I’d Like to Buy a Thousand Angels

I’d Like to Buy a Thousand Angels

(“God desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” 1 Timothy 2:4)

Your retail price for a thousand angels ($1000 dollars check or cash)
is far more than I can afford. Incidentally I already know of nearly
a thousand
that surround me day and night.
Some have faces I recognize, some have names I have forgotten,
some are invisible, some as small as butterflies.

Why do you take the money that belongs to individuals,
why do you charge for blessings that are free?
Incidentally, I have wondered how my cash increases my
angelic horde, how they surround me, just based on your word?

I’ve walked in the rain enough times to know
that the range of angelic protection each day does not include
a promise to stay dry. It’s not their fault,
I need the rain to wash away doubts and inhibitions.

You promise an enemy to my enemies,
and I gasp that you call it gospel. You have
drastically raveled up the beautiful story,
the one that gives enemies our love.

The story is plain, the position insanely more pleasant
than prying dollar bills from an old man’s hands.
I’ll keep my angels, thank you, and move my offerings
to someone who refuses to make insane promises,
to someone who has no idea I gave them anything.
I’ll keep my angels, I’ve known them too long now
to start new incidents and replacements for those who
have hung around long enough to put up with my
doubts, suspicions and desires to visit the donut shop.

So, here I stand, with messengers who have walked
with me through swamps and deserts, through inhibitions and
oppositions. But never did I ask them to become an enemy even
to my most ardent foe.

We Auction Our Hopes

We Auction Our Hopes

(“’Tell David that all I want for the bride price is 100 Philistine foreskins! Vengeance on my enemies is all I really want.’ But what Saul had in mind was that David would be killed in the fight.” 1 Samuel 18:25)

I wondered why the universe wouldn’t be placed like
a hologram before us sitting on the kitchen table.
Why couldn’t we put our hands upon the orb, examine
it with our skin on?
Why not orbit its perimeter, experiment with its trajectory,
change the refraction of light and realign the spectrum?

Isn’t that what kings and presidents, ceos and John Does
try to do every day?

We would make the rain fall on flooded plains if we could,
just to show the pains we’ve taken to rise to the top of the mountain
billions of years in the making.

I don’t have to hurt myself to see if I still feel pain,
that’s already been done for me. I could meditate all day in
the desert or
the forest
and be done in a moment to find the spike in my head that
now slices my heart.

I wondered why we can’t just be in the world
and not of it.
Why we can’t refrain from turning the dials and just
learn to love it the way the Master does. The Lover does.
The Mother does. The wild goose and the peaceful dove does.

I wondered what happens when the pain beneath our skin begins
to be the atmosphere we walk in, the ocean we swim in,
the dirt we dig in and the noise that never leaves us a moment
of silence.

100 foreskins, 200 foreskins; we auction our hopes and double
the bribes,
all because raggedy rulers decree a bride-price for
the guarantee of our freedom.

What Did You Buy?

What Did You Buy?

(“You must let a Hebrew slave go free after six years of service. Your ancestors did not obey me.” Jeremiah 34:14)

What did you buy today, and how much did you pay?
Was it guaranteed? Did you pay retail? Clearance?
Or was it a fire sale?

Who did you buy today? Who set the price? Good
pedigree? Did you get a second opinion, more than one
person’s advice? Where will you store your purchase?
Was it a bargain, a steal? And, once you have used it up,
how will you dispose of the remains?

“I am weary of possessions and stockpiles. Amassed
above beams in the garage, top of the ladder unbalanced
reaches to scrape my fingernails on the cobwebs coating
the bottom of the boxes.”

“I have lost count. I have tossed dice. Disrepair and
newly vacuumed air combine to announce I’m worth
more than my first year transport: all my goods in
two cardboard boxes.”

I’ve returned (without refund) every person I purchased,
and yet I find in my twisted mind, I still play with them
like they are my own. I’ve returned (without exchange)
every friend I owned from birthdays and Christmas,
and yet I know, they own me with no money ever exchanged.

The world spins and we only feel the wind,
we buy dirt and defend it with fences and property lines.
The world swims in space, we gaze past the places
we first grew up and wonder where our first acquisitions
have outgrown their pricetags.

Next time I shake your hand it will not be like
a shopper squeezing the cantaloupe to discover whether
it is worth the price.

I Find no PriceTag

I Find no PriceTag

(“You know how full of love and kindness our Lord Jesus was: though he was so very rich, yet to help you he became so very poor, so that by being poor he could make you rich.” 2 Corinthians 8:9)

What is this pain dropped upon me,
a pack breaking my neck and twisting my back
that never lessens. No one adds to its weight
over time,
but the same burden carried hours and miles
over mountains of days and plateaus of hours,
unchanging terrain, my feet hang like anvils over
the edge of each mornings bed on waking.

And yet I know the destination, unseen today
through the blinding squeeze,
some well-photographed travelogue sent
back from beyond, waits. No, I am the one who

Waits.

The destination exists now, at the end;
and how far the hike when one day’s trek
is an hour of blindfold darkness and turning
around
I see exactly where I began. Each day,
the end less than inches from the start.

The milliseconds I have to reflect,
I know the pain of the Beloved was fire
fiercely ignited,
void of light or dark, presence or absence;
beyond my worst day and deeper than the
cliffs of agony I slip upon in heat or noise.

I know there is a Passion that has covered
the bloodshot crawl I call my walking,
where I used to run, my feet lie aching tomorrow.

Pay my way, I can find no pricetag to defray the cost,
and am lost so close to home. I would come now if
You would grant it; I have no energy to panic.

The Price

“God paid a great price for you. So use your body to honor God.” 1 Corinthians 6:20

One ancient rite of marriage included the bride and groom paying a price for each other. Being a ceremony, it was not about the sum of money, but about what it represented. In fact, the common amount was referred to as an eight of a farthing. Since a farthing is equivalent to a quarter-penny, that equals a measly 1/32 of a penny. But, having been paid, it said that the bride and groom had bought each other, and therefore belonged to each other.