You Can Choose

You Can Choose

(“’In that day, declares the Lord, ‘the king and the officials will lose heart, the priests will be horrified, and the prophets will be appalled.’” Jeremiah 4:9)

You were playing games and changing the rules;
you were throwing the dice disguising the results with
light flashing like saber tooth tigers competing for survival.
You thought your prayers were the answer when you
filled the altar with dead words and loud admonishments.

You who proclaimed the end of days, will you be ready
for your justice to come calling? You were ready to deport
every dark-skinned neighbor over their birthplace a half
century before. When God meets you at the end of the road,
what will you say to justify the cruelty your declarations
incited?

You kings, you should never have imagined you were monarchs
giving matches to strangers to burn down the meager cottages
of the poor. From the throne to the backyard chickens, you
thought you reigned with impunity. Instead, it will be you
who will lose heart when you see the hand of God reducing
your words to sawdust to trample underfoot.

Take a breath you purveyors of underhanded mischief.
There is still a chance for your redemption. Walk away
from the conflagration you have created with
heat of your hatred. You thought you would never be
found out, that no one would see the loathing you
learned despite it all. You had your chances;
your stances were arrows aimed from your thrones,
and you thought they only advanced your cause.

You can choose today how you will learn the dirges of
the disheartened. You can change your tune; you can
unfold your cartoon character and feel the pangs of
hunger your policies have caused.

You can choose today. Look into the eyes of the One
who sees everything.
You can choose today.

I Could Listen All Day

I Could Listen All Day

(“When the king heard the words of the law scroll, he tore his clothes.” 2 Kings 22:11)

The flock of geese flew overhead sounding
like children on a playground. The fog had turned
to rain and
they felt closer than ever, flying under the
misty domed sky.

Don’t stop browsing these pages, they are never
exactly the same. Never assume you know the
answers because the question will be different each time.
The cattle lying in the rain-soaked field are
commentators of the scripts we read.

Once around the neighborhood,
skirting the road where new developments form,
there is a cemetery just north of the edge
of the mudded field where you can see the river from its
its gentle hill. There is little boredom when the
river punctuates the occasional verses testing the
waters,
testing the distance to the end of the day.

Though the sun is not shining there are rays
that pierce the heart even on the most clouded elevations.
There are voices reciting lyrics and faces leading
the band. I’ve heard them before, but today they
sound new, like a baby’s first words: colors, books,
up and down, mom and dad. I know thousands more
but the babble of babies is its own interpretation. I could
listen all day.

Your Count Was Off

Your Count Was Off

(“The king replied, ‘But look, I see four men. They’re untied, walking in the middle of the fire, and unharmed. The fourth one looks like a son of the gods.’” Daniel 3:25)

Have you ever stood outside when the grass was dewing,
when the darkness was wooing your feet to the meadow,
your arms by your sides, and your eyes to the sky;
Have you ever stood outside in the smudgy dark
and watched all night as the moon came down?

And were you certain, mostly because of the static electricity
from people rubbing on your head,
that it was your fault the moon was dead?

Have you ever lived in God’s house (in our out) where
every move was calculated, measured, and manipulated?
Have you ever walked in to pray, and cried instead, words and
devotion fled and only your naked knees understood anything?
Have you ever dreamt, 30 years later, that it all meant something
but you never were tall enough to bring the glory down?

And were you certain, mostly because of the chemical reaction
from short-robed preachers accusing your soul,
that it was your fault behind and ahead?

Have you ever held up new grapes to the sun,
wondering in a half-second’s eternity of winding vineyards
and wines that brighten the eyes?
Have you ever had a day when a king’s summons
met your serenity tête-à-tête squeezing you between
another’s troubles; a wound upon the head because of what
the king had said?

And were you certain, mostly because of the wind in your soul,
that there was no other option, though most thought the king a priest,
that it was you and the troubled who might not escape unscathed?

And did anyone tell you at midnight, after the madness, in the middle
of either faith or sadness,

That your count was off and one more stood unburned, not only in the furnace
but also in the years with you unarmed. And unharmed.

Shortcut

Shortcut

(“Therefore, when Jesus perceived that they would come and take Him to make him a king, He departed again into a mountain by Himself.” John 6:15)

How well have your shortcuts worked
to bring the king down from the mountain to
slay the mongrels that have slobbered all over your
beloved memories, the golden age, the gilded cage
where you hid pretending that you held the key to
bring back the foursquare families only baby

Boomers

Remember.

Your cage is jaded, the statues you’ve erected to
cannons, generals and frightful confederates
stand next to your churches waving the flag
as if god wanted you to sing (OF thee i SING),
off the stinging sun blocked by the stars and stripe forever.

You’ve got to take the long way round,
ride a donkey, ride an ass,
smell the crowd, the peasant class,
watch the sandals worn through the desert’s dust
and the sun bake the faces of those you
thought you could outrun in your glittering limousines.

Who do you want him to overthrow?
What do you want him to enforce?
Your plans? Your course of events?
Did you plan to be left behind?
Did you take the scepter and declare, in the name of

God and

Country

The king was surely on your side?

You want a ruler to enforce your borders while

Christ weeps over the masonry hearts
beautifully mortared just inches outside his hearing.

On Post Office Walls

On Post Office Walls

(“Yahweh said to Samuel, ‘Listen to the voice of the people in all that they tell you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me as the king over them.’” 1 Samuel 8:7)

We cannot survive on silence,
the space between molecules gives us
nothing better than the missing pieces of a
jigsaw puzzle.

Have you ever seen one of those posters hung
on post office walls, or stapled to a telephone-pole?
The picture is a wide-smiling woman, business-casual,
and glad to have been photographed. “If you want to
enjoy your life
like her” it says, “Call the number below.”
You’ve seen them, I know you have. And along the
bottom of the poster tags are cut like a dozen tiny tickets.
Tear one off and take the phone number with you. Only,
this one, the one that caught your eye, the one that might change
your life,
has been stripped of every tag with its magic number.

God, we cannot hold you. You are worse than water to grasp.
We would pull you down like a string on a kite; we would
tug the tail of your coat until you recognized our smallish face.
But we only grip nearly weightless mass as the air passes
between our fingers.

We cannot populate invisible planets. Even if we could touch
without seeing, each step would be dread, not seeing the green, the yellow
or red. Hopscotch would be impossible; prodigals would never find
their way back to the homestead. Most frightening would be the
demagogue who said only he could see.

We do not want your Second, your Administrative Assistant.
We cannot live on mere representations of the only thing
we really want to know. Nations beg for rulers; democracies are
the worst. We expect the one who says she knows you best
will make it all comprehensible; the one who says he’s closer
than the rest…but both remind us of

One of those posters hung on post office walls.

Rejoice; the Almighty Reigns

“Hallelujah! The Lord our God, the Almighty, has become king.  Let us rejoice, be happy, and give him glory.” Revelation 9:6b, 7a

There have been more interpretations of the Book of Revelation than the number of church denominations throughout history. Whatever I write today will have as many detractors as those who say “Amen!” Whether we view the entire book as a tome of future events, an extended metaphor about Christ and the Church, or some combination of the two, there is blessing attached to its reading. “I’m coming soon! Blessed is the one who follows the words of the prophecy in this book.” Revelation 22:7

Into The Quiet

Into the Quiet

(“When Jesus saw that they were ready to force him to be their king, he slipped away into the hills by himself.” John 6:15)

I have seen men on cable tv with atrocious haircuts (and women too)
speaking for God the Creator of All, the Potentate and Holy One,
Invisible, Omnipotent, Omnipresent, Who speaketh unto us
in antique English like Shakespeare. There is a reason students shudder
at both Titus Andronicus and the KJV of Lamentations.

Could I understand κοινή Greek commonly, I could dispense
with tv translations altogether. But that is another poem which
must wait until I learn to translate my own stubborn phrases into
a language dead enough that none could critique my work.

I have seen graves with green unsettled. Half a dozen, an hour before dark,
and a day after the cancer won the struggle for the man’s last breath, the grass
hugging the sod with the shine from too many shoes shuffling a certain prayer
they were told would bring the widower’s husband back.

I have seen tv men swear to resurrection, prayer that brought the hands
disrupting the dirt piled above. The man climbed out, without stepstool
or directions, to find the world the same as it was the day his respirations
ceased.

I have seen tv men (and women too), or those with no access to air time who
snatch their lucky anointing because they lived long enough to finally receive the
votes they needed to give them the freedom to tell the unheeding
how God’s creeds are meant to be obeyed. Shame for the backward glances
and unanswered mail when a voter needs an answer.

Oh, but You, Son of Man and of God, eschew hairdos and personal assistants,
but find Your time alone on hillside fog and morning with Father to hear
how Your kingdom comes
without popular vote or golden thrones. And though its sorrow must
waft like incense through every fiber of Your humanity, the cross is
Your throne and our misdeeds Your crown.

I heard that you told those closest to you, “I am sending you in the same way
the Father sent me,” and I always took it to mean less self-seeking and more
quiet mountain retreating. But I have seen tv men (this is poetry, so I admit
my license usage) who love themselves and the stage, and I could be one.

Lest I forget, the sins that crowned Your crumpled brow, I will quietly
hope to follow well, and, not before the crowds, but before my King,
I will
bow.

King Over all the Earth

“The Lord will become King over all the earth in that day; the Lord shall be One and His name One.” Zechariah 14:9

There is no greater dream than the prospect of God’s final rule over all the earth. The kingdom of God will finally be completely fulfilled, and all will be summed up in the singular goodness and holiness of God. In other words, all evil, all destruction, hatred and violence will come to an end and God’s kingdom, with Christ as King, will reign with all peace, righteousness and justice.