I felt him sailing away
Last summer,
Going back
To places he knew, but we didn’t.
If you think demons don’t have power,
You are wrong.
We begged him not to go.
His rope broke free from our shore,
And he is over the horizon now. Our world is so much
Darker today. He took his lantern with him.
Friend. Ambassador. Encourager.
I will hear his laughter echo in my dreams
For a long time. I know he is in
A better place. But I am not.
I am still here.
I was
Wrong. I thought
It was about leaving
Breadcrumbs…like Hansel and Gretel…but
Following those breadcrumbs will only lead you
To the witch.
The grackles have eaten the damn things anyway.
The Way
Forward can only be
Found in imagining
With Jesus…
Asking…
Begging, pleading with Jesus
For a Way
Forward.
Imagining
With Jesus…
The real one, the Living One…
The Way
Forward.
There is
No other way
Forward.
I am sad today
Because I feel something that I have loved
Slip away from me. It is just beyond me. Always, it seems. Just beyond me.
I’ve heard it sing. The rustle of its wings in the brush has startled me. I just can’t
Find the simple word to tell myself and you what
It is. I only know its song
Is beautiful.
There is a grief. It is always there among
The flowers along the road.
So many illusions knifed down in these fields. The joy is never whole.
There never comes a day when
Every stone is plucked from the pasture
So that the rows grow straight, and the plow cuts
Gracefully.
My friend hasn’t spoken to me of it. I don’t know
Who I am to him. But from across this gap, I could feel something
Break. What broke in him today, is broken in me, too.
It was a different rod that broke it…there are so
Many that get picked up and thrown. “Count the cost”, the teacher said. But
How could we have possibly known how deep that slash would be?
And if, one day, we finally get to where that song is sung in full chorus, will there be anything left
In us to even recognize its tune anymore?
These years are
Not enough. There
Is so much I’d hoped
To teach you, to tell
You. And yet,
You will choose
Your teachers and tellers
Now. My place, if it was ever really mine, has
Changed. Instead
Of being
The teacher and the teller,
I am
Now the listener
Who has grown old. But
In my age I have grown
Proud of all you have
Become. Eighteen years and now
You fly. You must.
But visit me
From time to time
And I will learn to
Listen well. And I will
Love you always. These years
Are not enough, and they
Passed by so very fast.
If I knew
A way (or away)
To make it all
Right,
That is what I would do.
If I could take
The scratches out of things, I would.
I know a way…
But it doesn’t
Make everything
Right.
It just makes it so I can
Breathe sometimes.
I remember Ben. That is
My way. Remembering.
– For _____ (Ben’s mom) , May 2o, 2008
34,675 times the sun has risen for you, though
You may struggle to recall all its shades and hues.
The day rose and set on ninety-five winters,
Springs and summers and falls
Again. Furrowed deeper now than
Before. Wiser. More sure…and less.
Days and days and days in a row, the sun cast
Two shadows together. Now? Only one,
Who sees the days crest differently,
Knowing that neither winter,
Nor even the sun can separate
What God has bound together.
For now, though, let’s laugh;
For we know that the one still
Casts two shadows
Together.
-For Jane, April 14, 2013
Darkening
Darkening,
A soot-black fog
Creeping, enfolding, closing in on an already graying sky,
Hate gained a body and cut its way
Into hallways, headlines…and lifelines…and so much more.
Are you taking your name off of us, Lord?
Have we so let you down?
Signs of the times…the in-between times;
Is this the world’s last gasp, mocking demons
Rushing to the barricades
In bitter rebellion against you?
Or is it just another gasp?
Cain found a way out of Nod,
Enraged and blaming and armed with rifle rounds.
“And he killed him”…them. The world rages and spits
And fires bullets into tiny children…its own image spilling out in pools
Upon
The tile and grout. Seeking what? What does Cain want?
To stop
You? Has Herod set his minions loose upon us
Again in this Advent, killing our children to get at yours?
I had hoped
That ours were yours. Have you taken your name off of us?
Did you then?
Choked out through tears, your own murdered child’s plea
Barely can be heard
Among the wails of shattered mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters… and dreams
Echoing from Ramallah to Newtown,
“On earth as it is in heaven.”
I was
Wrong. I thought
It was about leaving
Breadcrumbs…like Hansel and Gretel…but
Following those breadcrumbs will only lead you
To the witch.
The grackles have eaten the damn things anyway.
The Way
Forward can only be
Found in imagining
With Jesus…
Asking…
Begging, pleading with Jesus
For a Way
Forward.
Imagining
With Jesus…
The real one, the Living One…
The Way
Forward.
There is
No other way
Forward.
When I was young, I wished
To fly, and I glared with the greenest
Envy at those who were born with wings.
Now? Hahahahaha. I long only now
To one day walk truly and well;
To give thanks purely for the shelter
That the earth provides;
To wonder like a child at the author of
The flight
Of others; and to drink in deeply all
The colors of the path
I was forged to trod. Once
One sees even a graceful hawk crash to earth, or merely
Struggle against the frigid wind, it seems quite stupid
To ask why some can fly and others
Not.
“What have you to do with us?!?!”, asked the Legions of the Master,
Frantically.
Strikingly, their darker meaning like children doing mischief, “What are you
Doing here?!?! You’re early!
It is not The Hour.
No bud has yet sprung, and the earth is still
Ours. Our game of death is not yet over!”
Oh, when spring comes early! Like Great News,
An early spring reminds even the addled that
Though winter…Death… still has its grip
On things, spring still arrives
At its hour, death’s game ends, and new life
Springs forth from beneath the blankets of hoarfrost. The victory trumpet
Of the Sandhill Crane high over head reminds us all
That neither we nor death decide
Spring’s arrival. And no matter
How long or short
The winter, no matter
How terrible its bitter grip, there is always spring.
There is always spring. Early
Sometimes, as if to say, “The tomb has always been
Empty. The field has never been
Yours.”
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