I’ll Plant a Metaphor

I’ll Plant a Metaphor

Imagine the reflection, listen to the slight inflection
when the words escape my throat/
that the tears are falling again.

You invited me to you party,
I said I couldn’t come,
I had other obligations,
an appointment with the sun.

But imagine the tone of my voice, listen to my dewy eyes,
when the syllables are choked/
that the sun has not dried them yet.

You insisted that I come along,
I said maybe next time,
I had other confrontations,
an employment as a mime.

But imagine the harsh heat on my feet, listen to my wringing hands,
when my knuckles are swollen/
and the sun has only burned them.

If I asked you to miss the party,
will you stay here this time?
I have scratchy destinations,
an emptying type of mind.

Here I’ll plant a metaphor in the crater
so deep
we will wait all summer to see it come
full bloom.
Imagine the moment, if you will just stay,
when it burst between our consciousness/
when it defines the tears you did not understand.

One Playmate Who Knows

One Playmate Who Knows

(“Isn’t it clear, friends, that you...are children of promise?” Galatians 4:28 [The Message])

Some days it seems the children do not
want to come out to play.
They stay inside measuring the hems of everyone’s
pants and dresses. No one confesses they would rather
skip a rope. The work is their burden, the burden is their work;
and wouldn’t God be offended if they ended just a stitch too soon?

Besides, the children outside do not care what you wear,
the bubbles will float wherever the wind delivers them.
The sprinklers will spray the serious toward laughter and
the moonlighters toward day.

Some days it seems adults have forgotten their childhood friends.
The days come to an end too quickly, the porches sit quiet and empty
while one man’s tears plead for someone to search their memory
and remember his heartbeat, imagine his throbbing pain,
look south, or up, or in, to find him again. All he is hoping
is one playmate who knows, so their own tears well up in
Summer-time pools.

He must have fooled himself. He thought it was always family.
He must have misspoke far too often, mistook the blossoms
for perennials. But they do not bloom here where he has been
transplanted.

Come find me, I am not hiding. I never was good at hide-and-seek.
Ollie Ollie Oxen Free, please come and see me. My green lollipop
has melted, stuck to the preheated cement. But every word,
every card, every letter, every vowel was always meant to tell you
I could never give you up my friend.

The sun is setting, children are heading indoors, and still I sit,
praying, hoping, crying behind the bushes so no one sees,
that you will remember the playful days when skinned knees
meant no harm, and funny bones were cold, electric, warm;
The days when hearts were mended before the next game of
marbles in the alley round our circles of dirt.

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.

Imagine Falling

Imagine Falling

(“Then Moses and the Levite religious leaders said to all Israel, ‘Be quiet and listen, O Israel! This day you have become the people of the Lord your God.’” Deuteronomy 27:9)

Imagine falling weightless in a slow spin into
a wide well that has no end;
bottomless and you find you have no more
need for air.

The silent liquid surrounds your every bend
and every wrinkle. Like a dream floating far above
the landscape below guided by the movement of the air,
your mass and the liquid’s are equal.

Imagine you fall without fear or reflex, bathed by
the warmth more solid than your usual air.
Each and every pore is filled, the entire scan of your skin;
more visible than air, your eyes do not burn. Every strand of hair
waves the slow tempo, the legato arc that, for this
imagined time
denies gravity’s demands, forgets calendar commands
while safely framed by beauty’s fantasy.

Imagine you stay much longer than you intended; an hour,
an evening, a day; and you recall the water (though it was not
water at all), now seemed like millions of molecules held together
by little more than a handshake. And the longer you stayed, the more
you sensed,
the liquid, the well, your skin were less foreign than you knew.

When we imagine that which is true, there is no other expectation
than that which we’ve known from the beginning. The Water
giving life and nourishing; the Joy stronger than death and
drenching our stubborn souls completely covered in Love.