Tears and Claims

Tears and Claims

(“Tell Hezekiah that the Great King, the king of Assyria, says this: ‘What kind of backing do you think you have against me?’” Isaiah 36:4b [The Message])

On one side of the road they pass me by in cap and gown,
dissertations glowing on well-laid classic or wove;
on the other side they barely notice me,
stuck in the corner of the switchback as I am.

No one taunts me anymore, (except my own thoughts,
oh that they would stop and let me breathe),
no one taunts me anymore, nor ignores. I am
simply the driftwood that landed on the side of the road
days after the flood receded to go back home.

I crutch in the solitude of my own making,
though I did not choose this isolation;
and limp alone (I walk upright and straight in the
presence of life’s companions)
uncertain the destination.

I heard a 90 year old dying, oh so slowly,
ask for her mother so breathlessly
you might believe she mother was just in the kitchen
bringing cookies and afternoon tea.

I am not alone in my loneliness,
travelers left and right watch the daily traffic,
the world passing us by on both sides of the road.

How can the wife of a husband like me
understand my tears and claims of ennui?
Is she not enough, she must think, and more so
she is; enough and more.

And Lord, oh Lord, how can the path wind in sorrow
with the Joy of the Universe my Companion? How, then,
my faith, my heart, my goals burnt like a mildewed map,
will I find the laughter along the journey again?

Of Pain and Suffering

“For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for him.” Philippians 1:29

Even though I have suffered with a chronic headache since November 2008, now over two and a half years, I feel like I am whining if I call my experience “suffering”. It seems especially complaining when I compare it to the suffering that early Christians when through; the kind of suffering Paul refers to when he tells the Philippians that they were granted “to suffer for Christ”.

Life on Purpose

“So, stay at your post, watching. You have no idea when the homeowner is returning, whether evening, midnight, cockcrow, or morning. You don’t want him showing up unannounced, with you asleep on the job.” Mark 13:35, 36 (The Message)

I wonder if too many Christians live for Christ by counting the number of things they no longer do. We are content to share a testimony that enumerates all of our previous bad habits that we no longer practice. So, for us, Christ has become the ultimate personal life-coach, taking us from drinking to sobriety, cussing to correct language, promiscuity to restraint and partying to piety.

Unfinished Conversations

Unfinished Conversations

Perhaps we can walk to the river and
finish our conversation there.
I would speak with you, sitting next to you,
on a craggy overlook with the sun behind us,
the river ambling past us,
and the fog nearly lifted above our heads.

Perhaps we can put a period to end
this unfinished paragraph without
rewriting the letter over again.

Walk with me to the river,
we will find the shade that makes the afternoon
nearly as contented as morning.

I will hope, (I have no indication for my hope’s veracity), but
I still hope the water past us, different as it is from the river
we knew a year before,
might also carry our words full distance to the
ocean where all things mingle without competition.

Perhaps we can sit by the riverbank
like we did only once before
and finish the sentence we started,
the ellipsis that translated everything without saying,
so your implications only left me wondering what lingered
between the dots.

Walk with me to the river,
there is more below the surface tension,
the quiet ripples that reflect the winks of the sun,
there is life beneath the mirror stream
beyond sight of our myopic vision.

I will slow my listen, and hope (still, evidence unseen)
the same life lies beneath the questions you left
the last time I thought I took the bait.
This time I’ll ask the questions out loud that
only bubbled below my fear, and trust, not you,
nor me

But the river to take the best sentences we have
out to sea and beyond reclamation.

Wake me Mid-dream

Wake me Mid-dream

Wake me up mid-dream from the slowly building magma,
swim with me midstream or float or wade, just be the company
I keep because I’m either weary or lazy and it’s so late in time
I cannot tell.

Pull me out of quicksand sideways until I realize someone actually
has a hold on me. I have more to see than the dark-lit haze
of needful naps along the way. Take me down the highway
full of surprises before the road rises near midnight
and sets me down at listless.

Shake me up to just to remind me You are there.
Skim across the opaque pond, a rock skip into my pining.
Become the comrade I say when the late side of the day
tells all others to stay away.

Take a whiff of me like a rose, pull me out of the doldrums,
and remind me of the rhythms that play in the backyard
where the bees fly flower to flower, the pill bugs crawl into themselves,
and the mocking birds try to sound just like my dog.

There was nothing sad except I made it so, when friends were
best during day, and dreams were what we should play better the next.
Homemade kites out of newspaper pages and the man down the block
with a garage-full of railroads chugging in HO gauge.

Let my nap refresh me again, not the place I wish I was every moment
I am doing something else. Let me walk with a friend, smile leading the way,
pain the simple and occasional salute to frowns once accommodated,
now nearly outdated. Let me wake
to awaken alive like the living child who made
boats out of sticks to float down the gutter
after the summer’s first shower.

Change your Clothes

Change Your Clothes

(“So get rid of your old self, which made you live as you used to; the old self that was being destroyed by its deceitful desires.” Ephesians 4:22)

I am told that our sense of smell is the strongest of our five senses, and that it is the one most associated with memory. A few years ago I was sitting in a coffee shop, and a couple of ladies who were perhaps in their early 60s were sitting behind me. Within moments their perfume wafted into my booth and I was instantly transported to a memory of my grandmother. I am not sure if it is a law written in stone, but I think every woman over 60 wears the same perfume.

Any Room Large

Any Room Large
(“Jesus would not let anyone carry things through the temple.” Mark 11:16)

Take a shortcut through the prayer meeting,
carry your briefcase to Bible Study,
update your status, answer the next text,
all while footing past the quiet few listening
for their answers.

Why try to bash your business through the front doors of the temple?
Ignore some more the careful view that some have painted to let their
hearts soar beyond the work-day.
Why keep your phone on? Why update at all when Mighty Attention
draws you tirelessly to His rest.

Burn your smart phones on the next idol pile,
stop your talk of tomorrow’s deal, leave the invoices you carry
behind.
We are not fractions; the Universal Passion will not live
in any room large enough to house second loves and third.

Turn them off the next whisper you hear,
there is desperation that demands meditation
uninterrupted by the need to display your centrality;
you cannot be unconnected for a moment.

Disconnect the next instant quietness calls,
put down the deal to seal; do not trample
buoyancy with the weight of your importance.
You mean more to the Speaker Eternal than
the next caller to place the next order.

Take the long road next time,
stop hurrying through the House of Prayer,
take the scenic route tomorrow,
no more scurrying unaware

Of the worshipers seek the hope of
a single word undistracted by my parade
of self-importance.