The Clock Ticks, The Peacock Warns, The Butterfly Soars

In every man’s heart there is a secret nerve that answers to the vibrations of beauty – Christopher Morley

Stop Thief

She wasn’t always so fluid.
She thinks.
This is a thought,
Not a sentence.
By desperate she means in danger of leaking out of herself.
People do all the time, she thinks, remembering all the puddles.
This goes beyond incontinence, she thinks.
This is a thought,
Not a sentence.
The sentence would go like this: I hate dreaming I am somewhere and waking up somewhere else.
(If it was a sentence, and if the dreaming place rippled and the waking place caged.))

Write it out. Write it out.
This is an encouragement.
Writing seems monumental until she considered the weight of a thought.
She often had such enormous thoughts they fell on her chest like stones
Writing seems dull until she understood the sharp edge of an undisclosed thought.
Once she cut off her own leg with one.
For years she limped looking rather than writing.
Of course as it is with all lost things, they tend to turn up in the places no one looks.
This is reality.
Who wants to go there? She asks. This valid question holds the key to the cage.
No one answers.
Why? She asks, folding the key into a cork screw.
No one hears it.
Write it out. Write it out.
Bring others into your undiscovered world.
They have it too. It is not up to them. It is up to you.
Delete.
Correction:
Up to me.

It’s enormous.
It’s dark.
It circles around her.
It takes time, she thinks, picturing a clock propelled by a million swiped legs.
Oh there, she shouts with a ball point pen.
I recognize that one. It’s mine, she writes, feeling the loss of her limp.

Falling from Grace to Grace

A Call To Freedom

She sleeps on a bed of heritage roses,

Awakens to a whispered invitation -

                                            Come unto me

Her ears cup the words as she tries out her mouth.

A rusty bugle nests her sleeping-bird tongue.

In the space of her silence she hears other voices,

each one a withering accusation -

You knew…

You did…

You are…

She raises the bugle to her lips, the bird flutters its wings –

But

But

But

I knew not…

I didn’t…

I am not…

Fear rustles her story into silence.

On a gust of the blue wind’s holy blowing, the invitation returns unwearied -

                                                 Come Unto Me

The bird is weary, the bird is weak.

She places the bugle in a glass curio,

secrets herself in a pleasing summer hat.

Shovel in hand, she loses herself in the heritage roses.

No thank you, I’m fine.

No worries.

No trouble at all.

Don’t think a thing of it.

It’s nothing.

Really.

Nothing at all. 

                                                    Come Unto Me

Against the scandalous invitation she cottons her ears with feathers,

waters the hat with burgundy wine.

Sleeping, working, planning, sleeping, working, planning,

shoveling through the years, hoping to earn her voice.

                                                Come unto Me –

What perseverance, what faithfulness in this long-suffering invitation.

The blue enhances, the holy blowing pursues.

But still, as fears silences a song

she hides in hesitation, cows to worming rumors -

confusing her past, obscuring her futures.

                                                Come unto Me –

Struggling to go up, she falls down,

down to the floor of herself,

right through the door of herself,

backwards, sideways then onto her childhood knees.

Unabridged, uncondensed, she lands on the edge of

what-could-have-been and what-can-still-be.

                                               Come Unto Me –

Retrieving the bugle, releasing the bird, she makes her reply.

I hurt blood.

I’m weak wax.

I white flag surrender. 

                                             Come Unto Me

Easter morning she awakes to the scent of lily-clad words,

She rests in her beautiful ruined story.

The current of myth takes stock of the truth

And judgement heels its curse at the cross.

                                                     I am

                                                     I am

                                                    I am

Your Rest.

Refusing Despair

Refusing Despair, we surrendered to Hope. We remembered our ruined stories and marked the disasters along the way. Returning to scenes of misconceptions, we nearly drowned for fear of their depths. But Faith carried us forward. We opened our eyes. We unstopped our ears. Truth showed us grief we ignored, crimes we witnessed. We came to believe life had always been unmanageable alone but now we embraced the friendship of clarity. Using the mirror of our memories, we found relics of our desires and unearthed them with our prayers. In the spring of our returning we found the children we suffered to be. Discovering them isolated, cold and hungry, we embraced them, soothed them with listening, cradled them with understanding. We told them what we ourselves had forgotten and they had never heard – “Don’t be afraid. Fear robs. Hope protects.” We became new children that day, chattering like birds, receiving our bread every morning, drinking God’s peace with the moon.

Get Carried Away (or Statement of Rights)

We have the right to get carried away by love, to celebrate the whole of creation, to smile, to pray, to bear witness as to what it means to be created in the image of God. We have the right to praise The Creator, to keep our eyes open, to examine our intentions, to cherish mercy, to stand against evil, to sit in solitude, to sing in community, to be amazed at children, to respect the elderly, to walk around flowers, to expose cruelty, to cling to faith, to practice gratitude, to say we’re sorry. We have the right to speak the truth, admit confusion, strive for simplicity, accept God’s liberation from chaos. We have the right to refuse the shame of our need, admit pain, to ask questions, celebrate joy and the freedom to live with an eye toward the dignity bestowed unearned upon us by God Almighty.