I Remember Boarding a Train

 I Remember Boarding a Train

“Daniel went to…his friends…so that they might request compassion from the God of heaven concerning this secret.” Daniel 2:18)

I remember boarding a train to nowhere but
it still headed straight north.
The steel spun and clattered on the rails like
Ezekiel’s angels with faces and chariot wheels.
I had embarked on a journey
hoping to change the world.
The scenery was foreign to me,
the night descended like a dragon’s cave
and we wondered where the mood would take us
that had begun with such enthusiasm.

Riding it for three years (or so it seems)
I lost a traveling companion for each one.

A friend who knew laughter and told the
same stories over and over again. And still
I listened.

My sister, frail but stony, it had been ages since
we rode the country together. And days before
Christmas
she finally sighed. I left the train behind and flew
to her family, my family, three nephews, one niece,
and a great-great nephew with a smile like hers.

My classmate, my beloved Hermia. A friend who
made the sunrise giggle and could make an entire room quiet
as she spun her tales. 50 years ago we were teenage
super friends
and 50 years later the same. She suffered and
she suffered well. To the last her eyes inhaled every
friendship she ever had.

I remember boarding a train to San Francisco but
stayed on it for two round trips. What could we find
on the streets and hills but steep houses and leftover
frills in Haight Ashbury? Our stories filled the silver car
until we finally disembarked to watch

Street-performing mimes and grab some pizza.

We were not sure we knew the answer, we are not sure
now
if we changed the world.
But none of us are the same, riding and going
nowhere
together.

The Ride of a Lifetime

 The Ride of a Lifetime

(“The only thing that matters is this new life we have from God.” Galatians 6:15b)

He mentioned baptism again and
everyone who heard grew restlessly quiet.
Anxious to prove their fidelity,
scores etched their names on the cardboard notecards
and passed them on down the aisle.

He mentioned prayer with fasting again and
so many feet shuffled they wore down the boards
where they sat.
Anxious to prove their holiness,
a dozen dug in their heels and wished for
one more steak before the week began.

He mentioned worship again and
those who sang loud, sang louder. Anxious
to prove their piety,
others hid behind the hands that waved so
exuberantly and hoped God did not mind.

But there was also a gentle wind that,
barely brushing the cheeks of the assembled,
filled in the gaps of the absent,
spoke in accents discernable to the
few with
ears to hear something both
foreign and familiar, and some followed
the breezy narrow way.

But some stayed behind, wanting to
be washed by the water,
heard for their fervor,
seen for their song-styles;
truly they had their reward.

The barely audible breeze led the few
inside out, foolish and pacific,
down streets with no names,
where the residents had no houses.
Down roads without p.o. boxes,
where the sojourners had lost their fame.

Some saw the chance for sun and rain
outside the domain of wooden walls and
concrete doctrine. Some were not sure
where the wind would take them,
but mounted inside it like a basket
under a hot air balloon.

And so, all were offered the ride of a lifetime.

He mentioned that it was time
to begin again.

The Timbre of My Own Guitar

 The Timbre of My Own Guitar

(“The important thing is faith—the kind of faith that works through love.” Galatians 5:6b)

As if I did not know the timbre of
my own guitar
I laid it on its side facing the window
and hoped the sun would revive it again.
And the saxophone squeaked through the speakers.
I snuck up on the day with
clouded clarity,
the wood fairies danced outside my
field of vision.
But closer in I could see the air,
the floaters and astronauts never obscuring
my view.
My heart beat against my lungs,
and pain wrapped its hot hands around my head,
but I still heard, through the auxiliary sounds,
the afternoon approaching
like those days in May when we
went driving through the hills with the
Moody Blues
on the radio.
With calloused fingers, swollen knuckles,
and a voice crackling like a paper bag,
I threatened to sing the solitary away.
Someone once pasted
get well cards
all over my bedroom wall. Someone
once washed my feet who I never had
met before.
Someone once sat on the edge of my couch
with tears to match my own.
Someone drove across the state to loan me
an extra breath or two.
Though I spend nearly every day alone
I carry the kindnesses in my body like
memories of poppy fields and warm Spring days.
Today I may play my guitar again.

Will You Pick Me Up?

 Will You Pick Me Up?

(“Because you are God’s children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into us to call out, ‘Abba! Father!’” Galatians 4:6)

And so, a day begins the same as most days begin.
The sun rose, but I rose too late to see it.
The pains that have trapped me in a body
too old for its years
keep me pinned to my pillow too often to
count.

I do not mean to complain,
though I know how it sounds,
but how do I reclaim a decade
stolen by trips to medical centers and
uninvited spears that kept me locked
inside myself?

Papa, will you pick me up,
will you tell me how to sit on this planet
while the nerves in my brain
flash like fire? Papa, will you pause me,
put me in a parenthesis where I can explore
the mountains or the
bookshelves seventy miles away?
Papa, I don’t mean to cry so often,
and my reasons change with the turning
of the wind;
still,
(is a wish the same as a prayer?)
my feet that love to wander both
thoughts and ground
barely leave the few acres they can
walk around.

Papa, will you wake me in time
to sit around a table with beers and
friends and
guitars and
dangling ends of conversation
before the next thunderstorm sets in?

At The End of The Road

 At The End of The Road

(“Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost!” Luke 15:6b)

Why do we build the wall,
can you tell me the story again?
Why do we keep our gold inside
and everyone out
and at what cost?
Why do we lock our gates,
can you recite the code again?
Why do we twist our iron into
so many shapes
and chain them with locks?

Look down, look down the road,
the dust is stirred by the feet of returning.
The light is blurred by the whisps of
bleating songs. Live sounds. Flying sounds.
From grey to white, from infra to ultra sounds.

Wait down, wait at the end of the road,
the sun will soothe your churning eyes.
The tiny strays, (the best of days) have found
their way home. Long travels. Footprint travels.
From lost to found, sound to song travels.

Why not tear down the wall,
that is the story older than time?
Why not share our wealth
with the dizzy children
without cost?
Why not open the gates,
so princes on donkeys can enter?
Why don’t we straighten our steel eyes
toward the horizon
and wait

At the end of the road?

Like The Friend Who Slows Down

 Like The Friend Who Slows Down

(“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you. I will take away your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.” Ezekiel 36:26)

I sleep because it is the
only escape
from the relentless hammer-on-anvil
in my head.

I crave attention,
not like a toddler or
narcissist,
but like a neighbor who longs for
the voice of a friend that extends
beyond words. A touch on the back
of the hand
would be enough.

My tears are the mud puddles left by
torrents of rain,
my breath is the only sound my body knows.
I did not avoid you because I disliked you;
I’m stuck in this corral of pain.

If you know me, you’ve seen me
change my mind
over and over again. Topics become
clearer, doctrines murkier, and people the
center of truth I’ve desired.
But my heart, or its orientation,
is unchanged. My spirit has always wanted
a home. A log cabin with a fireplace
and chili on the stove.

My spirit has always wanted to
let you stay rent-free. To hear your children
play in the background. To hear the
mustang you drove, or the
honda 450 we rode into the coastal hills
summers ago.
To hear from someone who knows,
like the friend who slows down
every time they see you.

Today my tears are more like
blood lost
through the ache of waiting and
living too far behind me. I do
not
want to live in this now where
the pain is a broken record that
sucks my attention from

Every tender love I’ve known.
Even your own, dear friend,
sweet son, loving daughter,
and,
Christ, (how I hate to admit it)
feels cold and I wish this long
winter of spikes and icicles would end
in the agnostic revelry of Spring.

Restore my heart that is weary, for
the waiting has me writing pain
where the beauty once began.

So Rural and Plain

 

So Rural and Plain

(“How many times I yearned to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you were unwilling!” Luke 13:34b)

The day was
fog and grainy photos.
There may have been a storm outside,
there may have been a crowd.
There may have been wheat in the fields,
there may have been a few who
drove on past without reviewing the
scent of new-mown grass.

The day spoke
hush and silent movies.
There may have been a flock of geese,
there may have been an eagle.
There may have been sparrows on the lawn,
there may have been rabbits
who mindfully paired up just inside
the neighbor’s fence.

The day slowed
climb and crescendo.
There may have been too much to listen to,
there may have been a marching band.
There may have been loaded picnic tables,
there may have been families
thinking the old ways were so much better
than all this fuss and nonsense.

The day stopped
clear and motionless.

While waiting for the next breath
something swept across the frequencies
of time and sound, of light and relativity--
a day to fill all days, a diorama,
a shadow-box hung on the walls of our
consciousness.
It was an invitation so rural and plain
we mostly ignored it. We went back to
our everyday, convinced that deity would
be above metaphors of poultry and feathers.

The day was…