secretly
longed for play. All was serious those days, so many, many
days, that ringing roses served no purpose because
all fall down eventually.

Presidents would save us; legislation would drive the
grayness from our land. But one win led to another,
and before we could love to clown again,
we invented machinery that ate away every bit
of humanity of any who opposed.

I should have rewritten that. We were the opposition,
and proud of the fact. We stacked our accomplishments high
upon the vaulted ceilings of faulted preachings
and wore red caps to prove we had Made it All
Great again.

I have not departed the faith;
the faith has departed me.
And now I will live a fool again,
walk down the street with Christmas lights
strung from my head to my toes
and a tiny chihuahua who has let
this grandpa fall in love with childhood again.

After Lunch

After Lunch

(“Then he said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace.’” Luke 8:48)

He had just finished lunch and his hands
were still greasy;
he needed to wash them before touching anything.
He wasn’t sure where the pain would take him,
it had struck him nearly dead the day before.
He wasn’t sure what friends would believe him,
or if they would talk about their aches too.
Or would they leave him thinking every word was
another complaint from a faithless mind?

It struck him, a mallet to the head, that so many who
once loved his words,
now barely heard what he had been saying
for years. Certainly, since they could not see,
the invisible pain must be a cry for attention.
(or at least something he should become strong for,
should overcome for the sake of those who walked past
him in phases like the moon who heard the same tune
and nothing new.)

He washed his hands with dishwasher Dawn
And cut the grease, deleted the germs and viruses
just in case someone might hug him back into the world.

Some even asked him, face to face, why his prayers
were not answered or
why he felt God fell silent
when he inquired as to causes and sources.
There must be a reason for the secreted decade
of pain.

Just the same, he wondered too, but with more passion
than suspicion. Just in case, he took to asking, in the
fashion of the day,
what the the definition of love was
among those who stayed away. 

A trace of mustard remained between his fingers;
he noticed the spicy notes as he scratched his nose.
He wanted to spill the beans, empty his heart of everything,
but there was no one nearby who would do the same,
and he feared losing his sanity over silences that remained
when he asked the rest of his friends why God had not
answered them.

But someone saw, the decade of bleeding, someone obscured
by humanity’s crush, someone surrounded by heaven’s attendants,
someone, it seemed, just like us.

He braved the cloud of unknowing, reached past the murky air
into the other world that crams this world complete. He found,
still with pain unabated, someone who knew before
he was known. His hand still stained, he moved in closer,
and remained until he was finally noticed. And then

He withdrew

still laid flat by the relentless plague; still chased by the
the unshakeable isolation of the unclean issue of nerves
he had spent a fortune to heal.

If anyone had seen him reach beyond the veil,
then saw him the next day, and a month after that,
they would swear he had failed, and knock less often
at the door of his heartache.

But there were moments, shorter than lightning, when
he knew
there was less wrong and righting than this world knows,
and only love that heals whos and whys and those
who wait uncurled for the new kingdom,
the new world,
the--your will on earth as in heaven world--

World without end, amen.

If I was Cold

If I was Cold

(“…that is, that we may be mutually comforted by one another’s faith, both yours and mine.” Romans 1:12)

If I was cold, would you give  me your blanket;
If I was alone, would you send me a card?
If I was homeless, would you give me a bed;
Or just offer a comb to brush my balding head?

If I was far, would you pay for my airfare;
If my sister died, would you send me roses?
If I was destitute, would you raise the funds;
Or put your phone on mute while worship music hums?

Pouring, a pitcher of sweet sangria,
weren’t your throats assuaged;
Painting, a portrait of peaceful solace,
weren’t your tears wiped away?
Sitting, a hospice of slow departure,
weren’t your breaths sanctified;
Praying, a moment of candle and incense,
weren’t your pleas respected?

Now I am thirsty where the rivers do not run,
I am weeping in the rain, for the sun.
I am dying, though not like everyone,
I am praying for an invitation that more
than mouths a prayer, but raises a hand,
a letter, a paragraph, a long note that sounds
across the continent; that calls us home.

I am isolated, would you help me come home;
I am grieving, would you cover me with your wings?
I am boxed in, would you offer me a great river to swim;
I am confused; where are the friends, the fellows,
the brothers and sisters,

Who all know where I am.

Faith is the Reality

Faith is the Reality

“Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen.” Hebrews 11:1

When I was young, maybe nine or ten, I knew my parents’ income. My dad said at one time that he was making $7,000 per year. Now, remember, that is 1964 or 65. A couple of years later my mom announced that she had received a raise of $700 per year. I was smart enough to know we weren’t millionaires, but not quite savvy enough economically to realize we were on the lower end of “middle class”.

In fact, one year my dad bought my mom a car for Christmas. He liked making her search through the house for her main gift. So, he would decorate a box which she would open. Inside the box was another box with a note in it. The note told her to look inside the oven. Once there she found a second box with a note saying, “Look in the hall closet”. This went on for half a dozen boxes. Finally, the note said, “Go to the driveway.” We all followed mom and dad outside to see the car.

It was a Fiat. An old Fiat. A very old Fiat. Indeed, it was even missing the passenger’s seat which dad quickly explained he would replace as soon as possible. Mom’s big gift was an old, tiny, rusty Fiat that cost $50! To this day I’m not sure if that was a result of our economic situation or my dad’s bit of Irish parsimony.

Mom worked three jobs while Dad pastored a church in Pasadena, CA. My brother and I both had paper routes. My sisters, too young to have jobs yet, helped us prep our bundles before we went into the neighborhood tossing newspapers that slid right up to our customers’ doors. Usually.

I really had little evidence of how much money my family had. I knew we went to McDonald’s occasionally and we could each order a hamburger. But, if we wanted a cheeseburger, we had to pay for the cheese ourselves. As an adult I have come to realize my dad was a child of the Great Depression. It has helped me understand his penny-pinching ways.

The only access I had to real “cash” was Dad’s wallet which usually sat on top of the blonde chest of drawers in their bedroom. I was inquisitive, and often looked through the contents of that leather envelope. There were S&H Green stamps, a Gulf gas card, his driver’s license, pictures of mom and us kids. And then I would find the cash. I don’t think I ever found more than $20 in Dad’s wallet. Usually only a handful of $1s. Nope, the evidence told me we were right to get by with a $50-dollar car!

What I didn’t realize, of course, was my dad’s wallet was not the only evidence of the family’s assets. There was the banking account, the savings account, a retirement account and a huge coin collection that, at least in my dad’s mind, was worth thousands!

What if I lived each day in fear that the only assets we had were the few bills I discovered in Dad’s wallet? What if I thought I would drive a $50 Fiat’s with a missing seat for the rest of my life?

But there was something more than the “evidence” I personally discovered. There were two loving, though imperfect, parents doing all they could to provide for their kids. We took in every sight that was free or inexpensive in greater Los Angeles. We frolicked at the beach. We wandered through Huntington Gardens. We drove up to Mount Baldy.

For me, this is an earthly picture of what faith in my Heavenly Father is all about. I know Christ from the Gospels. And I know Him from the witness of His Spirit in my heart. But, I do not see Him, I cannot see His eyes, feel His human hand on my shoulder.

But, my faith in Him is the same as the faith I had in my parents; only so much greater because He is greater. Trials are the opportunity to trust in the bank account of the patience Jesus offers. Failings are a chance to draw upon the sweetness of His mercy and forgiveness. Days of clouds and wildflowers are like looking through Dad’s wallet. They are the dollar bills, but Father-God has so much more prepared for us.

Today, trust the abundant reserves of Father-God. He has more grace, more power, more compassion and comfort than is possible to imagine.

Found My Hope

Found My Hope

(“What is faith? It is the confident assurance that something we want is going to happen. It is the certainty that what we hope for is waiting for us, even though we cannot see it up ahead.” Hebrews 11:1)

I found my hope in better things than bathing my brain
in acid poured from angry yet unredeemed. I discover
larger breaths of love that blanket the earth; sunshine and rain,
righteous, unrighteous, colonized and desert. While we cling to
our angry gods,
our tyrants who teach us
that every brain is shriveled dust except
the brain that sees the world like us;

The Father of All, with hope that pours from an endless store,
begins with more than our short-term fuse, and refuses to drag
His feet
over nuance. While the religious battle evolution and
“secular science” and “doctors without Jesus” He extends
His grace with a grasp so great it can only be missed

By those who have been blinded by their own idols
and

Those who believe they have believed the perfect faith
because they have hated the lefties, harangued the righties,
and learn that telling half-truths gets people’s attention
so much quicker than the mud-and-air we mostly know.

Lay down your taunts, they shatter faith.
Refuse to insult; the menu of the King never included
demotion or demeaning. Faith and Love are first cousins;
You cannot spit and kiss with the same lips.

I found my hope in kindness; the smell of dewy alfalfa
on an Indian Summer day. I found my assurance in compassion,
the fragrance of morning glories that follow the Sun.

Don’t tell me of everything you’ve rejected. A grocery storeprovides, on the little town’s corner, victuals to all, familiar

and foreign. But tack it “secular” and a certain segment will
bar the door, complain to the papers, boycott the soup aisle,
and puff up their chests with more hot air than an Death Valley.

I have discovered my hope in waiting for mercy,
and dropping my messy crumbles that harmed the hurting.
I found my promise in crossing the canyons that separate
with anyone who needs to opposite wall.

Troubles Test our Faith

“My brothers and sisters, when you have many kinds of troubles, you should be full of joy, because you know that these troubles test your faith, and this will give you patience.” James 1:2-3

I meet with a handful of teens each week at “Pop with Pastor”. We gather at a local restaurant, I pay for drinks, and we simply chat. It isn’t a Bible study or prayer group, simply an expression of my love for the students, and an opportunity to make myself available to them. Each week on Wednesday six to a dozen of us get together for about an hour.

More on Pain and Suffering

"The men who were holding Jesus in custody taunted him while they beat him. They blindfolded him and asked him repeatedly, “Prophesy! Who hit you?” Insulting him, they said many other horrible things against him.” Luke 11:63-64

It would be the utmost arrogance for me to assume the pain I have endured for nearly six years comes close to Jesus’ suffering. I have a headache of unknown causes diagnosed as New Daily Persistent Headache. I endure pain twenty four hours a day, with an average of six out of 10. It takes more than one try most days to simply get out of bed, and my physical activity has been severely limited. My wife and I just visited our kids and granddaughter for 14 days in Minneapolis and I ventured outdoors only once, with the pain keeping down the rest of the time.

Because You Say So

“When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break.” Luke 5:6

Having no portable PA system, Jesus borrowed, unannounced, one of two fishing boats onshore. The fishermen were finished for the day, washing their nets from the debris of the day and laying them out for the next. The crowd was growing larger and it was difficult to be heard. So, boarding the small craft, Jesus put out for shore just a bit. Both the water and the rising terrain in front of Him, made for a perfect outdoor arena, acoustics akin to the Hollywood Bowl.

Baseball was Cancelled

Baseball was Cancelled

(“Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” Mark 11:24)

Baseball was cancelled today and the breathing grass
had a rest.
It takes nine, they say, and two is simply not enough.
Yet the two did more with their day excused
than the others did at home alone, unused.

I believed longer than I could hold my breath
that my team would grow and run and sweep the
season like Mays or Drysdale. Let me pitch,
an inning, maybe two; right field is lonely,
my glove is new, used only a day or two.

I believed larger than I could vision, revising
data to meet me at the intersection of hope’s
certainty and childish imagination. My speed
and curve, knuckle and slider; were four names
for one pitch inches outside and high.

I read the comics and knew I could become
a caped and super human dressed in primary colors,
seeing behind the lead, taking the lead and knowing
no one teases a kid in bright spandex who

Can also fly.

I heard the radio, watched the black and white,
and my Dodgers rarely let me down. I believed
higher, somewhere over the outfield wall my hits
would land well beyond sightseers cars, on the ground,
found rolling on the sand underneath the slide while I
made the rounds from base one to two, two to three
and home.

I believed it all so well and found I struck out mostly,
pitched silliness costly, and was never picked up for
summer league.

My Lord! Is it possible that, when two show up and
the game is cancelled, my prayers are answered, and
new friends are made sharing bubble gum and baseball cards
in the shade?

The Touch of Healing

“As it happened, Publius’s father was ill with fever and dysentery. Paul went in and prayed for him, and laying his hands on him, he healed him.” Acts 28:8

Paul and his sailing companions had been forced to seek shelter from a terrible storm on the island of Malta. Although the people were kind, it was a bit of a scary start. Cold and rainy, the men built a fire and a poisonous snake, driven out by the heat, bit Paul on the hand.

Time to Run

“Right away a woman came to him whose little girl was possessed by a demon. She had heard about Jesus and now she came and fell at his feet.” Mark 7:25

She was in desperate straits. There was nowhere to turn. She was not part of the accepted religious people of her time. She was a Greek, a Gentile; she was outside the circle of those who had the golden ticket to God’s blessings. There were pagan gods, to be sure. She could bow to nearly any idol of her choosing.

Very/Slowly

Very/Slowly

(“Don’t be afraid! Stand still, and see what the Lord will do to save you today.” Exodus 14:13)

I am writing this to be read

Very

Slowly.

I/Mean/It!/

Take every word a-part a syllable at a time,
do not waste one single letter, do not subtract the
smallest integer. Every cluck of the tongue matters,
every vowel breath baritone will not be repeated.
The consonants cutting off air will speak once; listen

Very

Snail-pace.

/Frame/It!/

Now Moses meant it when he said the fear was in their heads
and they need only stand and watch to see (the victory) when
(in the Red Sea) overbearing chariots drowned. Moses spoke
it, perhaps wrote it,
and bequeathed it  for us to sift the leftover junk and pain
we fear might smother us like Job.

Now, I am serious, take this word by bird, beat by cheap seats;
it will not be repeated.

Moses meant it when he said the fear; Job felt it when he
saw the declaration written upon his the ridges of his dried skin,
God was his enemy, God held the winning cards, God had trumped
every bit of righteousness Job had every painted or sung. The
(bottom rung) was squeezing the life out of the affair He adored,
the GodHead, still beyond worship’s reach, had now besieged
the days of grace, replacing them with salt-herbs, potsherds and
pain.

Listen to my eyes roll slowly now. Moses meant it, Job spent
his pain divided/between love’s praise and the dazed questions
when God refuses to play fair.

Though Moses saw the chariots sink, Job’s tears splattered
the same pages; and I am left thinking

We all need to

Take it so/much/slower.

So Small

“The Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed planted in a field.  It is the smallest of all seeds, but it becomes the largest of garden plants; it grows into a tree, and birds come and make nests in its branches.” Matthew 13:31-32

The mission of the Pioneer 10 was to reach the planet of Jupiter. Launched in 1972, the probe set out on its three year, 700 thousand mile journey. Twenty-five years later, more than six million miles from the sun, the little probe was still beaming back radio signals to scientists on earth. With only an 8-watt transmitter, it continued its mission far beyond expectations. Those eight watts…about enough to power a bedroom night light.

The Smallest Timbre

The Smallest Timbre

(“And without faith it is impossible to please God, for whoever would approach him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” Hebrews 11:6)

I spot the impossible in memories and mind,
but miss it on the sod I’ve planted my feet upon.
The clouds increase my resistance,
my willingness lumbers under pretentious imagination
precisely where I left it time ago and
time again.

I have not done with seeking, it is finding that frustrates me,
and I wish the next bush would hold a bird or two with
a welcome song from the home where I know the view
has washed all the grey hues away. The music,
the lyric,
the lilt of fiddle tunes that echo from smokey mountains
to splintered front porches. The work is hard but the
play is better.

I love every word Jesus spoke, and need no others.
But I would like them front and centered,
above the late night memories and happy home rooms
I’ve entered so long ago they’ve come around and
masquerade as my future.

Let the morning carry the words I adore through
the cracks in the shutters, into the spirals that utter
dark expectations about the smallest timbre
and attach meanings to the absence I feel
of every love I’ve made or imagined. I
do not want to feel loved to rid my stomach
of its shivers
nor
my eyes of their tears.

I am nearing the end, and no longer needing proof,
I simply want to hear an answer to help me seek
just a little bit longer.

Water that Runs

Water that Runs

(“But blessed are those who trust in the Lord and have made the Lord their hope and confidence.” Jeremiah 11:7)

Before I thought about the morning moving on

so quickly and afternoon racing toward the final turn

I could swear I had wasted another day. There is

a pillow on the couch where I lay my head, a case

washed twice a week, and a blanket with occasional shreds

where the quilt has dropped a thread or two. I sleep till

noon, I wish.

When I do not, on Monday most, I choose a movie near 10

and watch till noon. The pillow holds my thoughts, the blanket

my security and the cat, white and black, visits me prone,

nesting upon my chest and, face to face, insists she is queen

of the moment. Who is to say she isn’t.

It is impossible to tell now, lazy or pain. I would rather

putt a green or cycle the hills, the afternoon valve to release

the cooked-up schemes of my swarmed imagination.

See here, the way I trust. The way I used to. A drive to the ocean,

tennis with an ever-drooping forehand, or just hardcopy

and coffee

where the shards of afternoon are pieced on tables of conversation.

Why should I bow to electrons that strangle the proper music and dance?

Why should this phantom (there is neither mass nor matter) make each

thought chatter while outside rivers and sunshine are a chef’s perfect savor?

But the vise grinds and my brain whines at a ghost that hitchhikes my neurons.

The passenger is invisible, the itinerary a drumline from eyeball to eyeball,

cervical vertebra to dura mater; it does not matter that it will not kill me;

the unknown traveler has squeezed my arms past uncle.

Here are the pieces of my afternoon, a few forgotten invitations,

a commercial for shampoo and a movie about a speed jump-rope athlete;

it is all so fleeting, and yet I move through mud with the few thoughts

I can capture,

still (sometimes, some not) enraptured in this drought by

the streams of water that runs from (somewhere, always here)

throne to (all) His own.