Like Picnics in the Shade

Like Picnics in the Shade

(“How beautiful is the person who comes over the mountains to bring good news, who announces peace and brings good news, who announces salvation and says to Jerusalem, ‘Your God is King.’” Isaiah 52:7)

The bridge spanned the ford
beneath greening skies.

The feet were beautiful along
the bluing banks.

The sky was descending along the
redding horizon.

The announcement of freedom was a prism full
of promise. Was a leap across the river.
Was a well-timed emancipation. Was a
well of water upon our parched tongues.

We had been disconnected. We were dejected
most days, sunny or haze. We knew the way
home
but the roads were well-guarded.

We started the inward journey as soon as we
understood that
no one could harm us on this way of open meadows.
No one could boast of conquering us like dust.
We were learning that trust looked a lot like
siestas in the sun.

We rejoiced like cranberry sky, strawberry wine,
and honeydew. We held our voices higher than
we had in epochs of time. We heard the message
and sang the words like an anthem of deliverance.
We spoke like we had know for years that we
were no longer captives, though we felt, sooner than
later
that we were imprisoned outside the fault lines
of mediocrity. We heard the news announced like liberty
unrestricted. And we shared it like picnics in the shade.

On HIllside Picnics with Us

On Hillside Picnics with Us

(“There was a tent behind the second curtain called the holy of holies.” Hebrews 9:3)

Inaccessible, and how do you get there from here?
How do you ascend the throne of the one who sits
across every constellation and speaks to the galaxies
like children?

Once a year one would draw near. Yet the curtain deadened
the vision and muddled the sound of sacred rites hidden from view.
I remember pulling the shades at night so neighbors could not
see what I was reading.

Who hides in that tented room? Who awaits the approach one
afternoon of the year? Smoke obscures our senses, incense
increases our guesses.  We wait as we have waited for this day
for hundreds of years. Yet, though mystery is the density behind
the veil,
we long for the familiarity of family. When the curtains open again
the precious stones carried on his heart glisten in the sun. He is done
for the year. We dine together, a savory meal with god and our neighbor;
a communal meal that leaves us satisfied and still unsure
about the nature of Shekinah, glory, judgement, atonement and holy
moments which seem much too large for our containment.

But the curtain is mere fabric; the ark of the covenant mere wood and
earthy metal hammered by human hands and place silently. We stand,
and dare not breathe, and less to talk. Our children pull on our robes
wanting an explanation of the one made manna and manufacturers snow,
the one who sends the sun riding on the sky and the moon hanging like a lantern,
the one (oh the ages would tell) surrounding the expansion of everything and

hidden within the smallest quarks without names.

We sometimes miss the truth for the tradition,
unchanging incantations convince us we have met the divine.
But we do not know, or are slow to hear, that all this is play-acting,
a metaphor, a puppet show. We memorized the words and drew
our swords against any who would say different.

But here we have been invited, the hospitality of Yahweh,
the invasion of the Son into every space we thought was empty,
into every moment we thought ordinary and so unholy.
But his sandals dug the earth, his hands cupped the mud,
his eyes wandered to scattered sheep, his mouth kissed the wine.

And, if this time we will hear it, we shall know that dust is sacred
(we are built of it)
Seeds are sacred
(we begin with it)
Humanity is sacred
(we can count on it)

For the Holy one who dwelt among the cherubim
chose rather to dine on hillside picnics with us.

Picnics Remade

Picnics Remade

(” The voice came a second time: If God says it’s ok, it’s okay.’” Acts 10:15 [The Message])

Lowered lovesick on the roof of a patron’s lodging,
fullpress prayer was all that was left of the noon devotion;
the only motion, rocking on the knees nearly calloused from
kneeling longterm, late term, before the object of love.

The skies are not enough to contain the passion flowing
from this tiny heart beating fresh, creating new love with
each pulse. The rooftop is not strong enough to
hold the weight of atomic moments where mass is greater
than the volume of words that poetry forms and
soily love envisions far beyond fascination to
strict affection. The code is obeyed for the
CodeWriter’s sake.

Fasting; for love nourishes the empty,
praying; for Divine enables the question,
seeking; for today replays the answer,
hearing; for spoken rehearses the remedy.

And seeing the answer, hearing the banquet
that lets us walk on the grass again, pet the animals in
the zoo,
cross the borders to love our enemies,
rsvp to recipes we had shunned so strictly,

Loving now cheery, the meals we take
are feasts remade into picnics for
cast-offs and relics, non-sequesters
and investors who are allowed now to
bet it all on walks where we once had
to wash our feet days before we began.