Small Things

 Small Things

(“If you receive this child in my name,” he said, “you receive me. And anyone who receives me, receives the one who sent me. Whoever is the least among you—that’s the one who is great.” Luke 9:48)

They started well, like an evening stroll through the forest,
like a dog greeting its owner, like a baby laughing out loud
for the very first time. But things expanded, they got bigger,
they demanded more attention shown to the leaders who started
out lying on cushions and now were seated on thrones.

It all got away from us; we got caught up in the hype that
everything we prayed for would make everything bigger than
we could ever imagine. And for a while, it worked. For a while
we convinced ourselves that the more obedience we demanded
the less bitter the future would be. We put our faces down to make
sure we toed the line and never stopped asking questions of the unaligned
who were a beat too slow when we sang our decorated hymns they
should have known.

We could have waited for them to learn the tunes,
to hum them unworded to start. We could have slowed it
all down but we had more people pounding down the doors
to get their next fix of what we advertised week to week.
We promised new songs given by the spirit,
we promised good health while they waited in line.
They crowded in to hear us pontificate about the triggers
that forced us to send them out against immediate enemies.
We grew, oh how we grew, like a creeping vine in midsummer.

We forgot all about the toddlers sleeping on Sunday.
We let the baby stay awake and left her at home.
We shushed the children who giggled too often,
we muted the questions the preteens asked too precisely.

We missed the wide-eyed fascination with canticles of faith.
We forgot how tiny voices could stay in our minds long after
the sermons drifted away.

We called for dedication, but left discernment aside.
We relied on lofty pronouncements when the truth was among
pint-sized.

Lately I’ve been thinking about the treasure we find in
cast aside converts who attempted to backslide. We doomed them
like the choking black of a moonless night.

But their story is truer. Their words full of life.
Their questions childlike, and their laughter
more holy than a dozen hallelujah shouted
full-throat by everyone in the balcony.

I Miss the Small Spaces

I Miss the Small Spaces

(“For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of Yahweh’s glory, as the waters cover the sea.” Habakkuk 2:14)

Hovering above the terrain of a thousand different
portraits
I wonder what the next face will bring.
Would you believe I was a dark horse?
Would you believe I’ve survived more undercover
obstacles, I’ve beat the odds too many times.
Now my inhibitions are stronger; I only dance on
command. I’ve slipped through the grasp of more
midnights than I can count. I’ve lasted
well past my expiration date.

That is not to say the world is more sluggish,
or the air full of flood and mud. It merely means
I miss the small spaces between us. I long for
something longer than hello and goodbye, something
stronger than a quick snack from the kitchen.

You don’t receive red ribbons for barely escaping
with your skin unburned. No one celebrates the days
you spend five minutes singing before the rain. But sometimes
the fog can hold you as near the ground of your being
as a day without uncarpeted skies. They all serve to convince me
my debts are paid manifold.

When the table was set there were more places than there
were
chairs. Never mind. Sitting on the floor is easier on the
back-log
of unfinished conversations. There are too many stops
in our talks
and not enough commas. Incomplete as we are,
we could find a place where words land like summer rain
instead of arrows.

Did You See the Way I Fell?

Did You See the Way I Fell?

(“Why do you notice the small piece of dust that is in your friend’s eye, but you don’t see the big piece of wood that is in your own eye?” Luke 6:41)

The pieces you see now I usually hid
before
the big bang that
started photons careening across my history.
Not that I’ll show it all,
or to everyone,
but I must admit I enjoy living with far
fewer fences.

Did you see the way I fell that day?
Did you see how I stumbled for more than a year?
Did you see the wobble in my orbit,
the onion peels in my opinion?
Did you suppose the dream you had
that cast me as a night-terror
was given you by a god who loves to
frighten shaking souls?
Did you see the way I cried?

I know you thought
you found trash in my back yard
months after I had moved away.
It should mean something to you that
I left it behind and
did not take it with me.

I admit my perceptions are colored by
an opaque woodenness. I confess I’ve thought
I might be death unlivable. But that was only based
upon
the words I heard from towering trees
whose roots were dry where they poked through
the hillsides. My roots were nearly lifeless too.

I’ve met vagabonds, I’ve met fancy dancers,
I’ve met wise men who eschewed answers,
I’ve met storage sheds locked up so tight
that they were all but empty inside.
I’ve met children of the forest, I’ve met mothers of the desert,
I’ve met drooping eyes that shined like starlight
and knew something they would not share.

I learned to welcome from those who welcomed me.
I learned to throw the garbage out
that I thought had stuck to me.

There are those whose eyes have wept for
their own pain,
and invite you like good medicine
to share the campfire where old stories
are only stories

After all.