A Silver Set

A Silver Set

(“Good words that hide an evil heart are like silver paint over a cheap, clay pot.” Proverbs 26:23)

I know you hoped that we would see you shine;
I know you wanted to be redesigned by bowing and
scraping and ordering every word around the perfect
incantations that sounded like speaking in tongues.

We had a silver set when I was growing up, sterling
silver I believe. We brought it out on holidays and scoured it
with the cream we kept hidden for just this purpose.
We burnished and polished until they reflected the sun
back to our open eyes again.

But we are all just silver plated, thinly wrapped around a common
lump of clay. I watched how you would get discouraged and then
call it depression and exit to watch it run its course like runoff after
the deluge. You agonized over hoping to reach another level but
your humanity seemed to be to blame.

I’ve laminated my own life scores of years over. I’ve wanted
to find
someone who didn’t care that all they saw was much. But
the crowds I ran in demanded prayer and perfection. They
expected a performance that looked like a faith-healer trashing
crutches and wheelchairs. But I always saw the healed person
limping around the same echoes again.

Touch me and you touch dirt, dust to dust, and ashes to ashes.
Hold me and your fingernails will get smudged with mud.
Talk to me, bring the wine, and I will open myself up
one last time. I am slow to show the slivers in the silver
that protects my ego. But for you I will try it one more time.

And perhaps we will find a better connection than thinly
disguised silver can ever deliver.

Silver Shimmer

Silver Shimmer

(“You cheat the poor and needy and rob widows and orphans.” Isaiah 10:2b)

Seduced by silver shimmer and
drawing the edges so close to home
you miss the earthen treasures and
annul the pleasures of the masses who,
with upturned faces only want their glasses filled
with new wine for this one day
of the year.

Your gold means nothing to them,
your stocks and bonds might as well be
broken shells dropped by seagulls on the pavement.
When will you come out of hiding,
when will your glimmering lights be turned down low
to let the lesser gleam of
oil lamps and candles

Pass through the streets, walk through the boulevards,
sing as the silent stars go by?

Your baubles and rings,
your gilded staircases,
your mansions compounded by
layers of fences will not change
the gravel roads just a half a mile
from your girders and concrete.

Exchange your breath for a moment with
the words of unrest from the homeless.
Barely living,
edging between darkness and darker,
they cannot eat your rubies and diamonds,
nor wish for decadent cakes at the tables they
cannot afford the rest of the year.

May the light that holds us all like silhouettes
scatter our presumptions, sweep away our privilege,
and help us see
through the eyes
of those whose hope is one sandwich or an extra
blanket for the bed.

I Saw a Silver Kite

 

I Saw a Silver Kite

(“Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.” Psalm 37:4)

I saw a silver kite fly high above the crimson sky.

I saw a battle gray army tank rising from the sea,
all creases and rivets, with teeth like a shark.
It folded itself high, assigned itself heavy and indestructible,
sucking in its prey, pretending to shred them serrated
and break them spread out upon the sand.
But, once it landed like a white-capped old man
it all was water, only water, and disappeared from the sand
again.

I heard the pack barking between sea and shelf
once the workmen started building the beach house above the waves.
The hammers pounded nails while the lumber echoed across the water,
each strike a woof and cry that canines took for language.

I watched a tiny butterfly, creamy and white (not a quarter inch wide)
continue its flight plan unhindered. The breeze
lifted its fairy wings above seaweed, above algae,
above breakers mistaken for monsters. Undisguised,
I might have missed her; airy and transient. And closer
I might have resisted the urge to make her alight upon
the leather flesh of my hands.

And in my latest dream I had done everything wrong, (a common
theme). I was running from the law.
My co-conspirator, dressed like a sheriff, rode shotgun and
held a rifle to my chest. When I awoke

I went downtown for blueberry crepes and latte.

I have seen kites fighting for space in primary colors
beneath the silver sky.

The dogs still bark while green waves deceive us.

Some see the rioters and disdain their grievances,
some hear of them and invite them to dinner.
All I perceive is Jesus reaching out to them,
His hands and feet swollen with splinters.

Things Wear Out

“You were rescued from the useless way of life that you learned from your ancestors. But you know that you were not rescued by such things as silver or gold that don’t last forever.” 1 Peter 1:18

The longer I live the more I observe the decay inherent to this world. The photos from our wedding 34 years ago are faded. (The fashions have decayed in altogether another way.) Rust invades my vehicles. The Bible I’ve used for preaching the last 20 years is well-worn with pages falling out. But most of all I feel the decay in my own body.