Today, there are storm warnings. Through the window, I watch the wind’s blustery, unpredictable dance. Embraced against its will, the branches of the ancient oak rise and fall, groaning from limb to limb. Seeking a more willing partner, the wind swoops down and twirls the hummingbird into a reel. In a burst of resolve, the tiny bird breaks free and hums for cover in the spirea.
I know why the hummingbird hums. It is not because she doesn’t know the words. She knows thousands of words. Splendid words. Eloquent words. But there is no language where the soul cannot be heard. You must earn the right to hear her.
And then there is Jack. Jack-in-the-Pulpit. Jack uses the entire winter preparing his sermon for spring. Just above his winter bed, a praying mantis cocoon mutely clings to the fence, waiting. In mid to late spring a two foot tendril rises, curtsies and Jack’s sermon begins.
I had a grandfather who was a little like the hummingbird and a great deal like Jack. Grandpa was a respected preacher. When his five children were small, his young wife, my grandmother died of pneumonia. He was left to raise the children alone. As was the custom of the times and understandably so, he sought a mother for his children and quickly remarried. Under the circumstances of grief and need, the union was fragile. In the years that followed, Grandpa was pulled in three different directions - to his children, his marriage and his ministry. Relentlessly, he begged God to rectify the troubling marriage. And though the relationship remained strained and volatile, he continued to preach the word of God.
He spent countless hours on his knees discussing the situation, asking for protection for his children, understanding of his wife and a blessing on his ministry. I believe it was my grandfather’s prayers which gave his prosterity a heightened spiritual awareness.
Thus far, his children have bore him 24 great-grandchildren. Each of us, carry the story of grandfather’s mysterious faith. We are a family of music and drama and art. We sing and paint and plant, each of us articulating our faith in unique mediums that words very often cannot capture.
My grandfather died with many of his prayers unanswered. I would like to have asked him questions about my relationships and fluctuating faith. We could have compared notes. In times of unanswerable mystery, I remember the life and witness of my grandfather and I act cautiously. I understand how my choices will impact the generations that follow. I want to stay faithful to the God of grandfather’s salvation. My Grandfather could pray for me, but he couldn’t choose for me. He couldn’t leave me all the answers, but he did teach me who to ask.
I am my children’s history. I leave a map in the shape of an arrow pointing away from man’s wisdom. Tell God. Ask God. These are my instructions. God has earned the right to hear. In the seasons of storm, in the seasons of Thanksgiving, bring your tales to the God of ongoing regeneration.
“Speak truth, each one of you with his neighbor.”
❦
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
Friday, October 22, 2010
(excerpt from Elemental Desire)
God. She thought about God, remembered how she’d managed him, how she’d kept him at a safe remove. Though she had joked about religion, God was a serious subject. Religion was one thing, God another. Especially the Hebrew God. Especially Jesus. She left Jesus undefined. How he got himself christened with thorns, labeled King of the Jews and nailed to a cross was a discussion she’d always avoided. Why hadn’t he ended up in a bedtime story like Geppetto or The Wooden Soldier, The Velveteen Rabbit or the lucky Cinderella? Those stories made sense. They were the kind of miracle stories people wanted. Take Pinnochio for instance, Geppetto had the sense to credit the Blue Fairy for Pinnochio’s life. Blue fairies don’t include blood. And those donkeys? What child has not at one time or another brayed with the best of donkeys? And what donkey has not played the stubborn child? Who could blame Pinnochio for going astray? All he had for a guide was an insect crammed in a top hat and a piccolo voice. But raising the dead? Giving sight to the blind? Mobility to the crippled? Allowing his own crucifixion? Jesus is all about freedom, transformation, good winning against evil. What government would not put an end to that idea?
God. She thought about God, remembered how she’d managed him, how she’d kept him at a safe remove. Though she had joked about religion, God was a serious subject. Religion was one thing, God another. Especially the Hebrew God. Especially Jesus. She left Jesus undefined. How he got himself christened with thorns, labeled King of the Jews and nailed to a cross was a discussion she’d always avoided. Why hadn’t he ended up in a bedtime story like Geppetto or The Wooden Soldier, The Velveteen Rabbit or the lucky Cinderella? Those stories made sense. They were the kind of miracle stories people wanted. Take Pinnochio for instance, Geppetto had the sense to credit the Blue Fairy for Pinnochio’s life. Blue fairies don’t include blood. And those donkeys? What child has not at one time or another brayed with the best of donkeys? And what donkey has not played the stubborn child? Who could blame Pinnochio for going astray? All he had for a guide was an insect crammed in a top hat and a piccolo voice. But raising the dead? Giving sight to the blind? Mobility to the crippled? Allowing his own crucifixion? Jesus is all about freedom, transformation, good winning against evil. What government would not put an end to that idea?
Monday, October 18, 2010
Love and Abstraction
It is impossible to truly love and keep the soft fragile center of oneself, that part so much like an egg, but not an egg, safe. (Of course, not an egg.) A person only begins with an egg. Once born, this beginning person is meant to be joined. Arriving in a self folded upon a self, a person is a vessel meant to be unfurled and accompanied in fly. One does not place an egg on a feather and expect it to fly. But that is often what we do in love. We stay inside our shells, content with fluff and the proximity of other shells, worry about being broken and forever cease to fly.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
(An Excerpt from "The Color of Grace" by Tonia Triebwasser published by Fleming Revell/Baker Books
Foxgloves
The same heart healing medicine found in the leaves of a foxglove can also cause a heart to fail. If love maketh a heart merry and also causes it to break, a medicine for its benefit would most certainly have similar risks.
Myth says a heart needs merely to receive love to thrive. But it is in giving and in receiving that the heart grows strong. Amateurs recklessly divy it up. Exchanges are seldom equitable. Wounds are inflicted. Weaklings withdraw.
But love is a daring dance of surrender. A dance of courage. Love is a labored waltz. The speckled trumpets of the foxglove sound revelry to hearts waiting dance.
Foxgloves
The same heart healing medicine found in the leaves of a foxglove can also cause a heart to fail. If love maketh a heart merry and also causes it to break, a medicine for its benefit would most certainly have similar risks.
Myth says a heart needs merely to receive love to thrive. But it is in giving and in receiving that the heart grows strong. Amateurs recklessly divy it up. Exchanges are seldom equitable. Wounds are inflicted. Weaklings withdraw.
But love is a daring dance of surrender. A dance of courage. Love is a labored waltz. The speckled trumpets of the foxglove sound revelry to hearts waiting dance.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Sunday, August 8, 2010
MUST SEE
Os Guiness speaks about freedom, virtue and faith. Very Very
Intriguing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZ9ZiIWkcmM
Intriguing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZ9ZiIWkcmM
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
From J.R.R. Tolkien
“'What do you fear my lady?'
"A cage. To stay behind bars until use and old age accept them and all chance of valor has gone beyond recall or desire.'”
"A cage. To stay behind bars until use and old age accept them and all chance of valor has gone beyond recall or desire.'”
A Quote Worth Reposting
"God utters me like a word containing a partial thought of himself. A
word will never be able to comprehend the voice that utters it. But if I am
true to the thought in Him I was meant to embody, I shall be full of his
actuality and find him everywhere in myself and myself nowhere. I shall
be lost in him. In patient endurance, we wait for God to make clear
what he wants to say through us. Such waiting not only demands alert
attention but the courage to let ourselves be spoken. Such courage
arises from unfailing trust in the wisdom of God, who utters no
false word."
(Brennen Manning)
word will never be able to comprehend the voice that utters it. But if I am
true to the thought in Him I was meant to embody, I shall be full of his
actuality and find him everywhere in myself and myself nowhere. I shall
be lost in him. In patient endurance, we wait for God to make clear
what he wants to say through us. Such waiting not only demands alert
attention but the courage to let ourselves be spoken. Such courage
arises from unfailing trust in the wisdom of God, who utters no
false word."
(Brennen Manning)
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Your Trip to Paradise
At three am,
On a black kettle night,
a yen for Paradise awakens you.
Rising, you pack ridiculous
flimsy clothes -
shirts without sleeves,
pants without legs,
shoes without a hint of protection.
This crime is committed in faith,
committed in passion and a desperation
that sends large boulders flying.
You make your bed, carefully.
In case you don’t return.
In case your private domain
is blundered through
by indiscriminate survivors.
Even bent on Paradise,
you want to leave Perdition
in an ordered state
worthy of a benevolent obituary.
Stepping through the door, the night
hits your face and you take note:
this is not a dream.
The sun, swollen with the liquor
of nocturnal recline,
shows no sign of appearing.
Lifting from the sliver of earth,
you are not alone.
In a square of dark sky,
you see her or him or whoever
the beautiful creature is,
because it is the who of you,
it is the yes of you,
the now and then and hope of you,
the love of you
the desire for you,
the transformed you
after you become the creature
you were fashioned to be.
This astonishing you runs at break neck speed.
But you are not out of breath.
Colored in twilight,
your legs drum the delighted sky.
You are outside of you.
The shell of you is strapped inside
waiting to make your acquaintance.
You study you, amazed.
You are ageless.
Empowered by engines not your own,
you run through endearing weakness.
Past storms meant to grow you wings,
you run through sunflowers
facing the moon,
through rivers of ice flowing uphill to fire,
through yearning
and angst all forgotten.
You run through trees hung fat with
I-can-do-anything-leaves and
you are not pretending in the slightest.
You dive backwards,
your neck arching,
your legs stretching,
your toes pointed to God.
You are dizzy with balance, giddy with peace.
Leaving a trail of shrinking lights,
you think primordial thoughts.
Thoughts of fire, of flood, of fabulous fate.
You are a river undamned by God.
The current is swift, but it is not against you.
Rejoicing and weeping,
a flock of crystal stars fly beneath you.
With wings of diamonds and bone and
feathers of colored surprise,
they make a wind for the transfiguring mill of you.
II
For this trip, only children are permitted
to sit in the exit rows.
In case of a crash, only the children
can open the doors.
It has always been this way.
But only now do you dare remember.
To behold yourself as this child
you envision a lime green shirt, or was it red,
or blue or maybe it was a dotted Swiss dress
with a yellow belt.
You remember kid white gloves,
or bare hands or fingers dipped in sugar.
It makes no difference.
The hands are small and the child is you.
You look down.
You want to know this two legged shape.
It is attached to you.
You are attached to it.
But it is not you.
Your body is just a sentence
that carries the noun of you.
You are a fabulous stuttering phrase
that carries the ill stated truth of you.
But it is never, not ever clear enough.
And now
you remember your former bed,
you remember the warmth of it.
How it felt to be in the arms of it,
how it protested with your every turn,
how the covers were never exactly
as you wanted them to be.
You remember God’s smothered voice,
the feel of your hands against your ears.
In this knowledge,
the knowledge of your small hands
you agree to stop apologizing,
to stop making excuses.
This is a story written for you.
But it is not meant to be written alone.
In the story you wrote alone
you were stuck behind a door,
afraid to try the handle,
afraid to risk its turning.
But the nudge to do so was unmistakable.
All along you’ve questioned the nudge.
God.
God himself explains your hesitation,
your resistance to the soft nudging
has to do with God.
You are afraid to encounter God.
Here in Perdition there is much
to overcome, to improve, to remodel,
destroy, amend, excuse, flatter, impress, refute.
But in Paradise, you arrive at an enduring story.
No need of your fixing, of rehearsed achievements.
In Paradise the water brims with tears
nobody needs to cry.
And the birds here?
The birds derive from angels.
The clocks are clowns and you are hour free.
The cutting wind has dropped its blade
and grown a cotton tongue,
and all the words are waterfalls
and all the dots have i’s.
The shredding cloaks of poverty
are gleaming satin gowns
and broken doors set sail as boats
and oars are pulled by skies.
In Paradise your questions beg
and answers grow like alms.
And yes and no are Siamese twins and
Mondays carry songs.
In Paradise you are who
you are supposed to be
and no one thinks to drown.
At three am,
On a black kettle night,
a yen for Paradise awakens you.
Rising, you pack ridiculous
flimsy clothes -
shirts without sleeves,
pants without legs,
shoes without a hint of protection.
This crime is committed in faith,
committed in passion and a desperation
that sends large boulders flying.
You make your bed, carefully.
In case you don’t return.
In case your private domain
is blundered through
by indiscriminate survivors.
Even bent on Paradise,
you want to leave Perdition
in an ordered state
worthy of a benevolent obituary.
Stepping through the door, the night
hits your face and you take note:
this is not a dream.
The sun, swollen with the liquor
of nocturnal recline,
shows no sign of appearing.
Lifting from the sliver of earth,
you are not alone.
In a square of dark sky,
you see her or him or whoever
the beautiful creature is,
because it is the who of you,
it is the yes of you,
the now and then and hope of you,
the love of you
the desire for you,
the transformed you
after you become the creature
you were fashioned to be.
This astonishing you runs at break neck speed.
But you are not out of breath.
Colored in twilight,
your legs drum the delighted sky.
You are outside of you.
The shell of you is strapped inside
waiting to make your acquaintance.
You study you, amazed.
You are ageless.
Empowered by engines not your own,
you run through endearing weakness.
Past storms meant to grow you wings,
you run through sunflowers
facing the moon,
through rivers of ice flowing uphill to fire,
through yearning
and angst all forgotten.
You run through trees hung fat with
I-can-do-anything-leaves and
you are not pretending in the slightest.
You dive backwards,
your neck arching,
your legs stretching,
your toes pointed to God.
You are dizzy with balance, giddy with peace.
Leaving a trail of shrinking lights,
you think primordial thoughts.
Thoughts of fire, of flood, of fabulous fate.
You are a river undamned by God.
The current is swift, but it is not against you.
Rejoicing and weeping,
a flock of crystal stars fly beneath you.
With wings of diamonds and bone and
feathers of colored surprise,
they make a wind for the transfiguring mill of you.
II
For this trip, only children are permitted
to sit in the exit rows.
In case of a crash, only the children
can open the doors.
It has always been this way.
But only now do you dare remember.
To behold yourself as this child
you envision a lime green shirt, or was it red,
or blue or maybe it was a dotted Swiss dress
with a yellow belt.
You remember kid white gloves,
or bare hands or fingers dipped in sugar.
It makes no difference.
The hands are small and the child is you.
You look down.
You want to know this two legged shape.
It is attached to you.
You are attached to it.
But it is not you.
Your body is just a sentence
that carries the noun of you.
You are a fabulous stuttering phrase
that carries the ill stated truth of you.
But it is never, not ever clear enough.
And now
you remember your former bed,
you remember the warmth of it.
How it felt to be in the arms of it,
how it protested with your every turn,
how the covers were never exactly
as you wanted them to be.
You remember God’s smothered voice,
the feel of your hands against your ears.
In this knowledge,
the knowledge of your small hands
you agree to stop apologizing,
to stop making excuses.
This is a story written for you.
But it is not meant to be written alone.
In the story you wrote alone
you were stuck behind a door,
afraid to try the handle,
afraid to risk its turning.
But the nudge to do so was unmistakable.
All along you’ve questioned the nudge.
God.
God himself explains your hesitation,
your resistance to the soft nudging
has to do with God.
You are afraid to encounter God.
Here in Perdition there is much
to overcome, to improve, to remodel,
destroy, amend, excuse, flatter, impress, refute.
But in Paradise, you arrive at an enduring story.
No need of your fixing, of rehearsed achievements.
In Paradise the water brims with tears
nobody needs to cry.
And the birds here?
The birds derive from angels.
The clocks are clowns and you are hour free.
The cutting wind has dropped its blade
and grown a cotton tongue,
and all the words are waterfalls
and all the dots have i’s.
The shredding cloaks of poverty
are gleaming satin gowns
and broken doors set sail as boats
and oars are pulled by skies.
In Paradise your questions beg
and answers grow like alms.
And yes and no are Siamese twins and
Mondays carry songs.
In Paradise you are who
you are supposed to be
and no one thinks to drown.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
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Friday, July 23, 2010
A Poem by Billy Collins
Purity
My favorite time to write is in the late afternoon,
weekdays, particularly Wednesdays.
This is how I go about it:
I take a fresh pot of tea into my study and close the door.
Then I remove my clothes and leave them in a pile
as if I had melted to death and my legacy consisted of only
a white shirt, a pair of pants, and a pot of cold tea.
Then I remove my flesh and hang it over a chair.
I slide it off my bones like a silken garment.
I do this so that what I write will be pure,
Completely rinsed of the carnal,
uncontaminated by the preoccupations of the body.
Finally I remove each of my organs and arrange them
on a small table near the window.
I do not want to hear their ancient rhythms
when I am trying to tap out my own drumbeat.
Now I sit down at the desk, ready to begin.
I am entirely pure: nothing but a skeleton at a typewriter.
I should mention that sometimes I leave my penis on.
I find it difficult to ignore the temptation.
Then I am a skeleton with a penis at a typewriter.
In this condition I write extraordinary love poems,
most of them exploiting the connection between sex
and death.
I am concentration itself: I exist in a universe
where there is nothing but sex, death and typewriting.
After a spell of this I remove my penis too.
Then I am all skull and bones typing into the afternoon.
Just the absolute essentials, no flounces.
Now I write only about death, most classical of themes
in language light as the air between my ribs.
Afterward, I reward myself by going for a drive at sunset.
I replace my organs and slip back into my flesh
And clothes. Then I back the car out of the garage
And speed through woods on winding country roads,
Passing stone walls, farmhouses, and frozen ponds,
All perfectly arranged like words in a famous sonnet.
My favorite time to write is in the late afternoon,
weekdays, particularly Wednesdays.
This is how I go about it:
I take a fresh pot of tea into my study and close the door.
Then I remove my clothes and leave them in a pile
as if I had melted to death and my legacy consisted of only
a white shirt, a pair of pants, and a pot of cold tea.
Then I remove my flesh and hang it over a chair.
I slide it off my bones like a silken garment.
I do this so that what I write will be pure,
Completely rinsed of the carnal,
uncontaminated by the preoccupations of the body.
Finally I remove each of my organs and arrange them
on a small table near the window.
I do not want to hear their ancient rhythms
when I am trying to tap out my own drumbeat.
Now I sit down at the desk, ready to begin.
I am entirely pure: nothing but a skeleton at a typewriter.
I should mention that sometimes I leave my penis on.
I find it difficult to ignore the temptation.
Then I am a skeleton with a penis at a typewriter.
In this condition I write extraordinary love poems,
most of them exploiting the connection between sex
and death.
I am concentration itself: I exist in a universe
where there is nothing but sex, death and typewriting.
After a spell of this I remove my penis too.
Then I am all skull and bones typing into the afternoon.
Just the absolute essentials, no flounces.
Now I write only about death, most classical of themes
in language light as the air between my ribs.
Afterward, I reward myself by going for a drive at sunset.
I replace my organs and slip back into my flesh
And clothes. Then I back the car out of the garage
And speed through woods on winding country roads,
Passing stone walls, farmhouses, and frozen ponds,
All perfectly arranged like words in a famous sonnet.
Quote from Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis
"Since I cannot mend the book, I must add to it. To leave it as it was would be to die perjured; I know so much more than I did about the woman who wrote it. What began the change was the very writing itself. Let no one lightly set about such a work. Memory, once waked, will play the tyrant. I found I must set down (for I was speaking as before judges and must not lie) passions and thoughts of my own which I had clean forgotten. The past which I wrote down was not the past that I thought I had (all these years) been remembering. I did not, even when I had finished the book, see clearly many things I see now. The change which the writing wrought in me ( and of which I did not write) was only a beginning - only to prepare me for the gods' surgery. They used my own pen to probe my wound......I looked at the roll in my hand and saw at once that it was not the book I had written. It couldn't be; it was far too small. And too old - a little, shabby, crumpled thing nothing like the great book that I had worked on day after day......There was utter silence all around me. And now for the first time, I knew what I had been doing. While I was reading, it had, once and again, seemed strange to me that the reading took so long; for the book was so small. Now I knew that I had been reading it forever, quick as I could, starting the first word again almost before the last was out of my mouth.....and the voice I read it in was strange to my ears. There was given to me a certainty that this, at last, was my real voice....there was silence in the dark assembly long enough for me to have read my book out yet again. At last the judge spoke, "are you answered?"
"Yes," said I. The complaint was the answer. To have heard myself making it was to be answered.....'to say the very thing you really mean, the whole of it, nothing more or less or other than what you really mean; that's the whole art and joy of words.'"
"Yes," said I. The complaint was the answer. To have heard myself making it was to be answered.....'to say the very thing you really mean, the whole of it, nothing more or less or other than what you really mean; that's the whole art and joy of words.'"
Thursday, July 22, 2010
The Half Known World by Robert Boswell
Robert Boswell says:
"a percentage of researchers genuinely believe that
humans do not really learn anything ever; rather we
spend our lives discovering inborn capacities. ...
If we don't learn then we merely discover the range,
complexity and limits of our wiring....what we
seem to be doing as writers (he infers) is
listening to a story as it spins itself out..
perhaps when we talk about the pursuit of
truth, as writers often do, we're talking about
the ability of the writer to make contact with
that pure narrative wiring, to successfully
ride the native circuitry."
"a percentage of researchers genuinely believe that
humans do not really learn anything ever; rather we
spend our lives discovering inborn capacities. ...
If we don't learn then we merely discover the range,
complexity and limits of our wiring....what we
seem to be doing as writers (he infers) is
listening to a story as it spins itself out..
perhaps when we talk about the pursuit of
truth, as writers often do, we're talking about
the ability of the writer to make contact with
that pure narrative wiring, to successfully
ride the native circuitry."
Matrimonial Honey
Matrimonial Honey
Here I have taken four pieces of birch, carved
away the negative space to reveal the images
signifying a Season of Rain, a Season of Moon,
a Season of Promise and a Season of Bloom. After
rolling the carvings with ink and stamping them
onto a paper called kozo, I embellished the
printed designs with hand applied ink and watercolor.
The bees are the result of myriad stampings of
one small carving of a bee. The paper was then
married to several layers of toile and sealed with
three pounds of beeswax.
In the Battle of the Books by Jonathan Swift,
wherein an argument ensues between the spider and the
bee, Swift describes the bees as follows:
"These bees have chosen to fill their hive with honey
and wax thus furnishing mankind with the two noblest
of things, sweetness and light."
In terms of dedication, pursuit, protection,
trust, desire and longing, we are all married to
something or someone. Unless the bee is married
to the flower it's wealth of honey is never realized.
And yet, it takes two million bees to make a
pound of honey. Rather than enlist assistance by
by making heroic statements the honeybee does a
dance. Her language essentially hangs on the
alphabet of dance. Dancer or not, wouldn't it
be lovely to use our bodies to bear such a
message of goodness and light as to evoke healing
music to be orchestrated in others?
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Looking
July 1999 (Excerpted From The Color of Grace, Tonia Triebwasser/Baker Books
Things Unfamiliar
By mid-morning, the sun is a hot kettle. I feel it through the walls. It has sent a blast of steam through the shingles and into the attic. I scurry about the yard looking. Somewhere there is a hidden pot, boiling dry on a red, forgotten burner. A heat storm. That’s what the experts called it last night. Nineteen days (today makes it 20) of 100+ degree weather. I am stuck in a season of heat. A universe of technology and still no one can find the burner and remove the pot.
I hide from the heat as I hid last January from the wind and the cold. The air conditioner runs equal time with last winter’s heater. Both climates smack of a conspiracy. I hose down the garden, hopping from shade patch to shade patch.
Tuberose does well in the heat. Its scent, delicate and far-reaching, bubbles up from a stiff wand of waxy white, clustered petals. I tolerate the heat long enough to breathe in a chest full of its scent.
With the sunset comes the buzz of crickets sounding like errant amperage crackling in a cave. “The coast is clear,” they buzz. “Come out, come out wherever you are.”
How can I resist? I bend close to the base of a climbing rose, digging in with my finger to see if any moisture remains in its hot bed. Nose to nose with a black and yellow racer, I spring back. The snake is calm. It stays fixed, wrapped like a ringlet around the thorny base.
The snake is said to be good for a garden, but I am not pleased by its presence. It has a suspicious persona. No arms, yet it can hang onto an ankle as well as a rose. It skin looks wet and slippery, but it is dry and rough. No legs, but it moves swiftly.
I escape the valley’s heat by visiting a friend on the coast. An old friend. When I arrive, she brings out a thick pile of letters. Letters we’ve exchanged through the years. I begin to read and groan. Much of what concerned me then, concerns me now. I had wished for more progress. I’m beginning to understand my childhood nightmares of going to school naked. They were not Freudian fears at all. They were warnings. Premonitions. This is what it is like to grow up. You have to be willing to show your self. Your whole self.
I once held a notion that a garden reaches a point of self-containment. I could not have been further from the truth. A mature garden needs constant intervention. Whatever I neglect finds me out. Points a finger. But my strength is limited as well as my time. The afternoon sun sits in a position that if I point, draws my arm into a Nazi salute. I refuse. The sun has tyrannized me enough today. I could dead-head the zinnas. Clip back the spirea. I leave it all for another day, go inside and thumb through the old letters.
After two hours, I am still reading, apalled at my own stagnation. The sun has dropped below the crown of the oak across the street. My front yard is immersed in its shade. I love that old oak. It stands on a lot destined for development, surrounded by a protective fence. “Come this far and go no further,” the fence seems to say. “Don’t need no water. Don’t need no spade.” The two things I can’t do without prove fatal to the oak.
Unlike the oak, I need shaking up to grow. My letters thrust my feet to the flames. They show me where I have remained compacted, desolate, unfruitful. Apparently, I am a late bloomer. I have a strong will. A thick skull. I need help. Divine intervention. I must not emulate Eve who at her greatest moment of need hid from God.
“The fire will test the quality of each man’s work.”
❦
Things Unfamiliar
By mid-morning, the sun is a hot kettle. I feel it through the walls. It has sent a blast of steam through the shingles and into the attic. I scurry about the yard looking. Somewhere there is a hidden pot, boiling dry on a red, forgotten burner. A heat storm. That’s what the experts called it last night. Nineteen days (today makes it 20) of 100+ degree weather. I am stuck in a season of heat. A universe of technology and still no one can find the burner and remove the pot.
I hide from the heat as I hid last January from the wind and the cold. The air conditioner runs equal time with last winter’s heater. Both climates smack of a conspiracy. I hose down the garden, hopping from shade patch to shade patch.
Tuberose does well in the heat. Its scent, delicate and far-reaching, bubbles up from a stiff wand of waxy white, clustered petals. I tolerate the heat long enough to breathe in a chest full of its scent.
With the sunset comes the buzz of crickets sounding like errant amperage crackling in a cave. “The coast is clear,” they buzz. “Come out, come out wherever you are.”
How can I resist? I bend close to the base of a climbing rose, digging in with my finger to see if any moisture remains in its hot bed. Nose to nose with a black and yellow racer, I spring back. The snake is calm. It stays fixed, wrapped like a ringlet around the thorny base.
The snake is said to be good for a garden, but I am not pleased by its presence. It has a suspicious persona. No arms, yet it can hang onto an ankle as well as a rose. It skin looks wet and slippery, but it is dry and rough. No legs, but it moves swiftly.
I escape the valley’s heat by visiting a friend on the coast. An old friend. When I arrive, she brings out a thick pile of letters. Letters we’ve exchanged through the years. I begin to read and groan. Much of what concerned me then, concerns me now. I had wished for more progress. I’m beginning to understand my childhood nightmares of going to school naked. They were not Freudian fears at all. They were warnings. Premonitions. This is what it is like to grow up. You have to be willing to show your self. Your whole self.
I once held a notion that a garden reaches a point of self-containment. I could not have been further from the truth. A mature garden needs constant intervention. Whatever I neglect finds me out. Points a finger. But my strength is limited as well as my time. The afternoon sun sits in a position that if I point, draws my arm into a Nazi salute. I refuse. The sun has tyrannized me enough today. I could dead-head the zinnas. Clip back the spirea. I leave it all for another day, go inside and thumb through the old letters.
After two hours, I am still reading, apalled at my own stagnation. The sun has dropped below the crown of the oak across the street. My front yard is immersed in its shade. I love that old oak. It stands on a lot destined for development, surrounded by a protective fence. “Come this far and go no further,” the fence seems to say. “Don’t need no water. Don’t need no spade.” The two things I can’t do without prove fatal to the oak.
Unlike the oak, I need shaking up to grow. My letters thrust my feet to the flames. They show me where I have remained compacted, desolate, unfruitful. Apparently, I am a late bloomer. I have a strong will. A thick skull. I need help. Divine intervention. I must not emulate Eve who at her greatest moment of need hid from God.
“The fire will test the quality of each man’s work.”
❦
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Through a Glass Darkly
This is one of the first in the Paris collection. The wash of yellow indicates promise but it is far off and muted. The four girls/women ban together, facing the light. They are armed, bare and vulnerable. If you look carefully, you can see how the woman in the foreground holds the edges of a gossamer gown, attempting to protect the others. Of course, she can't but she can tell the truth about the dangers, the lies, the distortions. The word in the lower right hand corner is love in Arabic. (The original is approx 9x12, its selling price is $300.00. The framed copy is larger (10-1/2x21" inside a pewter frame, black mat, which makes the entire piece 28x22", its selling price is $350.00)
Monday, July 19, 2010
Notice how she has ripped her dress
to shreds in order to lasso the bloom
and drag it to where she has the notion might be
safe. Which clearly it isn't.
All this is happening in the dark rain
of promise (rainbow sky in the background
behind the black leaves). AND she
is not glibly whistling along as if there is
no battle. There is. AND she KNOWS she is
on holy ground, thus the absence of shoes.
This is not me talking here, this is from John Eldridge's Book, the Sacred Romance. I find it noteworthy.....
The Wildness of God
We live our lives before the wild, dangerous, unfettered and free character of the living God..... Walter Brueggemann writes: The unknown Romancing or the Message of the Arrows- which captures the essence of life? Should we keep our hearts open to the Romance or concentrate on protecting ourselves from the Arrows? Should we live with hopeful abandon, trusting in a larger story whose ending is good, or should we live in our small stories and glean what we can from the Romance while trying to avoid the Arrows?
Perhaps God, as the Author of the Story we're all living in, would tilt the scale in a favorable direction if we knew we could trust him. And therein lies our dilemma. There seems to be no direct correlation between the way we live our lives and the resulting fate God has in store for us, at least on this earth. Abraham's grandson, Jacob, lives the life of a manipulator and is blessed. Jesus lives for the sake of others and is crucified. And we never quite know when we're going to run into the uncertainty of the part God has written for us in his play, whether our character has significant lines yet to speak or will even survive the afternoon.
(Again, this is from John Eldridge's, The Sacred Romance , 47)
The Wildness of God
We live our lives before the wild, dangerous, unfettered and free character of the living God..... Walter Brueggemann writes: The unknown Romancing or the Message of the Arrows- which captures the essence of life? Should we keep our hearts open to the Romance or concentrate on protecting ourselves from the Arrows? Should we live with hopeful abandon, trusting in a larger story whose ending is good, or should we live in our small stories and glean what we can from the Romance while trying to avoid the Arrows?
Perhaps God, as the Author of the Story we're all living in, would tilt the scale in a favorable direction if we knew we could trust him. And therein lies our dilemma. There seems to be no direct correlation between the way we live our lives and the resulting fate God has in store for us, at least on this earth. Abraham's grandson, Jacob, lives the life of a manipulator and is blessed. Jesus lives for the sake of others and is crucified. And we never quite know when we're going to run into the uncertainty of the part God has written for us in his play, whether our character has significant lines yet to speak or will even survive the afternoon.
(Again, this is from John Eldridge's, The Sacred Romance , 47)
Sunday, July 18, 2010
The Late Bloomer
The Late Bloomer
(44" x 60")
Watercolor and ink applied with a brush and a stick.
"Late bloomers are prone to caution,
to much reluctance. Late and bloom is a
curious combination, an inference that
something has bloomed but should have
bloomed sooner. Though blooming late
has its frustrations, it is better than not
blooming at all. After all, there is a certain
novelty in a truant bloom, a kind of triumph.
Late bloomers arrive on the scene once the
other blooms have departed."
(Watercolor copied onto canvas.
For Sale: $600.00)
Saturday, July 17, 2010
Spring Fever
She belongs in the War of the Seasons collection.
She is the same size as Winter Resisting Spring,
on rice paper. Enormous. (approx. 25"x35")
Unlike Winter, Spring is content and expectant,
having no inkling of the fast approaching
summer heat. Unlike the lot of
us who are in the midst of it.
Friday, July 16, 2010
Tiptoe
(Thiis is cropped from the center a much larger painting)
In a season of acute uncertainty, the woman came first to my mind.
I saw her on tiptoe. I saw her shoes thrown over her shoulder.
I did not know where she was standing. The table I was working
on was just inside a window facing west. When I finished painting
the woman who was, at that point, floating on the white space
of the paper, the sun was low in the sky and a shadow from
the paned window and the Japanese maple leaves from the tree outside
surrounded her. I painted the shadows. Instantly, she stood before
an immense glass wall in dappled shade. Now the sun was even
lower in the sky and it was casting rainbows through the
beveled glass in my front door on the floor. I put the paper on
the floor and painted the tiny rainbows and then made the
rainbows into wings. Taking a break, I got the mail.
In my mailbox was a postcard from a friend in
Paris. She told me she had been praying Psalms 91 for me every day.
I did not take the time to read the Psalm, nor did I have it memorized
to know its comfort.
The picture on the postcard was an aerial view of the La Defense sector
of Paris, which is exceedingly modern and, in terms of romantic aesthetics,
not something I would ordinarily think of painting. However, in the
center of the postcard was what is referred to as La Grande Arche de la Defense
which was built in 1982. If one stands in the center of the Arche looking west,
one can see Napolean’s original Arch D’ Triumph. La Grande Arche de la
Defense is so immense that the entirety of the Cathedral of Notre Dame can
fit within its cube. Suddenly, I knew where the woman was meant to stand.
After giving her the solid foundation of La Grande Arche de la Defense,
I surrounded her with tiny buildings and narrow streets. Floating in the
surrounding air are motifs of my experiences in Paris. After the painting
was completed, I thought to look up Psalm 91 and read it with open mouth.
.....“He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the
shadow of the Almighty.....He will cover you with his feathers, and under
his wings you will find refuge...”
(Unframed Original 22x36 $500.00)
Winter Resisting Spring
War of the Seasons
SPRING FEVER
“Now you will have noticed
that nothing throws him into a
passion so easily as to find a
tract of time which he reckoned
on having at his own disposal
unexpectedly taken away from him.”
( The voice of Screwtape in C.S. Lewis’
Screwtape Letters.) Notice how fiercly
Winter in her icy garb fights to remain,
while Spring in the background patiently
lobs snoballs hoping to driver her away.
Sometimes Winter has stayed so long
she has taken on an air of entitlement.
But Spring will persist. The warmth is
driving Winter to the northern regions
to wait her turn at command. The
geese will soon have their wings free of
ice. (This painting is on rice paper.
It is approx 25x35. It is one of 4 but
can be purchased on its own.) The
framed original is $800.00. Because
of the intricate detail this condensed
version makes it difficult to see. I
would be happy to schedule a viewing.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
What We Are and Are Not
The river is a heaven cried tear only Jesus turns to stone.
We are hatched from ice, born from glaciers.
But we are not water. This is what we must remember.
The water is other than us.
But we can stand on the bullrush banks
where rivers merge,
some salt, some fresh water,
we can be freedom's fireflies
can toe ourselves in, give ourselves
join our bodies with that of the river's.
We can flood the banks.
All the while remind ourselves.
We are not the river but its students.
Beneath our immersion, let our tears sprout wings,
fly our weeping,
listen to its lapping words that tells us how to care.
Less about some things
More about others.
We can stop making things up.
The important things are already happening.
Be a dam, be a funnel, be a moss crusted bank.
Be a pillowed shore.
Stroke, stroke,
be our truth.
Cry. Laugh. Remember.
Say please and thank you to good,.
To the innocent, yes.
No and stop to evil, (lips close to the mic and screaming.)
Keep swimming even in sleep.
Don’t course your way on whim except when it comes to love.
Be a sail.
Be an oar.
Be a boat.
Be a ladle.
Leave the dying to stonies.
We are hatched from ice, born from glaciers.
But we are not water. This is what we must remember.
The water is other than us.
But we can stand on the bullrush banks
where rivers merge,
some salt, some fresh water,
we can be freedom's fireflies
can toe ourselves in, give ourselves
join our bodies with that of the river's.
We can flood the banks.
All the while remind ourselves.
We are not the river but its students.
Beneath our immersion, let our tears sprout wings,
fly our weeping,
listen to its lapping words that tells us how to care.
Less about some things
More about others.
We can stop making things up.
The important things are already happening.
Be a dam, be a funnel, be a moss crusted bank.
Be a pillowed shore.
Stroke, stroke,
be our truth.
Cry. Laugh. Remember.
Say please and thank you to good,.
To the innocent, yes.
No and stop to evil, (lips close to the mic and screaming.)
Keep swimming even in sleep.
Don’t course your way on whim except when it comes to love.
Be a sail.
Be an oar.
Be a boat.
Be a ladle.
Leave the dying to stonies.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Walking Down the Same Road
Last Night
Last Night
We were walking down the same road and we were both crying, Both relieved and disappointed at being alive. We did not hold hands. Did not touch. There was no embracing. And our eyes were closed. As failures in love, the view, let alone an embrace, would have finished us off. The unthinkable truth of our mutual suffocation was best left unsaid. Words in the fierce clothing of voice, mine or yours – would make us tear our tongues out. People do you know. All the time.
Which of us could bear the blood of our fallen worlds, the red stain reflected backwards on faces smothered by too many years. I can’t speak for you. But I couldn’t. I’d worked so hard at not shedding them and you’d treated them as theives. But clearly muscle was not enough and even if it was, my arms were love-lies-bleeding blooms and yours were broken timbers.
But there we were persisting. How we even came close to being in the same dream was a cruelty and a promise. Maybe the fault we’d lobbed between us had fouled out, flown over the fence and would be forever lost in the creosote weeds. We’d somehow slipped under the gate nobody guarded. Now inside how could we bear the agony of waking? The fact that we were there together was a borrowed clemency. Neither of us took credit for the speechless alliance of minds which had never before managed to meet.
About the nakedness: Maybe it means we’d had the courageous weakness to extend forgiveness instead of blame. Maybe we ceased fearing our bodies and killed our pride in the smokey changing room with all those messy clothes. In total nakedness you can make a killing. Which apparently we did.
Last Night
We were walking down the same road and we were both crying, Both relieved and disappointed at being alive. We did not hold hands. Did not touch. There was no embracing. And our eyes were closed. As failures in love, the view, let alone an embrace, would have finished us off. The unthinkable truth of our mutual suffocation was best left unsaid. Words in the fierce clothing of voice, mine or yours – would make us tear our tongues out. People do you know. All the time.
Which of us could bear the blood of our fallen worlds, the red stain reflected backwards on faces smothered by too many years. I can’t speak for you. But I couldn’t. I’d worked so hard at not shedding them and you’d treated them as theives. But clearly muscle was not enough and even if it was, my arms were love-lies-bleeding blooms and yours were broken timbers.
But there we were persisting. How we even came close to being in the same dream was a cruelty and a promise. Maybe the fault we’d lobbed between us had fouled out, flown over the fence and would be forever lost in the creosote weeds. We’d somehow slipped under the gate nobody guarded. Now inside how could we bear the agony of waking? The fact that we were there together was a borrowed clemency. Neither of us took credit for the speechless alliance of minds which had never before managed to meet.
About the nakedness: Maybe it means we’d had the courageous weakness to extend forgiveness instead of blame. Maybe we ceased fearing our bodies and killed our pride in the smokey changing room with all those messy clothes. In total nakedness you can make a killing. Which apparently we did.
Monday, June 28, 2010
The Yellow Suitcase
It is a simple wedding.
Not elaborate.
They wear black and white.
Black and white.
No, this is wrong.
White and black.
The bride comes first.
Always the bride first.
Everyone agrees.
Everyone -
Florist. Caterers. Musicians.
Even the printers.
Even the priest.
The guests bring gifts.
Tied with ribbons,
swaddled in tissue,
dressed in foil paper,
kissed with glitter cards.
She carries a glass bouquet.
Imagine. Breakable blooms.
Blooms carried like
sky hooks to love.
It is a happy occasion.
But there are tears.
Wept and unwept.
The tears are here.
She knows nothing. Less than nothing. This is what she knows. This is why she holds her tears. She has agreed to what she does not know, to what she believes will be easy.
Something black.
Something white.
Knowing she knows nothing happens later. This is now. Now she does not cry. She leaves her weeping behind.
Behind is where it remains.
A ring is slipped on her finger. A circle of gold. And then on his. His hand is also captured with gold.
Pictures are taken.
Pictures help with remembering.
Nothing is needed to help them forget.
Forgetting is easier than remembering.
Between them is a suitcase.
Yellow.
The suitcase is as close to yellow as any other color.
For a surprise, the sisters wrap it with ribbons.
The brothers scratch blessings in its yellow side.
The lovers latch arms. This is why they think they are strong, why they believe they have power. There is strength in their arms.
They embrace everything. Lift much. Carry more.
The way is surprisingly rough.
She doesn’t mention the presence of hills
Ignores the ruts, sees only small declivities,
no ditches, no peaks, certainly no cliffs.
The road narrows, erupts with trees.
An unexpected wind sweeps down.
Avoiding the wind, she runs. Years of running begin. To slow her
down, wild animals appears. Wild animals distract her.
She dare not stay. Dare not linger.
Wild animals can never be tamed. .
Birds. Far off, now closer. Finally, alarmingly near, in her face, her hair, frisking her shoulders.
Infantry of feathers.
Battalion of beaks.
She is not at peace with flapping, not at peace with pecking.
Go.
Take your feathers.
Take your beaks.
Birds are not easily discouraged, especially wild ones. The birds remain. Before, she considered birds to be creatures of music, creatures of song. These birds do not sing.
Music is not in these birds.
Birds are the cause of their first fight. Not so much him, not so much her, but birds. Birds outside their influence. Birds they cannot cage or shoo away.
And so they cage themselves. Shoo themselves away. Dig elaborate tunnels.
They borrow almost everything - shovels, picks, back hoes as well as dirt.
He digs. She carts away, gets rid of the evidence.
Danger.
Tunnels collapse suddenly.
Suddenly a tunnel can flatten to a grave.
Because of her worries, she is driven to warn..
“Look,” she says, waving the suit case like a torch.
“Remember?”
He eyes the suitcase. Drops the pick. Returns the shovel. He remembers the sky, remembers desire.
Together they are a flower.
Open petals, visible stamens, scent of sea erupting.
Winter. Here in this unfriendly season, she feels a welcoming nudge. Small foot pushing. Small hand grasping. Instantly, she is captured by this second heart.
And then storm. And then rain. And then the sky slumps red.
The baby is lost.
This is the word used for death.
Lost.
Many things are lost. Babies are no exception.
Where is he? He is other than here.
Where?
When he returns he’s ready to move.
She feels his muscled arms. He is strong.
She believes in his strength,
believes in his protection.
Time passes. First one. Then another: Daughters. The first daughter knows what not to say. And the second daughter, she learns also. Turning the house to smiles, the children protect the lost language of their parents.
Even still, she finds herself alone on a very steep mountain.
A mountain of shame. The nature of shame is
inadmissable. No one wants to admit a thing like shame.
There should be warnings, a large sign with an enormous black X. She is weary, panting, mopping her brow. It is almost Christmas and she is covered in sweat. And the suitcase has
become a millstone of lead.
Against all her dreams, against the black
against the white, she calls forth the
last dregs of strength, lets fly
the suitcase and wails.
By the time the wail leaves her mouth, it has gathered such velocity, she knows it has been in route for years.
The whole of their lives scatters for decades.
Photos, furniture, jewelry, books.
She suddenly knows they had far too many books.
And now it is snowing. Not a Christmas card snow.
Leprous snow. Hungry snow, snow devouring the sun.
For lack of strength, she lies down, calls to him. He does not answer. He does not turn, does not come back. .
A voice calls her awake. God. There is no one else. God has been calling for quite some time. Suddenly, she knows.
She has been elsewhere. For a long time, in a place dangerously dead.
God has taken on the cloak of fire. Only God burns in a blizzard. She lifts one heavy foot, flings it forward, lifts the other and flings it desperately ahead.
Always before she was cold. Cold but not in the way of shivering, not in the way of blankets of ice. Cold in the way of numbness. Cold in the way of dead.
Even before she is thoroughly thawed, she considers the fuel on which the fire feeds. Astonishing. She is bewildered. Enchanted. Is the fire feeding on the fuel of the yellow suitcase?
This is the form her bewilderment takes, the form of a question. With the same words she can make a statement. Instead she asks a question. The answer is yes.
It is the yellow suitcase. Before the whole of it turns to butter, she sees the blessing she knows to be the brothers’. And there are ribbons. Against all odds a tangle of ribbon remains.
She sits perfectly still. It is risky to breathe. She holds her breath. Breathing might kill the fire. Even though she reasons the fire must be God and therefore, impossible to extinguish, she cannot help but hold her breath.
She knows where she is.
She is with God.
God is with her.
She is not alone.
God is now her only light, her only heat.
About Fire
I watched the flame go out. It happened so gradually, without that last minutes sputter and spit, I sank to the temptation of feigning its presence. Instead of naming the dark, I searched for a match. Having found one I spent words striking it over and over but it was wet your sweat and my tears. I hadn't bargained for our skill at juggling dying coals, hadn't imagined the possibility of our combined genius. We blocked the light of our individual glowing by canny acts of partial snuffing. When our flame was gone, it caused a radiating stumbling, a kind of unheralded careening of accumulating ghosts. But you couldn't see them and I couldn't swim through the smoke.
Who Doesen't Know this?
The baby slept in the bed of a pickup. The bed of a pickup is not a safe place for a baby to sleep. Who doesn't know this? The bed of a pickup is open to meteors, child snatchers, chronic low grade fevers, other things involving robbed potential. The bed of a pickup is most often used for transporting dirt. What happened is this: a 2x4 fell from the site of exploding construction. I don't know if it was the angel Gabriel or the hands of God reaching from the womb of light into the place of the crime that steered the board across the sleeping baby. But the 2x4 landed in such a way as to protect her head along with her inexplicable body. Thankfully, my lack of knowledge didn't alter the mercy. As the debris cascaded through space, tearing up the blowing dunes, creating a storm to sand the eyes, the baby slept until the storm passed.
Friday, June 18, 2010
Consider the flower
Don't pick it
Don't make it into a movie
Don't use it as a tool
Consider its shadow
Consider its holy petals
consider a woman
consider a man
consider lips and ears
consider the sound of listening
consider the risk of truth
consider yourself
consider the light
consider the faith of your breath
consider the ladder
consider the climb
consider the harvest
consider the crime
consider the woman weeping
consider the man cast down
consider the rain
consider the sun
consider the tender shoot
consider the sky of blue
consider God
consider the burden of proof
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Sunday, June 6, 2010
A Cord of Three Strands
At first they thought it was all about them,
(an understandable mistake). And in fact,
it IS about them but not ALL about them.
They are secondary to what IT is about.
They thought their commitment, their cares,
concerns, worries, struggles, hopes, dreams,
frustrations....(those things),
could be surmounted by the
presence and power of each other.
After all, they are strong women.
As for uniqueness, their separate and
combined individualities are the stuff
of legends. And such legends....
but these women have
pledged to remind each other of the
origin of their legends, the progression,
the doubling back, the sharp curves,
the inconsistencies and themes.
Whether their legends
will be passed on for ill or for good is
a conversation that often absorbs them.
The turning point in these still to be
lived legends was the day they realized
it wasn’t all about them. At core, IT
is about The Cord of Three Strands,
a cord which is theirs to grasp, not to construct.
With this mystery in mind, they subsequently
and alternately launch each other in the
direction of The 3 stranded cord, urge
each other in maintaining a firm grip.
Some days maintaining a grip is
more difficult than others. This is where
the birds come in. The birds give witness
to the presence of The Three
Stranded cord and It’s ever present provision.
On this day of storm and thunder, the women
cling to the 3 stranded cord. The clouds part.
The light appears. The women are not straining,
but clinging, in so doing, yanking back the clouds
and basking in the light that is not their own.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
After the Concert
In my letter, the one I did not write to you,
I said, "I'd been thinking about Lynard Skynard
and how the band ended in a plane crash
and how I hadn't remembered much about it.
I'd admitted I wasn't up on the music.
I said the idea of someone else coming along to preserve
a memory by singing songs was almost pentecostal
and probably well intentioned. I discussed my curiosity
about a man who would climb out of himself and into
a dead reputation, down to adopting the
habit of appearing barefoot in concert and how it made
me wonder who he was when he wasn't being someone else.
And then I rambled on about Oprah and a recent interview
featuring an author (whose name I couldn't remember).
I said it was unfortunate that the author's adventures
ascended to the height of victory because she met the perfect
man and all her former brokenness was mended in the
glue of their ardor. I looked up the spelling
of ardor because of the "u" that always seemed to force
itself into the middle of that old time word. I carefully
explained that it was not a disdain for men that led me to
this conclusion but my suspicion about the equation of singlehood
equating to brokenness. I reassured you that it is possible for
women to be strong and honest and loving without shackling men to the altar of
their expectations and giving them to task of playing god.
My tone was playful. I strove for lightness of conversation so
my surgical thoughts would not carve away the possibility of
your listening. Rather than mail the letter, I read it
to you so I could watch your eyes while I read to gauge
the prudence of continuing on and entering the arena of
literary structure. When your eyes said yes I described
how a woman longs for a man's words to veer
from Freitag's pyramid as much as a man
wants a woman's body to peak and peak again
and in so doing share in mutual waves
of excitement breaking the prevalent
flawed rules of romantic structure.
In your letter, the one you did not write to me, you said, "I
really had to stop and think about Lynard Skynard and his
missing shoes and the missing man who didn't fill them.
There was a time I might have mistook your observations
as little assaults on my sense of fashion. Once I might have
assumed there was something in your bevy of words that
clearly directed me to run. Words are ridiculous things
after all. Little squiggles on a page. Little fricatives making
sense of sound. Bilabial courtship with language when
kissing would do just as well. I have to say I agree
about Oprah, and by the way, I think it was my idea about
the unremembered author. The fact you stewed on it and
spilled it into a literary pot, making a clever sexual analogy
didn't frighten me as much as I wanted to let it. I've learned
alot about women over the years. But still, climbing into
a woman's brain doesn't make for safe spelunking. No
combination of rope, harnesses or pulleys could
ensure a safe trek out. Woman are fabulous, I just don't
want to think like one. It's all good and well to be on this
side of your mind and master the questions. Which is
why I wrote in the first place. I have so many.
For starters, what possessed you to fixate on Lynard
Skynard and how did it lead you to Oprah and what
story are we living anyway?
I said, "I'd been thinking about Lynard Skynard
and how the band ended in a plane crash
and how I hadn't remembered much about it.
I'd admitted I wasn't up on the music.
I said the idea of someone else coming along to preserve
a memory by singing songs was almost pentecostal
and probably well intentioned. I discussed my curiosity
about a man who would climb out of himself and into
a dead reputation, down to adopting the
habit of appearing barefoot in concert and how it made
me wonder who he was when he wasn't being someone else.
And then I rambled on about Oprah and a recent interview
featuring an author (whose name I couldn't remember).
I said it was unfortunate that the author's adventures
ascended to the height of victory because she met the perfect
man and all her former brokenness was mended in the
glue of their ardor. I looked up the spelling
of ardor because of the "u" that always seemed to force
itself into the middle of that old time word. I carefully
explained that it was not a disdain for men that led me to
this conclusion but my suspicion about the equation of singlehood
equating to brokenness. I reassured you that it is possible for
women to be strong and honest and loving without shackling men to the altar of
their expectations and giving them to task of playing god.
My tone was playful. I strove for lightness of conversation so
my surgical thoughts would not carve away the possibility of
your listening. Rather than mail the letter, I read it
to you so I could watch your eyes while I read to gauge
the prudence of continuing on and entering the arena of
literary structure. When your eyes said yes I described
how a woman longs for a man's words to veer
from Freitag's pyramid as much as a man
wants a woman's body to peak and peak again
and in so doing share in mutual waves
of excitement breaking the prevalent
flawed rules of romantic structure.
In your letter, the one you did not write to me, you said, "I
really had to stop and think about Lynard Skynard and his
missing shoes and the missing man who didn't fill them.
There was a time I might have mistook your observations
as little assaults on my sense of fashion. Once I might have
assumed there was something in your bevy of words that
clearly directed me to run. Words are ridiculous things
after all. Little squiggles on a page. Little fricatives making
sense of sound. Bilabial courtship with language when
kissing would do just as well. I have to say I agree
about Oprah, and by the way, I think it was my idea about
the unremembered author. The fact you stewed on it and
spilled it into a literary pot, making a clever sexual analogy
didn't frighten me as much as I wanted to let it. I've learned
alot about women over the years. But still, climbing into
a woman's brain doesn't make for safe spelunking. No
combination of rope, harnesses or pulleys could
ensure a safe trek out. Woman are fabulous, I just don't
want to think like one. It's all good and well to be on this
side of your mind and master the questions. Which is
why I wrote in the first place. I have so many.
For starters, what possessed you to fixate on Lynard
Skynard and how did it lead you to Oprah and what
story are we living anyway?
Thursday, April 1, 2010
The Sacred Romance
On this Maunday Thursday, I am withholding my thoughts in service to these of John Eldrige's from The Sacred Romance, "Being unable to defeat God through raw power, Satan’s legions decide to wound God as deeply as possible by stealing the love of his Beloved through seduction. And having “seduced them to his party,” to ravish them body and soul; and having ravished them, to mock them even as they are hurled to the depths of hell with God himself unable to save them because of their rejection of him."
The Beloved here refers to God's creations: me and you - all of humanity. In the scaffolding of this impossible thought, I take on the day open to God and His sweet incomprehensible wooing. Having been given a gift, I myself am incapable of giving, how is it that it is still being given and I have the choice to reject or receive?
The Beloved here refers to God's creations: me and you - all of humanity. In the scaffolding of this impossible thought, I take on the day open to God and His sweet incomprehensible wooing. Having been given a gift, I myself am incapable of giving, how is it that it is still being given and I have the choice to reject or receive?
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Oncore Oncore
It is a day of held back skies,
of skies restrained and waiting.
A day the clouds hold conference
and dance around a sun-caught moon.
No one seems to notice
or if they do they have the wherewithal
to storm the gates of morning
twice swaddled in last night's dreams.
Some people say they never dream.
They insist their dreams are things
of skin clad situations,
that they are pros at thinking them alive.
I see a man pushing
a wheelbarrow of pillows,
filling his calendar
with impossible appointments,
impossible alliances with those
seeking respite for thought.
Not realizing that at the end
of his supply he will be more wearied
than those to which he gives relief.
Now is now.
The clouds cease deliberation.
Recess is now a reconvention.
The sky loves earth with rain.
Earth loves sky, blooming the world,
splaying endeavor, dissecting work,
spending all that isn't fear.
Nothing is greater than its telling.
Courage redeems the secrets.
Canyons gape. Rivers flood.
The sea can't sit its stand.
Oncore. Oncore.
We spill ourselves to filling.
of skies restrained and waiting.
A day the clouds hold conference
and dance around a sun-caught moon.
No one seems to notice
or if they do they have the wherewithal
to storm the gates of morning
twice swaddled in last night's dreams.
Some people say they never dream.
They insist their dreams are things
of skin clad situations,
that they are pros at thinking them alive.
I see a man pushing
a wheelbarrow of pillows,
filling his calendar
with impossible appointments,
impossible alliances with those
seeking respite for thought.
Not realizing that at the end
of his supply he will be more wearied
than those to which he gives relief.
Now is now.
The clouds cease deliberation.
Recess is now a reconvention.
The sky loves earth with rain.
Earth loves sky, blooming the world,
splaying endeavor, dissecting work,
spending all that isn't fear.
Nothing is greater than its telling.
Courage redeems the secrets.
Canyons gape. Rivers flood.
The sea can't sit its stand.
Oncore. Oncore.
We spill ourselves to filling.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Crossing Over
Her dream was meant to be finished. She awoke to the sound of the neighbor’s hammer. A slipping board had proved too much for the old man, up in age and easily distracted from the business of dying. His time for subduing the earth was diminishing. Taking no thought of the dreaming woman in the house next door, he herded the board into place with his hammer and drove it in place with several nails.
The formerly dreaming woman stared at the ceiling, remembering. Following the elaborate production of the Wizard of Oz, she stood in the bleachers to get a glimpse of the water outside. This was the beginning of her dream, or at least the beginning of what was remembered. While the neighbor argued with belligerent vines between her house and his, she stared at the fan revolving over her bed and pieced together the rest. Before its interruption, the dream had put appendages, square footage and geography to her confusion. It had been the hands that pull a rabbit from a hat. Only in her case, the hands had placed her in the hat. She was the rabbit, the interior of the hat was not that of a hat, too small and too dark to take note of, but rather a place of light and activity, the tail end of a grand production. Adjusting her pillow, she recalls its particulars. Herself standing applauding, then retreating from a bleachered auditorium to the docks outside. Her contemplation to enter the water was interrupted by a pleasant enough assistant to the manger. With a southern gentility, he called her back, explaining the risks and ordinances against enjoying the water in full view of the dining guests. Sensing her disappointment, he calls her to the opposite side of the building. This, she decides, is because he is about to give her information he is not authorized to give, or if not authorized, certainly not encouraged in the middle of a busy night when he should be serving paying guests. With the building between him and management, he points to a place on the opposite shore.
"Over there is a place where the water will spin you in its embrace." The idea immediately appeals to her. She pictures herself being playfully tumbled by water. She sees the water as her lover and she its surrendering bride. He continues his explanation.
"There is a saying about that spot. Tell them to go slowly as they make their way in. Unless they are old. If they are old, tell them to hurry."
The neighbor yanks at another vine. She hears him groan. For his sake, she is glad he is making headway in the small scale jungle between their stucco houses. Already the dream is dissipating. She remembers her disappointment in the dream. She looked out across the water, realizing she would not be able to find the spinning spot alone. Finding the place required a knowledge she did not have. Speaking to her unspoken sorrow, the kind man makes an offer.
"If you want to go, I will take you."
"Now?"
"Yes. Now."
"I must change my clothes. Wait."
"Hurry," he says.
As she turns to leave, the man asks for a hug.
"Not now," she says. "Later, after the spinning."
P.S. Don't try to figure this out. I think it is about the stone of myself needing to be polished beneath the swelling tide of God's love. I can't be entirely sure. I'm drinking micro-waved coffee..........
The formerly dreaming woman stared at the ceiling, remembering. Following the elaborate production of the Wizard of Oz, she stood in the bleachers to get a glimpse of the water outside. This was the beginning of her dream, or at least the beginning of what was remembered. While the neighbor argued with belligerent vines between her house and his, she stared at the fan revolving over her bed and pieced together the rest. Before its interruption, the dream had put appendages, square footage and geography to her confusion. It had been the hands that pull a rabbit from a hat. Only in her case, the hands had placed her in the hat. She was the rabbit, the interior of the hat was not that of a hat, too small and too dark to take note of, but rather a place of light and activity, the tail end of a grand production. Adjusting her pillow, she recalls its particulars. Herself standing applauding, then retreating from a bleachered auditorium to the docks outside. Her contemplation to enter the water was interrupted by a pleasant enough assistant to the manger. With a southern gentility, he called her back, explaining the risks and ordinances against enjoying the water in full view of the dining guests. Sensing her disappointment, he calls her to the opposite side of the building. This, she decides, is because he is about to give her information he is not authorized to give, or if not authorized, certainly not encouraged in the middle of a busy night when he should be serving paying guests. With the building between him and management, he points to a place on the opposite shore.
"Over there is a place where the water will spin you in its embrace." The idea immediately appeals to her. She pictures herself being playfully tumbled by water. She sees the water as her lover and she its surrendering bride. He continues his explanation.
"There is a saying about that spot. Tell them to go slowly as they make their way in. Unless they are old. If they are old, tell them to hurry."
The neighbor yanks at another vine. She hears him groan. For his sake, she is glad he is making headway in the small scale jungle between their stucco houses. Already the dream is dissipating. She remembers her disappointment in the dream. She looked out across the water, realizing she would not be able to find the spinning spot alone. Finding the place required a knowledge she did not have. Speaking to her unspoken sorrow, the kind man makes an offer.
"If you want to go, I will take you."
"Now?"
"Yes. Now."
"I must change my clothes. Wait."
"Hurry," he says.
As she turns to leave, the man asks for a hug.
"Not now," she says. "Later, after the spinning."
P.S. Don't try to figure this out. I think it is about the stone of myself needing to be polished beneath the swelling tide of God's love. I can't be entirely sure. I'm drinking micro-waved coffee..........
Monday, March 29, 2010
Broken Flowers
I woke up thinking about broken flowers and the Bill Murray movie, "Broken Flowers". When I woke I realized the broken flowers were women. Obviously. A broken flower is an impossible thing. A flower is not glass. It thrives or dies. The broken flower puts in mind a tender thing that has taken on a varnish so as to protect its tender construction. Bill Murray was not broken but empty. Broken is better than empty. His (character's) only moment of passion was when he suspected he might have given a part of himself to create another...........when he pursued the boy he pursued the possibility of breaking and life spilling into himself. I'm sure the broken flower also refers to the hyman. But that is obvious. Numb is not good. Numb means something is not working. Something is so shut down that circulation is impaired. When circulation is impaired for long enough, blackness sets in because the blood takes a nap and refuses its travels. When blood naps for too long, appendages can snap off. A toe is a tiny thing but once it snaps off you miss it. Fingers are missed also but not as much as noses. Ears are just as bad. For lack of an ear, glasses sit askew. Then both seeing and feeling are impaired. Once an appendage snaps off, odds are it won't be snapping back on. Also, I found it tragic that a man who carres about a seemingly homeless, hungry boy has to explain that he likes girls. But he should have said, I like girls to like me. I don't really like girls. I just think they are pretty. Like flowers. When I bump into a girl, I break her. Don't walk behind me barefoot, you'll hurt yourself on the trail of broken flowers."
Friday, March 26, 2010
All Talk
I look at you.
You look at me.
I look at me looking at you.
I think thoughts.
Think words.
Thoughts like litter.
Words like seed.
Do I pick them up?
Do I plant them?
Is it already too late?
Has the wind caught them in the wires of my mind.
Has this furrowed soil suckled them in?
This frightens you.
It frightens me.
We are both frightened in the silence of the questions,
in the grip of what's left unsaid.
Fear does nothing but stir the wind.
nothing but dig a trench, die it says.
You look at me.
I look at me looking at you.
I think thoughts.
Think words.
Thoughts like litter.
Words like seed.
Do I pick them up?
Do I plant them?
Is it already too late?
Has the wind caught them in the wires of my mind.
Has this furrowed soil suckled them in?
This frightens you.
It frightens me.
We are both frightened in the silence of the questions,
in the grip of what's left unsaid.
Fear does nothing but stir the wind.
nothing but dig a trench, die it says.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Night of No Arms
It is a night of no arms.
I climb its legs.
I fight for its ear.
Even still my words bounce off the stars.
Flailing in a tangle of extremities,
I consider the notion of love.
It’s absurdity.
It’s insistence.
It’s cheeky advances.
It’s sudden recessions.
Recession is better than collapse.
Collapse happens upon the lovers.
They fight for air.
Recession is a slow gasp.
The lungs have a chance to catch up.
If I were to choose between collapse and recession,
recession is the kinder death.
But only if you believe love dies.
Which I don’t.
If it dies it never lived.
What lived by its name was something else.
What died was the wish for love to live.
I climb its legs.
I fight for its ear.
Even still my words bounce off the stars.
Flailing in a tangle of extremities,
I consider the notion of love.
It’s absurdity.
It’s insistence.
It’s cheeky advances.
It’s sudden recessions.
Recession is better than collapse.
Collapse happens upon the lovers.
They fight for air.
Recession is a slow gasp.
The lungs have a chance to catch up.
If I were to choose between collapse and recession,
recession is the kinder death.
But only if you believe love dies.
Which I don’t.
If it dies it never lived.
What lived by its name was something else.
What died was the wish for love to live.
Monday, March 22, 2010
Good Question
It came into him life, it went out of him truth. It could have been otherwise. The life, his life was a given. without his life he would never have been born. But he was. He took in the life he was born into. He could have spat it out. He devoured it. He swallowed it all. The pain and the comfort. The joy and the sorrow. He treated all to his table. He pulled up a chair and dined with al of life. It was a long impossible supper. He should not have lived. That first little connection to all his source of sustenance was immediately severed. From the beginning, he lived at another's sacrifice. Not everyone had it so good. Sometimes life stops before it ever starts. Sometimes life never starts at all but the days keep rolling over and stamping their wear on the face of the living. When life first started coming out of him as truth, he could have been frightened. He could of been told "shush." Don't ask those questions. Shush, don't think those thoughts. Don't say that. Don't ever mention that again. Let's pretend it never happened. He could have gone along with the pretending, he could have made a game of it until it became an occupation, until he made his living at pretending. But no, he was remarkably unique. His mother said, "oh my son, what an interesting question. I wonder the same things sometimes. Sometimes I have so many questions I'm afraid of becoming one. But I'm not a question and you're not a question. You are good at asking. I don't know how to answer that and that's how I know it is a good question."
Thursday, March 18, 2010
This is Not About My Real Life
This is not about my real life, the one I live on ordinary days. This is about that one, the one just around the corner. The corner I am continually peeking around. I am getting better at sneaking up on it. It is there after all. It’s more than real it is alive. The reason I say it is not about my real life is because I have gone so long limping on the definition. I have confused real for larger. My larger life makes peanuts of the real. My larger life is what I am pressed to pursue but it has
already caught me. I am learning to breathe in its grasp. I am more grateful than I was last week. Last week th real was choking out the larger. The real is a stop sign but the larger is a trampoline. I can bounce into it and out of it and not bother with the wind of the real. My larger life is one I am growing into now that I am less afraid of being big. I say Less but I don’t say Not. I have had to do a lot of talking to myself. I have had to admit questions about the things I used to pretend to know. Pretending is real. Questions are large. One question leads to another and they have friends and constituents. Questions have springs and special devices for slinging me into large territories beyond what I supposed to be real. Real should not be trusted when it slams the door on large. And it will you know. Bam. Sometimes the echo lingers. Questions are the handle. I keep yanking.
already caught me. I am learning to breathe in its grasp. I am more grateful than I was last week. Last week th real was choking out the larger. The real is a stop sign but the larger is a trampoline. I can bounce into it and out of it and not bother with the wind of the real. My larger life is one I am growing into now that I am less afraid of being big. I say Less but I don’t say Not. I have had to do a lot of talking to myself. I have had to admit questions about the things I used to pretend to know. Pretending is real. Questions are large. One question leads to another and they have friends and constituents. Questions have springs and special devices for slinging me into large territories beyond what I supposed to be real. Real should not be trusted when it slams the door on large. And it will you know. Bam. Sometimes the echo lingers. Questions are the handle. I keep yanking.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
What Happens When the Fireball in the Sky Lands in Your Dream?
What happens when the fireball in the sky lands in your dream and you have to listen to its flames? When you have to make sense of the blazing language that climbs up on your tongue and starts it wagging? I’ll tel you what happens, a light gets turned on. All those dark nights turn into summer and you begin to see why the shadows confused you. The fireball doesn’t have to be enormous, it just have to be hot, given the nature of fire you know that it is. You know it can burn you but it won’t. The fire will only burn the things that aren’t needed. Things like shame or fear or regret. Things like I wish I had not, I should have, I missed out on.... Once the fireball lands on your tongue you’ll be like those crazy people in Acts who knew about love. You’ll stop being cold, you’ll think about winter and how it won’t ever freeze you. You’ll realize how ridiculous it is to bundle up your desire. You’ll begin to yearn and stop caring about what is missing and why you can’t have it. You’ll start telling the truth and the feel the fire warm you on the inside where snow used to camp. You’ll act a little crazy when the fireball lands but it will be the kind of crazy that makes sanity jealous. People will circle around you just to stay warm and you won’t run out of blankets. I think the fireball was never meant to hide in the sky. I think it was meant to hide in you and me. It was meant to cause an uproar. To wake us up. To keep us hopping. To make us lie still. To undo us, to put us back together. All of this. All of it. All of that. The whole thing is ours. Its fire and its God and it is crazy and its good and now we can fan the flames and let it burn....let it alarm you. Good morning.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Your Trip to Paradise
At three am,
On a black kettle night,
a yen for Paradise awakens you.
Rising, you pack ridiculous
flimsy clothes -
shirts without sleeves,
pants without legs,
shoes without a hint of protection.
This crime is committed in faith,
committed in passion and a desperation
that sends large boulders flying.
You make your bed, carefully.
In case you don’t return.
In case your private domain
is blundered through
by indiscriminate survivors.
Even bent on Paradise,
you want to leave Perdition
in an ordered state
worthy of a benevolent obituary.
Stepping through the door, the night
hits your face and you take note:
this is not a dream.
The sun, swollen with the liquor
of nocturnal recline,
shows no sign of appearing.
Lifting from the sliver of earth,
you are not alone.
In a square of dark sky,
you see her or him or whoever
the beautiful creature is,
because it is the who of you,
it is the yes of you,
the now and then and hope of you,
the love of you
the desire for you,
the transformed you
after you become the creature
you were fashioned to be.
This astonishing you runs at break neck speed.
But you are not out of breath.
Colored in twilight,
your legs drum the delighted sky.
You are outside of you.
The shell of you is strapped inside
waiting to make your acquaintance.
You study you, amazed.
You are ageless.
Empowered by engines not your own,
you run through endearing weakness.
Past storms meant to grow you wings,
you run through sunflowers
facing the moon,
through rivers of ice flowing uphill to fire,
through yearning
and angst all forgotten.
You run through trees hung fat with
I-can-do-anything-leaves and
you are not pretending in the slightest.
You dive backwards,
your neck arching,
your legs stretching,
your toes pointed to God.
You are dizzy with balance, giddy with peace.
Leaving a trail of shrinking lights,
you think primordial thoughts.
Thoughts of fire, of flood, of fabulous fate.
You are a river undamned by God.
The current is swift, but it is not against you.
Rejoicing and weeping,
a flock of crystal stars fly beneath you.
With wings of diamonds and bone and
feathers of colored surprise,
they make a wind for the transfiguring mill of you.
II
For this trip, only children are permitted
to sit in the exit rows.
In case of a crash, only the children
can open the doors.
It has always been this way.
But only now do you dare remember.
To behold yourself as this child
you envision a lime green shirt, or was it red,
or blue or maybe it was a dotted Swiss dress
with a yellow belt.
You remember kid white gloves,
or bare hands or fingers dipped in sugar.
It makes no difference.
The hands are small and the child is you.
You look down.
You want to know this two legged shape.
It is attached to you.
You are attached to it.
But it is not you.
Your body is just a sentence
that carries the noun of you.
You are a fabulous stuttering phrase
that carries the ill stated truth of you.
But it is never, not ever clear enough.
And now
you remember your former bed,
you remember the warmth of it.
How it felt to be in the arms of it,
how it protested with your every turn,
how the covers were never exactly
as you wanted them to be.
You remember God’s smothered voice,
the feel of your hands against your ears.
In this knowledge,
the knowledge of your small hands
you agree to stop apologizing,
to stop making excuses.
This is a story written for you.
But it is not meant to be written alone.
In the story you wrote alone
you were stuck behind a door,
afraid to try the handle,
afraid to risk its turning.
But the nudge to do so was unmistakable.
All along you’ve questioned the nudge.
God.
God himself explains your hesitation,
your resistance to the soft nudging
has to do with God.
You are afraid to encounter God.
Here in Perdition there is much
to overcome, to improve, to remodel,
destroy, amend, excuse, flatter, impress, refute.
But in Paradise, you arrive at an enduring story.
No need of your fixing, of rehearsed achievements.
In Paradise the water brims with tears
nobody needs to cry.
And the birds here?
The birds derive from angels.
The clocks are clowns and you are hour free.
The cutting wind has dropped its blade
and grown a cotton tongue,
and all the words are waterfalls
and all the dots have i’s.
The shredding cloaks of poverty
are gleaming satin gowns
and broken doors set sail as boats
and oars are pulled by skies.
In Paradise your questions beg
and answers grow like alms.
And yes and no are Siamese twins and
Mondays carry songs.
In Paradise you are who
you are supposed to be
and no one thinks to drown.
At three am,
On a black kettle night,
a yen for Paradise awakens you.
Rising, you pack ridiculous
flimsy clothes -
shirts without sleeves,
pants without legs,
shoes without a hint of protection.
This crime is committed in faith,
committed in passion and a desperation
that sends large boulders flying.
You make your bed, carefully.
In case you don’t return.
In case your private domain
is blundered through
by indiscriminate survivors.
Even bent on Paradise,
you want to leave Perdition
in an ordered state
worthy of a benevolent obituary.
Stepping through the door, the night
hits your face and you take note:
this is not a dream.
The sun, swollen with the liquor
of nocturnal recline,
shows no sign of appearing.
Lifting from the sliver of earth,
you are not alone.
In a square of dark sky,
you see her or him or whoever
the beautiful creature is,
because it is the who of you,
it is the yes of you,
the now and then and hope of you,
the love of you
the desire for you,
the transformed you
after you become the creature
you were fashioned to be.
This astonishing you runs at break neck speed.
But you are not out of breath.
Colored in twilight,
your legs drum the delighted sky.
You are outside of you.
The shell of you is strapped inside
waiting to make your acquaintance.
You study you, amazed.
You are ageless.
Empowered by engines not your own,
you run through endearing weakness.
Past storms meant to grow you wings,
you run through sunflowers
facing the moon,
through rivers of ice flowing uphill to fire,
through yearning
and angst all forgotten.
You run through trees hung fat with
I-can-do-anything-leaves and
you are not pretending in the slightest.
You dive backwards,
your neck arching,
your legs stretching,
your toes pointed to God.
You are dizzy with balance, giddy with peace.
Leaving a trail of shrinking lights,
you think primordial thoughts.
Thoughts of fire, of flood, of fabulous fate.
You are a river undamned by God.
The current is swift, but it is not against you.
Rejoicing and weeping,
a flock of crystal stars fly beneath you.
With wings of diamonds and bone and
feathers of colored surprise,
they make a wind for the transfiguring mill of you.
II
For this trip, only children are permitted
to sit in the exit rows.
In case of a crash, only the children
can open the doors.
It has always been this way.
But only now do you dare remember.
To behold yourself as this child
you envision a lime green shirt, or was it red,
or blue or maybe it was a dotted Swiss dress
with a yellow belt.
You remember kid white gloves,
or bare hands or fingers dipped in sugar.
It makes no difference.
The hands are small and the child is you.
You look down.
You want to know this two legged shape.
It is attached to you.
You are attached to it.
But it is not you.
Your body is just a sentence
that carries the noun of you.
You are a fabulous stuttering phrase
that carries the ill stated truth of you.
But it is never, not ever clear enough.
And now
you remember your former bed,
you remember the warmth of it.
How it felt to be in the arms of it,
how it protested with your every turn,
how the covers were never exactly
as you wanted them to be.
You remember God’s smothered voice,
the feel of your hands against your ears.
In this knowledge,
the knowledge of your small hands
you agree to stop apologizing,
to stop making excuses.
This is a story written for you.
But it is not meant to be written alone.
In the story you wrote alone
you were stuck behind a door,
afraid to try the handle,
afraid to risk its turning.
But the nudge to do so was unmistakable.
All along you’ve questioned the nudge.
God.
God himself explains your hesitation,
your resistance to the soft nudging
has to do with God.
You are afraid to encounter God.
Here in Perdition there is much
to overcome, to improve, to remodel,
destroy, amend, excuse, flatter, impress, refute.
But in Paradise, you arrive at an enduring story.
No need of your fixing, of rehearsed achievements.
In Paradise the water brims with tears
nobody needs to cry.
And the birds here?
The birds derive from angels.
The clocks are clowns and you are hour free.
The cutting wind has dropped its blade
and grown a cotton tongue,
and all the words are waterfalls
and all the dots have i’s.
The shredding cloaks of poverty
are gleaming satin gowns
and broken doors set sail as boats
and oars are pulled by skies.
In Paradise your questions beg
and answers grow like alms.
And yes and no are Siamese twins and
Mondays carry songs.
In Paradise you are who
you are supposed to be
and no one thinks to drown.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
How to End World Hunger
Consider the flower.
Don’t pick it.
Not yet.
Don’t make it into a movie.
Don’t make it go to work.
Paint it.
Make it elegant.
Make it tall.
Give it a shadow.
Purple kissed in blue.
Make the petals yellow.
Make them look like sun.
Balance it on one leg.
Give it a skirt of sand.
Be a woman with an empty pail.
A woman waiting.
A woman sitting on a white ladder.
Be a man rising from a white sea.
Find an umbrella.
Paint rain.
Paint a billowing white dress.
Paint it on yourself.
Paint the wind. Give it language.
Speak for the wind.
Speak for the woman
Speak for yourself.
Speak for the man rising from the white sea.
Make his language reluctant.
Make him want to stay.
Paint ears on the man.
Paint words on the lips of the woman.
Return to the flower.
Return to the man.
Return to the white sea churning.
Paint the woman walking.
Paint her stepping through the sand.
Paint the man pursuing.
Paint the woman praying.
Paint them together.
Paint them as friends.
Paint them eating a petal.
Paint the woman held by the man.
Paint the man held by the woman.
Paint the sea devoid of salt.
Make the water yield.
Make it spill upon the shore.
Paint the woman digging,
her hands plunging through the earth.
Paint the man beside her.
Paint him digging also.
Paint the need for beauty.
Paint the need for food.
Paint the man and the woman tugging.
Paint the flower prostrate.
Paint the flower felled.
Paint a storm of banished seeds.
Paint a crop of doom.
Paint a crop of angst and war.
Paint the reign of greed.
Paint the woman weeping.
Paint the man distraught.
Paint a field of fallow earth.
Paint a sky of brown.
Paint the woman sans her gown.
Paint the lost and drowned.
Paint the starving children,
Paint the forests slain.
Paint the earthquakes.
Paint the greed.
Paint the birth of grace.
Paint the sky returned to blue.
Paint the green as proof.
Paint the sprout of tender shoots.
Paint the clap of clouds.
Be a man with open palms.
Be a woman bowed.
Plant the seeds that grow to love
and never eat alone.
Don’t pick it.
Not yet.
Don’t make it into a movie.
Don’t make it go to work.
Paint it.
Make it elegant.
Make it tall.
Give it a shadow.
Purple kissed in blue.
Make the petals yellow.
Make them look like sun.
Balance it on one leg.
Give it a skirt of sand.
Be a woman with an empty pail.
A woman waiting.
A woman sitting on a white ladder.
Be a man rising from a white sea.
Find an umbrella.
Paint rain.
Paint a billowing white dress.
Paint it on yourself.
Paint the wind. Give it language.
Speak for the wind.
Speak for the woman
Speak for yourself.
Speak for the man rising from the white sea.
Make his language reluctant.
Make him want to stay.
Paint ears on the man.
Paint words on the lips of the woman.
Return to the flower.
Return to the man.
Return to the white sea churning.
Paint the woman walking.
Paint her stepping through the sand.
Paint the man pursuing.
Paint the woman praying.
Paint them together.
Paint them as friends.
Paint them eating a petal.
Paint the woman held by the man.
Paint the man held by the woman.
Paint the sea devoid of salt.
Make the water yield.
Make it spill upon the shore.
Paint the woman digging,
her hands plunging through the earth.
Paint the man beside her.
Paint him digging also.
Paint the need for beauty.
Paint the need for food.
Paint the man and the woman tugging.
Paint the flower prostrate.
Paint the flower felled.
Paint a storm of banished seeds.
Paint a crop of doom.
Paint a crop of angst and war.
Paint the reign of greed.
Paint the woman weeping.
Paint the man distraught.
Paint a field of fallow earth.
Paint a sky of brown.
Paint the woman sans her gown.
Paint the lost and drowned.
Paint the starving children,
Paint the forests slain.
Paint the earthquakes.
Paint the greed.
Paint the birth of grace.
Paint the sky returned to blue.
Paint the green as proof.
Paint the sprout of tender shoots.
Paint the clap of clouds.
Be a man with open palms.
Be a woman bowed.
Plant the seeds that grow to love
and never eat alone.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
What stands in the way of prayer?
I think my difficulty in coming to Jesus in prayer, and when I say Jesus I mean also The Father and the Holy Spirit, has to do with mistaken identity. Not only my own but God's identity is hidden from me. To give an almost comic example - and one I often reflect, is the allogory taken from a short story called "Three Lessons from the Amazonian Jungle."
Renato, a character in Pamuel Houston’s book, Waltzing the Cat, tells an interesting story that speaks to this phenomena of misunderstanding. "Monarch butterflies make blue jays throw up. That is how monarch butterflies keep from being eaten. But over the years, by a process known as Batesian mimicry, several other butterfly species have learned how to color themselves to look like the monarch every time a blue jay comes around. The problem arises when a blue jay’s first experience is with an impostor butterfly. If the blue jay doesn’t throw up that first time, he will spend the rest of his life not knowing which are the safe butterflies and which are the ones that will make him sick."
In this I see my problem as so clear. I keep mistaking God for what I know of others. My experience with others, their experiences with me invariably come down to disappointment and confusion. Of course, it is not always disappointment. I have many wonderful (if I can use an overworked word) experiences with others. (meaningful, profound, healing, deep, truthful, etc.) But those experiences are limited. I am, for the most part, (hopefully) behaving with civility. My raw neglect of others, my propensity to gussy up and garner praise always creeps into the picture. But going to God, (the God of Abraham), going to Jesus (the manifestation of God is human form - fully God and fully human), I have nothing with which to impress. And if I step into the nothingness with which to impress, for even a glimpse of his merciful love, I am flattened by the absence of any way to appropriately respond. How do I show appreciation? How do I love back? Enough??? Of course, I can't EVER.
This a fragment of the thinking that comes into play when the question of "why don't we pray more?" arises.
Renato, a character in Pamuel Houston’s book, Waltzing the Cat, tells an interesting story that speaks to this phenomena of misunderstanding. "Monarch butterflies make blue jays throw up. That is how monarch butterflies keep from being eaten. But over the years, by a process known as Batesian mimicry, several other butterfly species have learned how to color themselves to look like the monarch every time a blue jay comes around. The problem arises when a blue jay’s first experience is with an impostor butterfly. If the blue jay doesn’t throw up that first time, he will spend the rest of his life not knowing which are the safe butterflies and which are the ones that will make him sick."
In this I see my problem as so clear. I keep mistaking God for what I know of others. My experience with others, their experiences with me invariably come down to disappointment and confusion. Of course, it is not always disappointment. I have many wonderful (if I can use an overworked word) experiences with others. (meaningful, profound, healing, deep, truthful, etc.) But those experiences are limited. I am, for the most part, (hopefully) behaving with civility. My raw neglect of others, my propensity to gussy up and garner praise always creeps into the picture. But going to God, (the God of Abraham), going to Jesus (the manifestation of God is human form - fully God and fully human), I have nothing with which to impress. And if I step into the nothingness with which to impress, for even a glimpse of his merciful love, I am flattened by the absence of any way to appropriately respond. How do I show appreciation? How do I love back? Enough??? Of course, I can't EVER.
This a fragment of the thinking that comes into play when the question of "why don't we pray more?" arises.
Saturday, February 20, 2010
I thought I
tossed the magic bean.
Threw it deftly
past my shoulder.
I took credit.
Impossibly it flew.
Out through strained glass.
Caught by dirt.
Cooked by sun.
Served by rain.
That there was life at all
was not enough to make me believe.
I needed grace for that.
I didn’t mind the hoeing,
the sweating,
the building.
I loved my castle in the sky.
Goliath arrived singing,
sweetly pursuing,
eventually bellowing,
bruise over promising bruise.
Then gone.
Golden hens and golden hatchlings
could not quell his lumbering greed.
Oh the grace that backed me down and down and down.
A humbling descent.
The sky all push,the ground all pull.
I praise the ax that cut me toppling to the truth.
could not quell his lumbering greed.
Oh the grace that backed me down and down and down.
A humbling descent.
The sky all push,the ground all pull.
I praise the ax that cut me toppling to the truth.
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