In the Space of an Hour

In the Space of an Hour

(“All of us, gazing with unveiled face on the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, as from the Lord who is the Spirit.” 2 Corinthians 3:18)

In the space of an hour, on my walk alone under cloudy skies
and stillness I observed two feral cats. One, black and white,
only gazed at me from behind a pile of firewood set out for the
winter. The other, tan and rust, caught my eye and dashed into the
foliage at the bottom of a fir tree. Why one stayed and one ran I
cannot tell.

I saw a congregation of crows on the ground near a cedar tree.
Their meeting had been called, I suppose, to determine where they
would scavenge together for their next meal. They were near the field
that lies behind the narrow cemetery where I had seen more than a dozen
deer a few days before. I scanned it entirely and not one could be seen.

I waved at those who drove by but recognized very few. The tinted
glass
hid their faces from my view. One waved first and made me smile.

Thoughts came and went about what I would write today. Should I
simply describe all my
eye
had seen as I moved through the rambling motions of this
daily walk? I didn’t check the mail; it was too early for that.
I did try my hand at singing to a couple of songs on my playlist.
It reminded me how much work I need to do.

Am I a mirror, or is Christ? Am I reflecting the sacred affection
that embraces all creation? All living beings are my kin, all creation
waits for the revealing of the children of the Divine.

Understandably I do not always get the connections, sometimes
going for days without a
handful of prescience and maybe miss the light that bounces
from the image of the One to the image of All.
Perhaps mysteries as not meant to be solved,
but experienced.

The Constant Drumming of Time

The Constant Drumming of Time

(“And he said to them, ‘Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while.’ For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat.” Mark 6:31)

How long have you been toiling, why do you rush to
to every new task without pausing? I need a refill,
and you could use a solitary moment to gather the
pain together in one place. We work to avoid it,
don’t we? The dances we missed, the daylight we wished
would caress us longer and bid us tarry a while. Take a seat
and wine and cheese and bread and ease and let the day
settle in all around you.

We understand the drive, we wish we could command the
underside of the way the moon crawls out of the night to
invite us to softer hours than the chemical moments that
turn heated reactions to frozen movements. We do not stop
even
when the gentle voice calls us to come away. We are
lonely
aren’t we? Do we seek distraction? Do we embrace
the thoughts that keep us straddling the line between
motion and momentum?

Even though the rain has driven us indoors we
can still explore the invitations to a settled mind
that beats in rhythm to the way the doves land
in the cherry tree two at a time.

The truth is I have found myself waiting for
a better day to take me away to the shelter of
last night’s dreams. Filled with their hazy
memory
of friends whose faces I will never forget,
I would visit them and bring a bottle of wine.
We could find respite in the laughter that
comradery brings. Some have seen our dark
sides
haven’t they? And they still invite to see
theirs as well. Can anything be more restorative
than spending an afternoon indifferent to the strict
adherence to the constant drumming of time?

The End of Your Suffering

The End of Your Suffering

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

No one could blame you for claiming each
morning was another day of pain. No one could
argue with your hard-edged blues.
It was chronic, there was never a day when
the wrinkles escaped your forehead. There was not
a moment you captured anything new.

Some had tried to disarm you of your complaint;
some had questioned your faith and your explanations
for missing appointments with friends.
All you knew, and had known for a dozen years
was that nothing touched the pain or lifted you
up as early as when you were well.

Your ailment was invisible, your pain a ghostly companion.
It was a crisis unseen and sometimes forgotten by those
who knew you well. Some suggested homemade cures and
were certain their words were good.

But without divine intervention you were certain the was
no end to the rushing illness that had held you alone so long.

Then this morning your neighbor told you the Anointed One
was just outside of town. She had run ahead of the crowd
to tell you the news. Could this be your day? Could he
be the one? How to approach him? How to carry your
pain to him?

You decided to simply touch him, to delicately grasp
a part of his garment, and hope and faith it; and stealthily
make it a moment that no one would notice. You wended
and curled your way through the crowd and seeing him
you extended your arm cautiously. You touched him barely
and could feel the pain leaving like a visitor who had stayed
too long.

You did not want to disturb him, but he turned and asked,
“Who touched me?” You knelt at his feet and confessed your deed.
And he touched you this time and set you on your feet.
And softly said with authority like a king, “Today, today,
is the end of your suffering.”

The Man Without a Name

The Man Without a Name

(“The demons begged Jesus, ‘Send us into the pigs; let us go into them.’” Mark 5:12)

The lackeys waited outside for their turn to enter the tent.
The air was lazy and they turned round and round hoping to
stir the breeze. They MC winked at the doorman and the
doorman swung the stiles open as the lackeys found their way.
The seats were emptied and they scattered in groups of
ten to a dozen around the ring.

The MC was lackluster; he was missing his usual verve.
There had been whispers suggesting that he had finally gone
mad. The lackeys knew his troubles and tried to replace him
or confine him
or define him as an oddity.

As he opened his mouth he fell like demolition in the dirt.
He writhed and quivered, the lackeys shivered, and everyone
wondered
whether the show would go on.

It had been like this for days. Worse and worse as the
year wore on. His words were sloppy, his dress was askew,
his introductions garbled with his jaw locked in place. And
the audiences only came to laugh at his struggles and his
aggravation.

But there was one in the crowd, a visitor to the region who,
seeing it all, saw more than everyone else did. There were
legions
inhabiting the poor man’s life, there was a myriad throwing
him in the dirt.

With a word the stranger dismissed his antagonists. And
the legion left and filled the space and rings, the trapeze and
strings of cotton candy with clowns one after another, more
than could be counted. The MC slumped, exhausted.

The clowns feared the man without a name and begged to
inhabit some new offering. If only they could be thrown to
the bottom of the cliff where a legion of jokers waited like
pigs in a blanket. He dismissed them with a word and they
flew and fumbled down the ridge, taking the jokers and themselves
into the sea. The waves washed over them as they disappeared
from sight.

The lackeys were slack in their duties and left the same way
they came. They filed up and down the empty streets where they
hoped for some novel entertainment that wouldn’t cost them a dime.

And the MC sat alone in the middle of the ring, seen only by
the man with no name.

Find My Way Home

Find My Way Home

(“And he woke up, rebuked the wind, and said to the waves, ‘Hush now! Be still!’ The wind dropped and everything was very still.” Mark 4:39)

It might be the streets alone that serenade my return.
I was tossed and turned; I was unspeakably fearful of
the waves that menaced my journey and the wind that
my hopes for survival.

I tried to shake God awake; I tried to make do with my
wafer-thin prayer. I couldn’t make out the immediate response,
the noise was ineffably loud. I hoped I could be seen like
a dove holding tight against the eaves as the storm
caught the best of us unprepared.

All I knew. All I can tell. All I care. All I can bear
was stuffed into a single hour of tempest. And
fear
was the name I gave for the cancellation of
supposed messages of light.

It was gloomy at noon. It was annoyingly
loud.
I heard nothing like the words that struck me when
I first turned toward the sun. I only knew it was time,
it was soon,
it was daytime at its darkest, it was unfortunate
like the folly of rowing upstream.

I only understood that it was time to
find my way home. So, I cowered with faith
at the bottom of my words and fright frothing
over the sides.

And a voice softer than the ripple of the water
on a still and sleepy night
spoke like it already had been decided that
the storm would pass before the day began.
And plainly watching the shoreline from here
I knew it was time to
find my way home.

A Stiff Fog

A Stiff Fog

(“And the priests were unable to carry out their duties due to the cloud because the Lord’s glory filled the Lord’s temple.” 1 Kings 8:11)

It was all a fog stiff as a northern goat,
and it bid me to walk circumspect and hopeful.
As I came nearer the fence that separated the cemetery
from an open field I counted 15 deer, including fawns
the size of dogs, and my breath slowed down.

And within there is a continual mist where a prism
of moonlight reflects the sun, an inner rainbow on a
vaporous day. I felt the cool haze on my cheeks and my
hands moved voluntarily to stay warm.

I passed a home where the smoke billowed out from
their stainless-steel chimney and could smell the sweet cedar
and pine they burned. They did not cause the fog, no one did.
It just showed up on a morning when the temperatures dropped
and the ground was wet and warmer.

Some fogs disorient you; they send you in circles as you
try to find a recent point of reference. You kneel to try to
walk beneath it, but it is less translucent nearer the ground.
This fog reoriented me instead. It drew me in like a series
of announcements sent as lyrics to some holy song.

Some fogs frighten you, for much the same reason. You fear,
if it does not lift, you will never find your way home. You
stop and consider the turns you’ve taken and think you could
get there
eventually.
This fog drew me home instead. It beckoned me like the
aroma of apple pie baking like a thank offering.

Ah this inner mist, the cloud of unknowing, this uncertain
gyroscope that leaves me sometimes listless, but often is
resistless and I follow its clarion call like chimes from
a small cathedral on a Sunday midmorning.

On this day the arms of love were accessible though
my eyes stumbled along the way. Not seeing, I felt and
wondered at the sacred moments that a morning fog could bring.

The End of the Story

The End of the Story

(“Then he said to them, ‘The Sabbath was made for people, not people for the Sabbath.’” Mark 2:27)

We were in such a rush that when we were cut off
we screeched to a halt and the paragraphs crashed
into the sentences, the sentences occupied new phrases,
the phrases smashed the words. Then the words careened
into the letters and the letters confused the spaces once
separating sense from incoherence.

The question mark ended the fable only feet from
the abyss and we went on our way blissfully ignoring the
end of the story.

One Word at a Time

One Word at a Time

(“When Jesus saw their faith, he told the paralyzed man, ‘Son, your sins are forgiven.’” Mark 2:5)

You felt like a bramble bush and a whirlwind within,
a storm on the horizon, darkness surrounding every
thought and you fought the demons that told you that
things would always be the same.

You used to talk like the thaw of April;
you used to listen like the Spring rains.
But somewhere everything stopped working and
elsewhere things spoke like you were the one to blame.

But this time there were voices more like goose down;
there were offers of hope like the rising sun. You had
no better choice so you entered their hope and
rode their words multiplied by time.

The road was dusty with spots of mud left
from the brief showers overnight. You hoped
you might get through the day without fearing
the gaze that unwrapped your soul.

You didn’t know when it began, or how it
happened
that paralysis had frozen you stiff. You only
knew that if someone looked into your eyes
they would see how dark it all was within.

You arrived together and they ushered you in;
the day was nearly spent and the hour was getting late.
The journey had worn us and we were weary,
yet the moment ushered us in, lowered into the crowd that
surrounded the words you had hoped would be spoken.

You had no idea, no point of reference to
unhear the words that dislodged the shame that
misplaced you at the edge of every crowd. You took
them in

One word at a time.
And you learned that walking was another way of
discovering grace.

Still Smelling of Fish

Still Smelling of Fish

(“Jesus said to them, ‘Follow me! I will teach you how to bring in people instead of fish.’” Mark 1:17)

The day started with warm breezes wafting in from
beyond the hills wading in the shallow waters of the lake.
We knew the fishing would be good. Our nets were mended,
our food was stocked, and we were ready to stay on the water
for the whole day,

And it exceeded expectations

We were about to dock on the sand after a few more casts
of our nets. We were ready to head home after
sorting the fish by kind and size.

Then they heard words that did not register. There was the
noise of the freshening breeze plus the crosstalk of fellow
fishermen asking about each other’s haul.

We heard him say “Follow me! I’ll teach you how to catch people.”
We were not clear we had heard right but we looked toward the
voice
and recognized him immediately. We had heard him teach the
last two days at the beach. We lined up like birds on a wire and
were awestruck by his words about God’s Dream for the world.

We had little idea what catching people meant, but he was
magnetic
and we were ready charged for a change of venue. But my
brother and I
dropped our nets where they were and decided to take the risk.
We followed still smelling of fish.

That Bad Wind Plays

That Bad Wind Plays

(“I have come to buy your threshing floor. We must build an altar to the Eternal there so that this epidemic will be lifted from the people.” 2 Samuel 24:21)

Do you hate the way that bad winds play on the scorched ground
where corn and grapevines once thrived? Do you think the smoke
from a burning bull well appease or please the divine? Would God
desire something more than just an altar built on a threshing floor?

Oh David, whose heart beat for God, did you believe one more
sacrificed cow could end what looked like anger from the throne room
of the eternal one? Could God have listened even without the
sacrificial altar built on the mud?

You paid a pretty penny for the privilege, but you had a lot more
in your stockrooms at home. You didn’t want the altar to be
an act of charity
but a sort of penance paid in cash.

Did God hear you because of the burning flesh of cattle,
or because of the hope in your heart, though there was nowhere
close to sacrifice your offering? I think God had a
soft spot for you David. I think God saw beyond your
cultic reasoning and would have answered your empty-
handed prayer.

God would have answered that heart that, full of remorse,
couldn’t bear to see the plague spread any further. Did you
know
the temple would be built on this sludgy ground? Did you
realize it would fall and later would be full of crowds making money
off the religious acts of the poor?

The plague stopped that is true. Even with the later
load-bearing walls of a magnificent temple, all God wanted
was enough faith to come to him with humility and truth.

But You Stayed

But You Stayed

(“Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee.” Matthew 27:45)

You had as much pain as the others,
maybe even more. Did your hearts break open,
did you chest heave in grief? Did you ever think
of turning your back to escape the tragedy you could
barely stomach?

The men ran. They hid. They cowered. Yet you remained.
Was your devotion dearer, your loyalty deeper than reason
should allow. And yet you stayed until the end.

Why this strain of pain? Why this pulling out of every
organ and the lungs elongated so they could not breathe?
Why the mockery? Why the crowds demanding his death?
Yet you remained.

Were you unsettled. Did you cry on each other’s sleeves?
Were there words you remembered like “why have you forsaken me” or
“Father forgive them” or “Into your hands I commend my spirit.”
Did you puzzle each moment and wish you could be a cloud to
cover him from the curses?

And what about Mother Mary and John who stayed near? Did you
shiver when he gave them to each other? Did you wonder that,
in his anguish he would still remember his mom?

You leaned on the rocks of the ravine where you watched him die
on the opposite hill of skulls. And the darkness fell and the atmosphere
chilled and a fear you did not expect, a fear for all your nation,
bid you to take in every moment of this gruesome spectacle.

In three short years he turned your gloom into gladness.
In three short hours he moved you from questions to sadness.
In three short years he opened your eyes to primal love.
In three short hours you wondered if these things would still live
above this midday of sorrow.

But you stayed. And you waited to see where he would be buried
so you could anoint his body properly and meet the divine opportunity
to tell those hiding men that the tomb was empty and the day had
just begun.

I Feel This Shroud

I Feel This Shroud

It happens too often and I feel this
shroud will never be lifted, a burning cloud
that has sifted every memory until they lose
all meaning.
Once I could count on the smiles across from me,
but now I look away wondering if I will be
unfurled.

I try to take it in stride and stop reading the thoughts
of nebulous origin. My worry does not serve me well.

Those old connections are frayed, and I stand displayed
as if everything inside me has been revealed without
my permission.
The mountains were steeper than I remembered
and my steps smaller upon the muddy ground.

I’d start a conversation, but I run out of words to say.
I’d sing an old song, but the copies are aged like autumn.
I’d play along just to fit in. I’d list my reasons for awe
that I once displayed like a badge on my forehead.
Tonight I just can’t see how this loneliness can
lift any time soon.

But I also am weary of writing these tomes of melancholy.
They are true, I know, but so are the bright eyes that
smile back when I was looking down at my feet.
My conversations end with awkward pauses hoping I
have not repeated
phrases from just a week ago. While others are
building planter boxes for a future Spring
I sit darkly writing and wishing something would bloom
again.

Do you remember when I could walk down the
hallway to the auditorium and everyone would know
my name? Now I saunter and wish I could feel the same
as those days at eye level when everyone was my friend.

I should take a nap and start this day over again.

Never Be a Day

Never Be a Day

(“You changed my mourning into dancing. You took off my funeral clothes and dressed me up in joy.” Psalm 30:11)

I have seen the pockets where you hide away your pain;
I know you’ve prayed for darkness to cry the day like pain.
You have wanted to dance again and feel guilty when you abstain.
You’ve wished you could drink an elixir to make you love again.

Every time you peek out from your hidden cave you’ve made,
every time you let the sunlight catch your eyes,
you hope and imagine it will be different, things will change this time.
But within days the gloom sets in again and you knew you shouldn’t
be surprised. You cannot even count on sleep to be your friend.

With me you can hide if you want. Or I will turn down the lights so
you can let your tears drop unseen. Or I will reach inside your
pockets and remove a stone or two. I would heal it all if I
could.
I would change the wounds backwards in time before the
first evil befell you. I would mend the seams where the
violence
caused your voice to cease its beautiful song.

If I could I would hold you forever; if you let me,
I would blow away every sore and scarred place you
hide so well. The days would shine again; your eyes
would take the lifeline and sparkle again.

So, when I ask if you are ok, you can share one of those
pocketed stones with me. There will never be a day
when
I will turn away from anything you show me.

That We Would Stay

That We Would Stay

(“He told them, ‘My soul is crushed with grief to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.’” Matthew 26:38)

Sadness makes me slumber and pain makes me crazy;
and I could not choose which one I would lose when you
told us you were grieving far greater than we understood.
Perhaps it was the wine with dinner,
perhaps it was the dinner itself;
Or maybe it was the evening fog climbing the mount to
the garden where we had come.

All we wanted was clarity and all we had were pronouncements
we never quite understood. But we could hear it in your voice
that sounded vacant and your eyes red with pleading.
We had spent time with you before, just the three of us and
you,
but tonight was different and the air was heavy with discontent.

I promised to do anything for you my future and present Lord,
but though my spirit willed it, my will was drowsy and heavy
with the construction of a home on what felt like sinking sand.
We wished we were angels and could wing our flight above
the garden to watch out for the coming gloom.

Crushed with grief you said. To the point of death you said.
And we barely heard or understood. It felt like the nets of
safety
were badly torn and every evil was about to fill the massive
holes
that kept classless horror at bay. And all you asked us was to pray.
All you asked was that we would stay.

I Thought it Was Courage

I Thought it Was Courage

(“Peter said to him, ‘If they all fall away because of you, I will never fall away!’” Matthew 26:33)

I meant it when I said it; I thought it was courage and
never entered my mind it could be hubris. You were our hope,
our royal, our King, our divine deliverer and we were just waiting
for you to ascend the judgement seat where you would dismember
ever inch of empire. We knew you would bring some kind of coup,
a regime change, that would set us truly free.

I didn’t understand then, sometimes I still miss the meaning;
but I didn’t take your words into me and only thought this would be
a victory march up to the temple walls.

I wasn’t alone in my over-glossed promise, all the others backed
me up. We thought we could ignite it by some sword-play and
one of us cut off the ear of a palace official. And all you did was
reach up and heal that mercenary.

I wanted to look you in the eyes and see the fire burning that
would consume every adversary of empire that kept us under its thumb.
We only heard the bells ring from another time to announce
the call to vespers and long-robed mendicants praying on
bruised knees.

They took you to the judgement hall, the began to interrogate
you. The stripped you and whipped you and stripped your back
of flesh. And that was when I became afraid.

I watched it all from the outside warming my hands by a
welcome fire. And they thought they recognized me (I wish
I had hidden my eyes) and insisted I knew you. How did they
know? How could they tell?

But it took a young servant girl, a whisp of one, to get me
to curse and deny you full-throated.

And then I heard the crow. I wanted to sink, to melt between
the cement cracks. I wanted to see you, I wanted to tell you
I never meant it, I never wanted to let it come to this.
So I ran and hid. I heaved in silence. I didn’t trust myself with
even the slightest sound for fear I would say the same things
again even in the solitary darkness.

I was afraid I would never see you again, never speak with you
and hear your words that set me free.

I lumbered to the street where the criminals walked carrying
their crosses
on their backs. I waited, not knowing how long before
I would see you once more. When you passed by, I saw your eyes
and I hope you saw mine. I hope you saw the sorrow, the regret,
the self-loathing that led me to admit I was less than I imagined.

I saw your eyes and could not decipher them. Was that disappointment,
sadness, pain? Was that affection hidden behind the tears welling
in your eyes?

I know you, I knew you, and I shall know you more. Dearest
Lord
forgive the mud I found myself rolling in only to
protect my tiny self.

A Dozen Webs

A Dozen Webs

(“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” Matthew 25:34)

This foggy morning, I spotted a dozen different webs strung from
mailbox to support. The strands were braids of diamonds made by
dew drops hanging still.

You gathered us in the way you usually do, to teach us,
or send us out again for miracles’ sake. But you instead
said we were blessed by the Father, and now we are inheriting
the dream that has been dreamed from the foundation of the world.

Did we feed you when we filled the bellies of the hungry?
Did we give you a drink when your throat was parched?
Did we welcome you, stranger, even if you came from across the boundary?
Did we round up a new suit of clothes when you were naked?
Did we sit by your bed, holding space for you in your illness?
Did we visit you in prison even though the paperwork was tedious?

You told us every time we did any of this that we were doing it to you,
even if they were the least, the smallest, the last in line. We had
no idea it was your mouth we fed, your thirst we quenched, your hope
reignited. We only felt like we were doing what we could for
the suffering in the world.

And you called us the “nations”. Sheep or goats.
And you called us “sheep”
Other nations were goats and did nothing to alleviate
the pain of people trod down by systemic hatred.

It is nations you look to do this, isn’t it?
I acted like an individual, but you long to tear down the
systems that hold people hostage, that call them freeloaders,
that name them illegal, that mock the spectrum of their autism,
and spew invectives at the queer nation that carries Christ too.

In a couple of hours the webs will not shine so brightly;
the dew will evaporate once the fog lifts and the sun shines
on them.
Maybe they are there to remind me that sometimes waiting
is waiting far too long.

My Agenda

My Agenda

I laid my agenda down on my desk and noticed
there was nothing empty there, no plans for the
day.
So I got myself up, hung my body on the hinges and
let it sway with the ebbing and surging of the wind.
I never meant to spend all the daylight there;
I was waiting for someone to notice me and
invite me to town.
That’s when it occurred to me that if I blinked
one time too many I might miss the
Wave of the white-gloved hand that saw me
breathing slow.
I let myself down and wrote in my calendar:
“Tomorrow I will just hang around.”

It Has Been Too Long

It Has Been Too Long

(“God is faithful, by whom you were called into fellowship with his son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” 1 Corinthians 1:9)

It has been too long between steps that
lead to your house. I visited years ago and
still have the memories misting in my mind.
We both grew bolder with age.
What could we talk about that we didn’t
already suspect? Predilections of piety
sometimes shamed our silly expectations
that someone might buy us lunch.
For those who thought it all was certain,
for those who had answers to every question,
we only kept our silence and waited for something
less extreme.
We longed for a baptism that would make the
circle larger. We knew it younger and
wondered how it splintered now.

Do you remember the halcyon days when
pretense
had not yet been learned? Do you call to mind
the ways that finished the days when we walked the
two miles home from school? We took the bus
a couple of times when we were freshmen.
Sometimes we hitched a ride with the girl from
down the block. I think we both fell for her and I
doubt
she remembers either of us now.

It has been too long since we shared a glass of wine
together. We let it breathe. The last time I saw you
a machine was doing the breathing for you and I hope
you know I came to visit you. I muddled my way through
the Lord’s prayer three or four times holding your hand
a day before you left for good.

It has been too long and now only lengthens like
the shadows on an autumn afternoon.

Slowly Leaking

Slowly Leaking

(“You will be righteous, Lord, even if I bring a case against You. Yet, I wish to contend with You: Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the treacherous live at ease?” Jeremiah 12:1)

When will you let the iron hammer fall on the
plywood boxes of hypocrisy? When will you
lower the boom for the sake of the dying?
It used to bustle along the streets, the avenue
markets
were full of mothers and children.
When will you blow away the smog and smoke
that chokes the tiny lungs of these little ones?
Now the markets are dust and crumble and the
appendages of hope have disintegrated.

When will you judge, when will you answer?
When will you capture them, trapped by their own words?
Why is your timing so slow, so different than mine?
Why have you not destroyed the backroom plans
of the wicked? Why do the billionaires float above
it all like space rats escaping gravity?
Where is the moon on the nights of gloom;
hidden behind the shrapnel that exploded this
afternoon. The day is fading and we
fear the night when the sirens will bid us
to our bunkers and wait to next wave of destruction.

How long will the grass wither, how long until the
healing rains come?
How long until the unrighteous are taken
to task
who hide the truth behind spoiled facets of
sacred words?
Show them what their end will be, but do it
sooner before more are shot down in the streets by
icy masked men hunting for game.

Why do you take your time? Why do you delay?
Why does it take so long for you to drag them
with the dividing line of justice? Hear our petition;
act before we are all taken like a helium balloon
slowly leaking.
Take these words and give us a token,
hear the aches that we have spoken
and turn your face away from them who
pretend to speak for you.

This Groggy Heart

This Groggy Heart

(“If you feel you must brag, then have enough sense to brag about worshiping me, the Lord. What I like best is showing kindness, justice, and mercy to everyone on earth.” Jeremiah 9:24)

You stayed long after every thought had its day.
You were the heaviness of contemplation and the
lightness of hilarity when morning came.
My mind is still stuffed with worries,
my brain with the unease that comes from
dreams filled with inadequacy. I need
you
closer than ever and every moment
when my thoughts stray like neighborhood dogs
on the prowl. I need the kindness that meets me
in the middle of my dirge. I need the laughter that lasts
well beyond the afternoon.

The earth feels old today, long in the tooth and
bearded in gray. It was younger when I walked to
the corner bowling alley and played pinball most
of the afternoon. I thought summer was the
best playground and would never end.
The earth feels stale today, I hate to say it.
For I know it is full of verdant discoveries and
colors of autumn as the leaves depart for the winter.

While I clean out the cobweb thoughts, you remain,
just the same,
and bid me mirror your love at the speed of light.
Can I, quietly and quickly, silence the report of gunfire
and let the drops of rain coax life from this
groggy heart of mine?