The Timbre of My Own Guitar

 The Timbre of My Own Guitar

(“The important thing is faith—the kind of faith that works through love.” Galatians 5:6b)

As if I did not know the timbre of
my own guitar
I laid it on its side facing the window
and hoped the sun would revive it again.
And the saxophone squeaked through the speakers.
I snuck up on the day with
clouded clarity,
the wood fairies danced outside my
field of vision.
But closer in I could see the air,
the floaters and astronauts never obscuring
my view.
My heart beat against my lungs,
and pain wrapped its hot hands around my head,
but I still heard, through the auxiliary sounds,
the afternoon approaching
like those days in May when we
went driving through the hills with the
Moody Blues
on the radio.
With calloused fingers, swollen knuckles,
and a voice crackling like a paper bag,
I threatened to sing the solitary away.
Someone once pasted
get well cards
all over my bedroom wall. Someone
once washed my feet who I never had
met before.
Someone once sat on the edge of my couch
with tears to match my own.
Someone drove across the state to loan me
an extra breath or two.
Though I spend nearly every day alone
I carry the kindnesses in my body like
memories of poppy fields and warm Spring days.
Today I may play my guitar again.

A Suite

A Suite

(“Say to all the people of the land and to the priests: When you have fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months even these seventy years, did you really fast for Me—for Me?” Zechariah 7:5)

Like a guitar trying to pluck its own strings, we sing to prove,
we dance to earn, and spurn the free embrace love created
when it invented our shape, our tone; space our scales and
semi-tones to pleasure’s hearing.

While You freewheel good, we invent exact,
we bow, surrender, keep the balance black;
while You give prizes, first to last.

Had we missed a note in our songs
(over and over, like dolphins being trained
we push it to the edges, synchronizing our best efforts
with our best ideas of what You want)
we slop our cry and drag our imperfection around
like we think it is the cross You asked us to bear.

Had we hit each note in our solo
(only and only, like daredevils flaming
we push it to the edges, being sure the blaze and
thunder are big and best enough for Your approval)
we straighten our spines and never look back
like we think it is the position You now owe us.

Like a guitar created by a lover of wood and sound,
skill set against skill, passion for the painting ignoring the frame,
we wait for You to play (not better than we have attempted)
the music that shifts there to here and then to now
in one laced movement; a suite that tells the story
we had been trying to hear.

Taking the Lead

“But you are not that way. Instead, the most prominent among you must be as the youngest, and the leader as one who serves.” Luke 22:26

There is no dearth of information on how to be a good leader. It would be cynical to say that most of them disagree with Jesus’ teaching about servanthood; but I don’t think that is entirely true. Most business models emphasize being the best at providing for your customers’ needs. That seems to parallel Jesus’ statements about leaders who serve.

The difficulty is in personally acting it out in our own lives. Today I played guitar for 25 fifth-graders at a Veterans Day Assembly. It was fun and I truly enjoyed it. I learned “This Land is Your Land”; Woody Guthrie’s famous American anthem and practiced the fairly easy arrangement with them twice this week.

Besides the usual musician’s joy of playing, there is another side of me that likes people to know I’m good at something. I suppose that is part our human nature generally, and my desire for accolades personally. “Hey, I didn’t know Mark played guitar…or that he played it that good!”

With that back story and confession behind us, I take you to this morning. First of all, I forgot a pick. Big deal; use your fingers. But we guitarists know that does throw things off a bit. Plus, finger picking, without properly grown nails, is about half as loud as with a pick. I had forgone the use of a microphone for the very reason that I was using a pick.

Without time to run home and find a pick, I did my finger-picking best. It was not nearly loud enough, the couple of flourishes I did “flat-picking” didn’t work at all with my fingers, and, worst of all, I miscounted the number of verse we did. No big deal, except that the final chorus was to end with the last line repeated a little slower.

It didn’t happen, not with the guitar anyway. The director and fifth-graders hit their mark perfectly on the ending line, but I kept playing on tempo, right on through, as if we were riffing right into another verse. As everyone always says, “Nobody probably noticed.”

Wrong! I noticed. I noticed not playing it the way I wished. I noticed that the guitar probably wasn’t heard well. And I noticed, keenly noticed that I raced right past the ending. What I didn’t notice was how happy the students were when everyone clapped for them.

I’m a real servant leader, I tell you! I was happy to play for fifth graders instead of Carnegie Hall. I was ready at the first phone call to spend a couple of mornings at the Elementary School. I was glad to leave the important duties in my office to play a simple song for a room full of 10 and 11 year olds. But, you see, even though it appeared to be servant-like; my interior was still aching for recognition.

I’m not being too hard on myself…truly I am not. I know the very fact that I realize what was going on inside me is evidence I’m not all that into myself. But it does illustrate for me the deceptive nature of leadership and recognition. Even when we are trying to serve others, it can feel less fulfilling if no one notices. Or, when they do notice, it is when we have not performed up to par.

Whether it is to accompany elementary students, or lecture grad students at an Ivy League University, our drive can still be measured anywhere from self-serving to self-deprecating. I believe the healthy attitude is at neither end of that spectrum, but rather an attitude that places the needs of those I lead above my need for recognition.

So, next time I’m invited, I will once more gladly accept. And next time, if I forget my pick, I will try to be just a little less self-conscious, and a little more focused on how much fun those particular students are actually having. After all, it is our Loving Heavenly Father I serve, and I thing He enjoyed the music my friends and I made.