Memories are Sticky

Memories are Sticky

Memories are sticky and
left alone they attract ants like
candy on the sidewalk.
Some we hang on to while we
brush the ants away.
Others we wish to be released from,
setting us free from the sweets of
another time
that have long ago been discontinued.

Yet, sitting in one place,
never venturing between the forests and
the sea,
we download another app,
fish for something to keep our minds
from alighting on friends now gone,
backs now turned,
the doorbell that never rings,
the endless sameness of things.
To my shame I admit,
I sit stuck in one place too long.

I could knock on your door, I know.
I could phone you, though
disembodied voices unnerve me.
Would you unbreak my heart if I
helped unbreak yours?

Dreams are thin as spider silk,
left alone they disappear like water
in the sun.
Some we write down over again,
some we forget and weep formless.
Everybody knows but no one asks
which dreams might be redeemed,
and which cling like cobwebs and dust.

We were pretty once. We were undeterred.
We were starlight and moonbeams,
we were more than we seemed and less
than our egos allowed. We dipped our
toes
in every stream.

We were unafraid to dream.

The Stirring of Spun Clouds

 The Stirring of Spun Clouds

(“Let’s learn about the Lord. Let’s get to know the Lord. He will come to us as sure as the morning comes. He will come to us like the autumn rains and the spring rains that water the ground.” Hosea 6:3)

And just today, barely an inch ago,
the Japanese camelias carpet the gravel
leading to my home.
Like teacup shards, like cotton candy fog,
like rain that loosened the blooms from their
mid-spring branches,
the pink is silky between the pebbly gray.

And just now, barely a jete ago,
a glimmer blanketed the retinas of the
unspoken glow. What was dark cold was
now
a warm you could hear all the way
across the river-shaped room. What was cold haze
gave way to warm blue waterfalls and
lagoons where ballerinas came to play.

Whether we mind or not,
whether shoes chewed by asphalt or
toes singing sand,
the day lives within us,
the dance sculpts us,
the stirring of spun clouds
(classical rain)
lifts us outside and
into ourselves.

Like an Astounded Sunrise

 Like an Astounded Sunrise

(Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky…” Daniel 12:3a)

They are hanging on to air for dear life,
grasping the shadows that have hidden their humanity.
What we cannot see, what we dare not compare,
are the forces that buried them there.
Promised rooms at
Hotel Manna,
they wish time had cleaner lines.
They wish for music in their voice,
in their key,
in joyous solemnity.

Did you think the only light are
pinholes in a purple sky?
Did you pause to collect enough
for orphans, mothers,
breadlines and the living
who are breathing
full-size?

They are speaking, their throats are not closed;
we only hear the syllables we have chosen to be
correct and decent,
arise and descent,
descants for hymns in grandstand buildings.
In sight of the shore they paddle;
we sit on the hill and tell them to move upriver
farther from the privilege we have inherited.

Insight sounds like tremors underground,
justice looks like an astounded sunrise leaking
over the hills.

I’m sorry you were sent away,
I’m grieving you must hide away,
I’m standing still and looking where your
tears have spilled
while power preachers tighten the circles
on raised platform ascended by only the chosen.

Come drink my wine, sing our song,
face the eternal sun,

Let us share the feast of the forgotten
while orange sky envelops us all.

I’ve Thought of Fire

 I’ve Thought of Fire

(“No foul language should come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for needed edification, that it may impart grace to those who hear.” Ephesians 4:29)

I’ve thought of fire,
I’ve conjured smoke,
I’ve conferred with wind,
I’ve bought a home
for doves outside my window.

I’ve heard the sun,
I’ve written rain,
I’ve painted with snow,
I’ve lured the song
like sirens across the silence.

I’ve wrestled pain,
I’ve conquered fear,
I’ve compared the view,
I’ve sought the grass
for days to rest in summer.

But I’m still erasing,
I’ve awoken slow,
I’m still rehearsing,
I’ve run too fast,
I’ve brushed the golden hair
of a toddling daughter.

I’ve spoken low,
I’ve daydreamed sage,
I’ve deferred my soul,
I’ve smudged my words
for days like this. For
love.

Up By the Roots

 

Up By the Roots

(“Daniel…knelt down in prayer three times a day, giving thanks to God.” Daniel 6:10)

Would you pull me up by the roots
if I need replanting?
With every tick of the clock I
know
time is oozing by like a mudslide
tearing up the hillside.
Would you still sit beside me
in silence and solitary confinement?
Would you see what no one else sees
and still love me the same?
Would you believe (how can I deceive you)
that my love is deeper than ever before?
And yet I will not bow to the images;
I

Will

Not.

Nor to the graceless claws of
embattled rhetoric.

So, though I appear a fool,
though the days pass faster than
whitewater tumbling over the narrow
rock-strewn rapids,

I’ll grow if you plant me. And mis

Understood

By many, I’ll take my chances
that love still nourishes every prayer
I cannot say.

I Might Mend My Boat

I Might Mend My Boat

(“We are God’s creation. He created us to belong to Christ Jesus. Now we can do good works. Long ago God prepared these works for us to do.” Ephesians 2:10)

I never expected smooth sailing,
but this felt like a peaceful place to land.
The shore wasn’t far from dreams and visions
and the waves lapped gently most of the time.
Yet today, when all the universe rattled like a grain elevator,
I wanted to hear a fellow sailor say
they knew what it was like

When the swells were ferocious,
when they hit at acute angles,
when they propelled you higher than
the houses that hugged the narrow shore.

Those were the days that the box where I lock my troubles away
creaked at its hinges and threatened to unleash a bigger storm
than the river’s wild crashing.

But these days everyone’s boxes are full,
everyone’s docks are splintered,
everyone’s words are a slice of white bread
parading as pie.
Every person I’ve told about my journey
is far too polite,
(at least the ones who knew me when I embarked)
which I know is the nice way of saying
they wish I could just work things out,
could see the storm would pass,
would agree that everything happens for a reason,
(when I ask about the ones who died in the shipwreck
they tell me about the one that was saved)

They tell me to have friends I should be one;
but I have been one from the day I arrived.
I hear some say I’ve gone off the deep end,
but they have no idea how deep and which end.

If I had the strength, or the time, or the help,
or the tools, or the sunshine, or the courage,
or the health (oh mental health that wraps the
brain in cavernous sludge), I might mend my boat.
But my body would not allow me to enjoy it again.

No one likes lament,
no one like shipwreck stories without
survivors.
No one likes the brains that
capture darkness at noon and
silence in cafes full of burgers and
retired men.

And, if I am created, if I am

Art

Then, let me be the art that I am.

Like I said,
no one likes lament. We want
broth of carbonated shallows,
we want to wade in frothy waters.
We would rather tie up the loose ends
than admit walking barefoot sometimes hurts.

But, if I am art,
and am made of mud,
let my artwork be earthy and
my tears salty and loud. Let my heartache
in quarter time
be the one song that someone needs

Who has forgotten their own.

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.