Letters Along the Way

From a Brother

2011-08-19T13:01:00.001-04:00

Something is trying to come to life inside of me. No, not something, but someone, a person. The person is me, but the person is not yet me. That person is not me, but the person is already living in me. The person is beyond me.

I was made to be that person. The person is for me and is meant to be of me, but the person is not from me because that person is not who I am now. That person is who I will be. That person is more than me.

I am Anthony. I am only Anthony. But I will be Anthony because my life depends on it. I will be Anthony because Anthony is going to be a person.

What is it to you? Who am I to you?

The being and the becoming, the life here and the life to come: God has everything to do with all of this. This is all I care about, so I cast my cares onto God. Jesus Christ is God in person, and so I follow Jesus to be, in Christ, a person. Practically, to know God, the maker of my person, and to know Jesus Christ, God in person, I aim to walk in the footsteps of Francis of Assisi, and to walk like Francis of Assisi, who was a consummate person for others.

So that is what it is to you. Who am I to you? A person for you. Your brother, I hope.

This blog is not a diary. It is something else. It is not the place to read about being-becoming a brother. This is where you can read about it.

Call and Response

2011-08-18T11:32:00.002-04:00

"My young adulthood is coming to an end." But not your youth.

"I am undertaking an expedition." Ridiculous. You are a moviegoer, and your life is a film festival.

"There is a path, and I see it leads me straight and true." This is no time for tourists. There is a person who must walk straight and true, or there is no person at all.

"A sign of contradiction ... a fool for Christ." And a legend in your own mind.

"There is a book within, and it has got to come out." Aye, ordinary words. What low ambition.

"She said, 'Do what you love.' " Do Who you love. Love does not know What.

"I said, "I will do works of love." Love longs for a human Being.

"O God, come to our assistance." You mean, "O God, come to our insistence."

"God helps those who help themselves." Amen, they already have their reward.

"Healing Spirit, set us free." The free are beyond victory and praise.

"A prayer in distress." Indeed. Hopefully, without despair.

"They're looking for answers." Don't answer. Don't tell them anything. Give them a response.

Untitled

2011-07-29T22:07:00.003-04:00

Author's note: This poem was written in May 2008. The electronic document was lost soon after. Thought to have been lost for good, a printed copy was rediscovered recently among miscellaneous papers.

Mary rejoices under sunshine
on a bed of grass
in warmth
with a daydream,

love of lands
beyond the bondage of clammy flesh and chilly blood,
further than your hasty hands of fellowship can reach,
beseeching her to embark again,

to find, to feel, to follow something as smoky as a spirit,
wreathing a few beautiful souls
ringed in glints of burgundy, cream, and gold.

She is moving. I cannot pretend.
We are sitting at the river listening to the hushing water lapping darkly,
and I can also feel the currents carrying her blood.

Hearts open as they close and close as they open,
so that every breath of life may pass into the streams of our bodies
and the exhaustion of death-breaths may pass from them.

Mary lets her joy-kissed happiness come and go to life.
I hold my breath and stiffen. How stupid.

We linger at the table of our last light meal, an indulgence granted.
Write wonderfully, she says --
with beauty and power and meaning, she says --
but I cannot, do not, want to write the stuff of dreams undreamt,
I say with penitence.
Meanwhile, Mary's face takes light,
soft shapes of consolation, forbidding sobriety.
The trick is to inspire. Inspirare. Inspire.

Even accidental gifts set hearts in motion.

Flowers in the Harbor

2011-06-04T23:04:00.002-04:00

There are flowers in the harbor
Rainbows flutter in the breeze
As lovely as they are
Would that we had no need of these

Bells ring soft, your name is spoken
Someone prays with a guitar
No one names the spirit here
The spirit isn't what we are

No demons will disturb us here
But we can't stay here in the park
No sooner than we've come
We scatter to the brightness of the dark

Living speak here to the living
No one knows the dead but those who died
If we had half the courage to die as will to kill
The fronts would fall from every side

Women blessed me -- blessed my anger
But they couldn't balm my soul
Priestesses, O can you pray
For prisoners in the endless hole?

Many, far too many, are the faces
Known to me down by the sea
Few, oh, precious few the more
Beyond my count sleep under me

A man of wire flats a bugle
We surrender to the czar
A ransom for futurity
The future isn't what we are

There are flowers in the harbor
Rainbows flutter in the breeze
As lovely as they are
Would that we had no need of these.

Evangeline

2011-05-30T00:29:00.003-04:00

Today we've got a way to go
I love it, if you want to know
You're back to life in front of death
I thank the stars with every breath

I saw your face down in your lap
My eyes could blurt, my heart could clap
The track is tricky till the end
Don't ride this train without a friend

You'll never know the hour you're being seen
I'm gonna put us in the movie scene,
Evangeline.

I came to you to make a home
And lived in your inspired poem
To touch your flesh would be absurd
How wise of you to make it word

The sun brings everything to bud
The sun is simmering my blood
You wait inside the cool of shade
It's hard to believe that you were made

You know me, woman, but by other means
We are the strangest lovers ever seen,
Evangeline.

I think we've been this way before
You make me sure of it the more
You smile -- O how my soul would burst
The last is better than the first

The days are turning to the midnight dream
You're gonna rise a precious body sheen,
Evangeline.

The Deaf-Mutes

2011-05-29T23:36:00.002-04:00

I need you to forgive me

You can't hear me

I can look at you

Don't want you to

Who are you
Intruding traceless

Faceless

I won't give you

Then I won't see you

Then I'll wait and write about you

And you'll lie too

Show me

I have told you

No you didn't

Stay

I'm here

You don't know

Come back

It's too late
I'm gone with a wave

To hell with yesterday
O can't you see what I say

Forgive me

I said give me

A Treasury of Wind

2010-08-30T12:22:00.005-04:00

Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you.
I command treasuries of wind.

God will say to me, the dust:
"Why have you forgotten me?
Why do you go mourning,
Oppressed by the foe?"

If you want to become what you ought to be,
Then you better learn to fear your misanthropy.

Sleep through your dreams, and you will wake up to your nightmares.

I want the kingdom of God, not Augustine's seed.
Truly there is no use in crying over spilled milk.

Wait for some things. But for other things, never wait for them again. You are not one in waiting.

Proof is not enough. You must transubstantiate your claim.

Pirate! Whose song are you singing?

"Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!"
It will be done, friend; only sing also for your prey, for you are hunting yourself.

You are not a writer. You are a spy, a mail thief, an interceptor of messages that creative genius intended for other eyes, ears, and minds to receive. The least you can do is become an excellent thief.

"And was Jerusalem builded here
Among these dark Satanic mills?"
Look for the cornerstone, and you will know.

Another night on your own
No urge to go home
Your friends are strangers on the way
On a fast red line
To pull you
Bearing your burdens
Always singing your way into abstractions
Talking about God
Speaking to no God
It's colder than the summer ought to be
I've lost the magic left in me.

On a Cold Beach

2010-07-28T17:16:00.003-04:00

Stuck in the step
Between prayer and later
On a cold beach

Painting my feelings
In oils and jams
With picky fingers

Counting up the grains
And down the time
Weathering clay to bone

Some fool wants to silo
The dungy leavings
Of my barnyard mind

Oh, don't you feel so small
When you wave to the bloody sea
On a cold beach?

Nocturne

2010-07-20T23:41:00.002-04:00

You've never been depressed
You've never tried to bounce
A concrete ball
Get up or down
Who ever saved a boring frown
Go live on a bridge
Go play in traffic
Fear is a cure for static
He who takes an oath upon a dollar
Will swear upon a dime
The days will come when you're too poor
To spend even time
There's wool to scratch your back
A pillow for your chin
And shaky dreams to put your shaken images in:
Short blond hair
Warm lip cushions
Gravity's living daughter is silently grasping
To pull you under into holy matter
The antiquity of spirituality
The geology of soul
Come, oh, come, boy
Down the caving hole
To the pips of moons
To the frosty air
Windy windy waves of water
Lashing where the squalling storm of baptism never ends
Oh mercy, oh me
See the eunuchs in the street
And they're giving you a chance, too
Buy the beggar's banquet feast
Peopled with people
Symbols that crash like cymbals
And break into fire hear fire dear fire.

Loser's Blues

2010-07-18T14:43:00.003-04:00

Lose the blues
They said lose the blues

Heads they win
Blues you lose
Heads they win
Blues you lose

Don't save yer money
Gotta save yer soul
Don't save yer money
Gotta save yer soul

Lose the blues
Lose the blues
They said get the green
And lose the blues

Gotta live for the body
Live for the body
Live for the body
Live what you know
You don't know no soul
You don't know no soul
You don't know no soul

You gotta choose
You gotta lose the blues
You gotta choose
You gotta lose the blues

All I got to lose
All I got to lose
All I got to lose
Tellin' me to choose
What I got to lose
Tellin' me to choose
What I got to lose

Don't wanna, mama, wanna lose the blues
Don't wanna, mama, wanna lose the blues

Done lost a woman
Haven't got a home
Don't got bad religion
My friends are few
Done lost a woman
Haven't got a home
Don't got bad religion
My friends are few

Up come the devil
Say up come the devil
Up jump a devil
Up jump a devil

He say lose the lose
Lose the lose he say
Lose the lose
Lose the lose

Woe-is-a-me-bop
Woe-is-a-me-bop
Woe-is-a-me-bop
Woe-is-a-me-bop

Don't wanna, mama, wanna lose the blues
Don't wanna, mama, wanna lose the blues

Gimme rock cross fire
Dove harp boogie
Gimme rock cross fire
Dove harp boogie

Gonna be a virgin
Soon as you stop touchin'
Gonna stop drinkin'
Soon as you stop pourin'

Boy gonna win no sin all in
Boy gonna win no sin all in
Gonna sin all win boy in
All sin gonna in
Boy gonna lose the blues
Lose the blues
Lose the blues

Why don't you leave me alone
Ain't got a thing of my own

Lose the blues
Lose the blues

Why don't you leave me alone
Ain't got a thing of my own.

89 Degrees

2010-06-30T22:49:00.002-04:00

Up, up and under the roof, in sweat and sticky dirt
Getting hard to sleep, don't wanna see that dream
Up eighty-nine degrees, another few might hurt

I don't wanna like you, now love me do
I don't wanna like you, now love me do
Well now, what you said, now what you gonna do

Got your bag in hand, time to turn your cheek
Got your bag in hand, time to turn your cheek
You've been going so long, been standing still for weeks

Ain't a fox or birdie -- where you gonna go
Ain't a fox or birdie -- where you gonna go
Well I will go to the desert, ain't none to lay me low

What's the matter, woman, did you lead him on
Said what's the matter, woman, did you lead him on
They're all drunk in Cana -- the hour's come and gone

Got no use for money, only made me poor
Got no use for money, only made me poor
It's eighty-nine degrees, don't let it rise no more

Hey hey oh my Jesus, how long John be
Said hey hey oh my Jesus, how long John be
It ain't none of your business -- you're gonna follow me.

Apologies for My Desire

2010-06-08T01:22:00.002-04:00

We're on the way and up the bend
I'm wondering where these journeys end
We're walking where the water swept
I feel convicted every step

You think that no one calls to me
I know my truth -- now set me free
I'm comfortable in my own skin
You'll never change the shape I'm in

The time we spent was no mistake
We know the turns we have to make
They aren't easy, could be hard
Our roads were made to drift apart

You're gonna do what you will do
I'm gonna go on leaving you
We're wiser when we never meet
Our history must not repeat

I thought I had some more to say
My unborn son just died today
Take back your tablet and your chalk
It isn't right for us to talk

O friend, why is it you require
Apologies for my desire
Of gods and men, to each their own
I'm gonna mount the golden throne

This city ain't enough for me
I'm giving you the city key
I'm soaring up the empty sky
I won't remember how to cry.

Steal My Heart

2010-05-31T21:48:00.003-04:00

We prayed until we prayed no more
And dared to say God closed the door
The church is dark this Sunday night
And now I'm fixing for a fight

For longer than I should have done
I used to see you in the sun
The burn is gone, the itch remains
I'm peeling off a layer of pain

My lips are sealed -- I vow they'll never part
You'll never know the ways you steal my heart.

Take my evacuated place
What was a mess is empty space
My soul is cool, my mind a blank
It's you I have to hate and thank

The fight's begun in fleshy towers
Cities rise and fall in hours
I'll see you in a smile that gleams
On summer days, in rainy dreams

I'm watching you -- don't make a hasty start
You better ask before you steal my heart.

I've crucified and raised the dead
A tongue of fire rests on my head
It's time to hope for bigger dreams
I'm going down to New Orleans

Mind, soul, and strength -- you got each lesser part
You're going to have to work to steal my heart.

All the Women Said Amen

2010-05-23T14:38:00.004-04:00

You turned a trick on a heart of lead
There's nothing you'd refuse to bless
I should thank you for the charity of this unmade bed
But you know it's all a mess
Take back my roof, my nest, my den
And all the women said Amen.

Today I learned you have a face
Maybe tomorrow I'll look in your eyes
Before you vanish into grace
It's a poor thing to be wise
If I can be a man about it I'll write you now and then
And all the women said Amen.

The light was there before the sun arrived
Take me back, dark wind, to the abyss
Living is the truth that will survive
I believe I can do without all of this
I know I did before, though I can't remember when
And all the women said Amen.

It isn't good to be alone -- I'll be alone with you
We'll make pretend our weakness makes us strong
It isn't very smart, but it's the faithful thing to do
We'll get the hang of suffering before long
Then one day we'll be friends
And all the women said Amen.

For years we beat the path around
Until we doubted and forgot from where we came
Until again what twice was lost was found
Who cares if everything still looks the same
Our accidents we shall transcend
And all the women said Amen.

There's a lot of special people like me
We're the only ones, we can't be one in two
You ask the probability --
Say one in one to the infinite power of you
It's karma, charism, destiny, zen
And all the women said Amen.

Hey Me

2010-05-08T22:48:00.002-04:00

Hey me
Don't tempt me
You ought to know what you ought to be

Hey me
Don't mind me
I'm getting smaller and setting free

The me
You can't be
Get out the way or get in me

Leave me
You're lonely
Peddling a false identity

To me
Not to be
Isn't a question -- a malady

Your me
Is sickly
Poorer and poorer -- an effigy

Of me
Lost meanly
Swallowing, choking on destiny

My me
Wants truly
You want a you that wants a new me

Not me
The only
First and the last and ultimately

No me
You could be
Evil is but a facsimile

Hey me
You ain't me
Get out the way and let me be

Hey me
You've lost me
Wide is the mouth of victory.

Three Cameos

2010-04-24T15:59:00.003-04:00

Awake while you sleep
He breaks death's dates, and his laughs
Destroy all sickness

Find her in the choir
Singing in the loving tongue
Dancing in rainbows

He doesn't live here
He sweeps the dusty corners
Looking for freedom

Small Coins

2010-04-18T15:19:00.003-04:00

Are you giving your life away, or are you merely giving it up? The difference in prepositions is as great as heaven is from hell.

Withdraw, even from withdrawal!

Never, ever call for destruction. All you know how to do is to destroy. Train all your energy and wit on creation, if you have any wit within you.

Out of the sanctuary and into the street. Leaving your church was easy. You have killed your idols. You have murdered your myth-makers. You are a cut-rate Nietzsche. Bravo. Ah, but you refuse to let go of your cherished community (which is really only a cadre), your sacred space (which is only private property), and your precious safety (which is only the surplus of conquest). Leave the fiction of home all together. Out of the sanctuary and into the street. You will not be saved until you are homeless.

Be set free, even from freedom!

"Follow me." There is no escaping it. Everyone has tried, but no one can get before you.

You are a mindless monk and heartless friar. Do not pretend it is otherwise.

Yesterday your church was a gymnasium. Today it is a hospital. Tomorrow it will be an airport.

You don't want friends. You don't want companions. You want brothers. You also want to leap tall buildings in a single bound.

For as long as you run, the horizon does not grow closer. Think instead about how you will ascend. It's either ascend or run aground.

The journey never starts over.

You said you have nothing to left to give. Rubbish. There is pain, anger, sadness, loneliness, and emptiness. Find a way to give those things away. Or have you given up on these, too?

Eggs and Scorpions

2010-04-04T21:09:00.003-04:00

I am full of things I cannot say. I am traumatized at the empty tomb.

Now I can answer the singer of the spiritual:
Yes, I was there when they crucified my Lord.
I took his hand.
I nailed it to the board.
I even lay with him inside the tomb.
A cooling, fooling, lifeless, wifeless groom.
But then somebody rolled the stone away.
I panicked at the sight -- alone at day!

The women at the tomb are either the greatest messengers the world has ever seen, or the world's most notorious lunatics.
What? Must it be one or the other?

How terrifying it is to worship a God who is there by being not-there.

This year for Easter -- no eggs for me. I have asked for scorpions, and I shall have them.

God, be silent. Do not speak. You are so cold. Your voice would be like a rush of ice water down the neck, freezing the spine. God, be still. Do not touch me. It would mean paralysis. God, leave me alone. Do not love me. Why do you love me? It will be my annihilation.

It is not the cross that gets me. It is the empty tomb. Not the cross, but resurrection. I do not see a risen Christ in the empty tomb. I see a shadow. God is in the shadow, and God is the shadow. Christ is in the abyss. Mark, that minimalist and psychologist, saw it best.

It is no mere stone that covers the tomb of Jesus. It is a heart. A heart of stone? No, this is a body of stone. And God is the sun, burning cracks into this fine firm heaviness. God will not send the fire. The fire dwells within the petrified body. God will turn this rock into fire and leave nothing but fine glassy sand to be carried ruthlessly into the ecstatic air. Oh, that Pentecost might come very soon and consume every poor charcoal soul!

Mary of Magdala, forgive me. I have scoffed at you and all your daughters. You rouse within me intensely conflicted emotions: awe and ingratitude; desire and revulsion; respect and jealousy. Please accept my confession and grant me pardon.

I believe God is alive, fearfully alive. The presence/absence of the empty tomb makes me question how alive I am -- that is, whether I am truly alive in God. The anxiety lies in doubts about my own presence. Where Jesus has gone, do I dare to follow? Not only to the cross, but also beyond crucifixion?

There is something terrifying about a God who is capable of bringing new life out of death. That kind of God is more than love.

I am full of things I cannot say. I am traumatized at the empty tomb.

Grand Canyon

2010-04-03T15:57:00.003-04:00

The man and woman
Smiling at the Grand Canyon
Ring the empty gulf

From the bright plateau
A dread animal's echo
Barking for water

Plummets the canyon
A metallic wave scrapes rock
Two billion years thick

The couple covers
With geologies of uplift
The ancient gorge

The animal sees
The cascading passion
Of breath and running rain

In the dry abyss
Where earth forever swallows
Everybody thirsts.

Behind the Light

2010-03-31T13:10:00.004-04:00

All that we blessed has now been broken
We shared the love that shares the pain
It was a picture-perfect world that floated off
Our fingers into air

Here I stand and do no other
All my life I have remained
But now I see you run, embrace the prodigal
And consecrate despair

Mother, O Father,
Why don't you see me grieve
O Mother, Father,
I won't come back if I leave

I've waited for nothing
I waited, but one is one
I'm running behind the light.

What I wrote, has been written
By many hands across the page
Maybe you can burn the book and wash the wall
You can't unmake the word

Mother, O Father,
God was not God for me
O Mother, Father,
God is still haunting me

I've waited for nothing
I waited, but one is one
I'm running behind the light.

Fool in the Rain

2010-03-16T23:55:00.003-04:00

Ten billion crystals of ice in the sky
The lowly and lucky, they fled to get dry
Some of the sainted turned their face to the storm
To trample the dragon and spit on the worm
They conquered the city with spirit and art
Then one deserted -- the peace fell apart
The cancerous cell, the weakest link in the chain
Betrayed he was nothing but a fool in the rain.

A man at roadside said "I'm gonna die"
The fool looked at him and said "You're telling a lie"
Repeating his sentence the man spoke his breadth
An eclipse in his eye, a sting in his breath
He shuffled his feet, he glared two more times
The poor have a right to judge the rich for their crimes
Wade in the water, but don't be so vain
To trouble the water like a fool in the rain.

The money is running out, no time on his hands
Living on credit, no supplies, no demands
He's breaking away from the rats in the race
The living is easy when you're standing in place
It seems to be simple, it seems to be true
But sooner and sooner the debts will come due
When he comes a-beggin' for his soul to regain
Don't spend all your pity on a fool in the rain.

Beatrices teased him at the top of the hill
He married Lucinda, adultered with Lil
So many women in the eye of his mind
And so many more that his heart left behind
They wish him no ill, in fact they wish him all right
None of them knew him, but someone else might
They're waiting for daylight to break on his pain
You can't see the tears of a fool in the rain.

He's telling you something as true as he knows
We all take an error as far as it goes
Staring at dead ends, most will turn on their track
When he is ended, he brings the end back
All his adventures are sideshows for God
Spoiling the children and sparing the rod
Now take it on faith -- you've heard the refrain --
Don't get in the way of a fool in the rain.

Unknown Friends

2010-03-13T22:28:00.004-05:00

Tonight
There is no one, no one
Within a hundred thousand miles
Or a hundred years of here
That I want to be with
But you

And I
Fear the cold empty rain
Flying on the black winds, pressing
Me forward away from a home
Less than I fear a word
A name

A face
With a cry and lightning
Tumbling into my bosom
To dig the pit of my desire
And bid me to fill it
Alone

With all
The dirty unknown friends
Of God. Oh, invisible Love!
Why, when I beg one friend for me,
Would you send myriads
Like these?

Riddles and Blessings

2010-03-12T22:24:00.005-05:00

"The beauty that will save the world is the love that shares the pain." That is the kind of wisdom I don't dare speak. That is the kind of wisdom most people never have the authority to speak. Those who do, they do not need to utter such words. They speak the wisdom with their lives. They die young, or alone, and most likely forgotten. But they die in God.

When God comes to your assistance, it is not only your prayers that have been answered, but also countless other prayers prior to, concurrent with, and beyond your moment of deliverance. Think about how the answers to your prayers are delivered. Then remember this: your greatest and most ordinary calling is to be someone else's answered prayers.

Christians are not gravediggers. They are not mountaineers, either. Primarily, they are farmers.

Your pain is not a delusion, but your illusions magnify it.

Talking is not a cure, but conversation is a healer.

Say what you mean. Let even your riddles be straightforward.

Let us be clear that blessings are not always clear. Your happiness is not proof of blessing. Vindications do not guarantee blessing, either. Sometimes all you have is a weary feeling in the calm of night.

Do not resist when fatigue draws you down. When boredom bears down, fight like the devil.

You are poor -- of this, at least, you are certain. Rejoice in this blessing.

Your uncertainties are also blessed. You are rich.

After Contrition

2010-03-05T23:17:00.002-05:00

Were these last words,
Upon the final wrest of light from night,
I pray they treated not of the temptation;
Fumbled not, thickly, through the faults;
Nor settled guiltily, as a paraffinic film, onto faithful ears.
Eyes sense too poor to see the stain
And lips profane much more the alleged sight.
Now, silently, please send me into the earth
God gave to his own, and put your thoughts aside
With love and sense beneath the good black light.

August 9, 2000

Benediction

2010-02-28T20:15:00.002-05:00

Dear children,
Go quietly into the morning.
Feel the breath of the sky over your little bodies.
Walk with wide steps. Look everywhere.
The light touches everything.
Be like the birds of the trees and call on each other.
Fly with the flock. Nestle when it rains.
Sing like you were born to do.
Be on your way.

Dear men, dear women,
Go silently into the afternoon.
Give names to all the birds and animals.
You will know the words to use.
You will know them because they will sound like the sea
And they will feel like sunfire.
Keep a room for an unexpected guest,
For the ways of life are strange and uncertain.
Be of good cheer, for clouds will always keep moving.

Dear elders,
Go deeply into the night.
Take pain, take rage,
And everything that time cannot assuage.
The helpless tears shed for defeated peace
Fall on the face whose sight will give release.
And when your names are spoken with desire,
Behold the sound unending -- feel your souls ascending,
Becoming birds of fire.

Before the Transfiguration

2010-02-28T16:21:00.003-05:00

You dawned on me while I was null and void: your light
Too strong for sight, you knew a moonchild I would be,
Mourning with the day, retreating into the mind,
Dry fruit beneath a heavy rind. Aloft, away,
That is where your messengers went to leave a word.
I overheard in part, illiterate and poor.
And it was odd -- while falling to the sun-kissed earth,
A fetus in stillbirth, I saved the life of God.
I would believe at first, but now it's best to do,
Invoking you, offending in the faith. I leave
No hope, no fear: I do not love, but yes, I could;
It is very, very good for me to be here.
O come around, my saintly visitors of night;
This time I might remember what you prophesy.

Solitary Thoughts

2010-02-27T22:49:00.003-05:00

"Alone at last." No, hardly last. It has been first, second, and always next. You think this is the way to holy solitude?

Go away only if you bring the world with you. Otherwise, stay where you are and drop everything.

There you go again, hiding your face from the strangers, the neighbors, and even your housemates. At this pace, they will never know you. What if salvation depends on saying hello? Or being said hello to?

When you sit in your room by yourself, eat by yourself, work by yourself, and sleep by yourself, you bring no one closer to solitude. Even the monks have each other. Even the hermits have the sun and the moon and the earth and all its creatures. Thank God it is impossible for you to dream by yourself. The communion of saints, living and glorious, haunts you from depths below your being and brings you closer to solitude.

From behind the door in the room where you have prayed, you wait until the people are gone, and then you go. And you have the nerve to look down upon honest atheists?

Stop thinking about the people you do not love: look at them. And stop looking at the people you watch thoughtlessly: you love them falsely.

You crave attention? Go tell it to the person you want least to see.

You survey your spacious life with satisfaction, as if congratulations were in order, as if you were proud of the achievement: getting yourself enough room to breathe. Sinner, repent! We all must breathe that same air.

The next time someone shows an interest in you that awakens in you a longing far out of proportion to that interest, you will know what it feels like for God to receive your prayer.

To an Infant

2010-02-22T00:04:00.002-05:00

I marvel at you, and it is for nothing you have done.

You are the proof that love creates life. Try as we might all our lives to disprove it, we cannot. We can only unprove. Forgive us when we forget who you are.

I am happy you are being loved. I hope you will always be so loved. Forgive us when we don’t want you to be loved. That’s going to happen a lot.

I am sorry for the world of violence we are throwing you into unaware. I am sorry for all the ways we will teach you how to sin and to believe your sin is good.

You are a reality whose sanctity should never be trifled with, even when one day you yourself will act in a manner unworthy of the mystery of yourself.

You are awakening. May your awakening awaken the rest of us.

May it be a pleasure one day when you discover who you are, and our pleasure to observe your recognition of the fact.

I hope your life is challenging but not impossible. I hope your life is strenuous but not a strain. Let it have tension but not anxiety. Let it brim with vitality but not violence.

May you succeed at being a human being. May you be free to choose your own form of suffering.

Do not be dismayed if you and I fail to make a connection. Do not be discouraged if one day we can no longer speak to each other. You will have family beyond your blood. You will have brothers and sisters in the spirit. The household of God is great, and we do not have to live in the same room. What we cannot forgive of each other, what we are unable to unbind, God will release for us.

I just wrote the word “God.” You do not know who God is. That is all right, because neither do I. Go on dreaming anyhow, and I will go on praying anyhow.

Many things will go wrong, and you will know emptiness, failure, and pain. You will lose, and you may lose it all. For all that, there are things that remain. Every word that comes from the mouth of God remains. And though I do not understand how or why I say this, I believe that what has been spoken once cannot be unspoken. You are a word not spoken by human lips. You have been Spoken.

Someday, when you have grown in years and strength and wisdom, you will look upon an infant and remember things you do not know. When you do, be kind to others and to yourself.

Small Thoughts

2010-02-21T10:53:00.003-05:00

"God himself will set me free from the hunter's snare." Stop hunting yourself.

"Today is holy to the Lord your God." It is always today.

"On my bed I remember you." Rise, pick up your bed, and walk.

"On you I muse through the night." See me in the morning.

"Your love is better than life." You know not what you say.

"On my bed I remember you." Your bed is too small.

"Let the praise of God be on their lips and a two-edged sword in their hand." No justice, no God.

"He was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil." Into the desert, not into temptation.

"Be with me, Lord, when I am in trouble." So said your adversary.

"The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart." Let it speak. Let it bleed.

"When he had fasted for forty days and forty nights, he was hungry." He survived.

"On my bed I remember you." Forsake all others.

Near Sleep

2010-02-18T22:31:00.003-05:00

You are always awake when no one else is around. You are always awake at night. That is good, but there is another friend than the darkness.

You must learn to wake when the light arrives. The light is your first friend and always the newest.

You have been dreaming into the heart of the sunrise. You must awake into the sunrise. Do not wake feeling sad and lost, as you do.

Be awake, be watchful. You cannot pray asleep.

Watch for all. You do not watch if you look upon only one person. Love all. You do not love if you love only one person.

Look around, and let yourself be looked upon by a thousand fiery eyes.

When you must rest, pray that your rest be brief. Pray that God looks upon you from below and above, from beyond and within you.

See, listen, share. Work, watch, pray.

You are the final reason for the light God let be. Let yourself be illuminated.

In the world you are always near asleep. When you nearly wake, you will be near heaven.

When You Go

2010-02-01T17:35:00.002-05:00

O God forgive me when you go
O God forgive me when you go
Forgive me when you go
I fear what I don't know
O God forgive me when you go

Mother forgive me when you go
Mother forgive me when you go
Forgive me when you go
The love I did not show
Mother forgive me when you go

Father forgive me when you go
Father forgive me when you go
Forgive me when you go
I reaped but did not sow
Father forgive me when you go

Brother forgive me when you go
Brother forgive me when you go
Forgive me when you go
You will make it on your own
Brother forgive me when you go

Sister forgive me when you go
Sister forgive me when you go
Forgive me when you go
A lifetime left alone
Sister forgive me when you go

Lover forgive me when you go
Lover forgive me when you go
Forgive me when you go
You will laugh again and grow
Lover forgive me when you go

People forgive me when you go
People forgive me when you go
Forgive me when you go
The kingdom I brought low
People forgive me when you go

O God forgive me when you go
O God forgive me when you go
Forgive me when you go
There's so much I don't know
O God forgive me when you go.

Inverted Gratitude

2010-01-31T12:19:00.003-05:00

For those things that even the most thankful take for granted.
For those things that the chief of sinners could hardly forget.
For those things too difficult to word in prayer.

That your friends don't see you like this.

That couples can't feel your raging jealousy of them.

That sometimes God lets you sleep and will pardon even this mortal sin.

That you avoided a time of trial today -- but that tomorrow will surely bring your destiny.

That your wretchedness today will be followed by another fifty years of life and not end this hour.

That sometimes God leaves you alone -- but is so incorrigible that you still wind up getting what you don't deserve.

That the full moon catches you before you go crazy.

That you are powerless.

That you are a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal -- at least you know who you are.

That you have failed greatly, and that you may fail yet even more spectacularly.

That your affliction is too invigorating to be a depression.

That people do not take too close an interest in you.

That one day the money will run out.

That you will always find a way to struggle.

That you are hardly missed -- the suffering is only your own, and knowing that is a consolation.

That, while you have buried your one and only talent, some fool is dropping two more at your feet.

That, despite your best efforts, your secrets have been betrayed, some of them by your own conniving.

That you are inept enough to fail to sin small but not so incompetent as to avoid sinning big.

That the people you hate to love, love you -- and the people you love hate you in return.

That no one hangs on to every word you say.

That, to your dawning horror, more people every day hang on every thing you do.

That, when you rise, you immediately realize you have fallen.

That, after all, your concupiscence is really rather mild. That's the good news, considering that you consent to every bent desire you have.

That, in spite of your concupiscence, God will console your suffering soul with an intensification of desire.

That God is not, in fact, the kind of God who intervenes to prevent you from doing evil to others; that God lets you do what you will. Suspending the laws of creation -- that would be the greatest evil.

That you realize every now and then that you have acted as if you could suspend the laws of creation.

That one day your friends will see you like this.

Destiny Cookies

2010-01-24T22:12:00.006-05:00

Or, more aphorisms.
You won't find these in fortune cookies.

You are praying alone? Then you are not praying.

Don't write what you don't want God to read. Better yet, if you have integrity, don't write about another if you don't want the other to read it. Put positively: if you are strong, write about another with the intention of having the other discover what you wrote.

"Suicide is painless." No, it is not, but you think it is. That is why you are doing it again for the thousandth time. Every day a suicide. It is easier than risking life.

You are bored? Somewhere a soul is dying for want of you.

You will never know how to pray if you do not first learn to watch, watch with your whole being. Watch what? Watch what you pray!

An itch is injustice. A tingle is grace. A shiver is joy.

It is all right to pray without knowing what to pray for particularly. But above all you must know how to pray. God knows what it is for which you pray.

[This aphorism is not incompatible with the fifth aphorism above. If you do not know what you are watching for in prayer, watch the one who does know what to watch.]

"Suicide is painless." So is mediocrity. Both lead to death.

You are feeling lazy? No wonder. Look at all the things you do by half-measure. Lay them down; lay them all down. Better to do all of nothing before half of something, which is really less than nothing.

Don't trust the politics of one who has no interest in domestics.

"Suicide is painless." No, it isn't. You killed yourself yesterday and took out your roommate and best friend. The day before it was everybody you talked to on the telephone. Who will it be tomorrow? Suicide is the practice of non-being, and it is very painful to people who wish still to be.

You don't want to go home? Fine. Then you can go to hell.

Soliloquy

2010-01-23T19:45:00.004-05:00

The lights are out, the telephone is off,
The net is down, and I am off the line.
The door is shut, the evening is outside,
The room is warm, and I am on the ground.
If only it could cover what can't hide!
I want to run around and tell them No,
But all I really do is wait for Yes,
A Yes from you, to stop the silly things
I do for God against the gods of king
And country or the dollar or the few.
Who are you that I want your love so bad?
To make me wish that I were high or sad,
Just not the rubbed and rusted spoon I am?
A lion lairing, not a wayward lamb?
If you could pluck the jewels from my mind
Or find the treasure in my cave of blood;
If you could just draw near my dirty face
And cleanse with spit the deepening sores of soul;
Then I would jump and instantly sing praise,
Then strip myself and show myself to you
And you would be the mirror seeing me
See myself. We never talk anymore,
We never see each other now. "Don't talk
To me," I told you. "Live your joyful life."
I drew my words as if I'd drawn a gun,
As if the war I'm living can be won.
Ten thousand prayers, and still I'm off the mark.
When Jesus' strangers come I keep it dark.
It is not from but for you I've been freed;
There's nothing that you've got I really need.
Your life, too safe for truth, is still a sin,
But I can't tell you, with the shape I'm in.
When I made a secret vow to resist
The vow was mine alone; not to enlist,
Entice, seduce, or mystify a mass
Or only one whose open heart should pass.
I should be glad you do not lock my heart;
Instead I've taught myself the fettering art.
I'll fasten to the mountain's dangerous slope
With neither mount nor man being moved. Of hope
I've had my fill, and now I'll keep a fast
And wonder what you'll do if you climb past.

For a New Home

2010-01-16T10:54:00.003-05:00

I call on you,
You who gather us in,
You who send us forth,
Holy One of coming and going,

You who give the land,
You who make the road,
You who call us on the journey long,
From land to land,
Who raised us from the ground
And to the ground return,

I thank you and I bless you
For you brought me to this land
And you brought me to this people
To a people who know where they live
To a people who know life’s grace and mercy
To a people who remember their home
And a people who are on the way back
And making this place their land again

They are your people
I am their people
And I thank you for bringing me home
Over many lands and hard roads
Thank you for bringing me home.

I call on you
To make this house my home
Strong as a mother’s arms around me
Soft as a father’s whisper
Warm as a lover’s breath on my cheek.

Holy One,
My home is here.
My home is holy.
Make this house a blessing for every friend who enters.
Make this house refreshing for my tired body and my weary soul.
Protect it, please, from storms, fierce winds and waters,
From accidents and incidents of violence,
From sadness and despair.
Watch here my waking hours with your all-seeing light,
Guard my sleep with your silence.

Help me make this home a house of hospitality for others.
Bless these rooms with laughter,
Sprinkle these spaces with tears of joy.
Give me friends to break bread with, to drink with,
To talk, to sing, to dance, to play with,
Bring them here.
Bring them to my table, to my seats, to my floor.
Let every child, woman, and man pass through my door.
They are your gift and my delight.
Bless every day and night
That rises over the people under this roof.

Remain with us, Holy One,
For without you we are homeless in this world.
We are at home in your Spirit,
And your Spirit is here.
Come down to us,
Well up within us,
Shine your light on this place,
This house, this land, this people.
Keep faith with us,
Give us hope for abundant life,
And love us so our hearts may love.

All this I pray
Through your powerful name, Holy One,
You who release the exiles,
You who set us free to get back home,
You who make this land our home,
You who are our home,
All this I pray. Amen.

At Fourth and Walnut (for Thomas Merton)

2010-01-11T23:48:00.002-05:00

He stopped dreaming
Of impossible solitude
And in the presence of his people—
Yes, his people, the filaments of an incandescent word,
the fibrous strands of his own soul—
He became friends with his God again for the first time.

What was he doing in the shopping district?
He was about his Father’s business!
What was his Father’s business?
Adoption! Matchmaking!

The Lord gave you brothers!
The Lord gave you sisters!
The Lord gave you lovers!
The Lord gave you, too, to the world.
You, not what is made by you.

You make telephones
You make computers
You make automobiles
You make medicine and mouthwash
You make cigarettes
You make high fructose corn syrup
You make complex financial instruments
You make intercontinental ballistic missiles
You make racism and reaction
You make religion and revolution
These are your gifts to the world.
Put them away, put them away.

What you are given to give, you do not give of yourself.
Being human is the gift not made by human hands.

In the crossroads, in the marketplace,
Something shines.
It can’t be sold. It isn’t gold.
It can hardly be seen
It can’t be won. It comes like sun
Like God
Into the world
Into the rooms of our consciousness
Penetrating walls
Coming silently
Leaving you alone
With you for the first time.

Did you know you come from the heart
Of an empty, pointed space? Do not fear:
Everything is found in this speck of nothingness,
Everything except war, hatred, cruelty, and greed.
Here there is poverty, but not want;
Dependence, but not slavery;
The word that speaks truth to power
Without the will to power.
Evil has no reality.

Here there is nothing left to do.
You don’t have to fight for truth, justice, and the American way.
Don’t paint crosses on your friends or targets on your enemies.
You don’t have to dress up, stop eating meat, give up sex and chocolate, or grow wings.
You don’t have to choose between illusions.

You are held by nothingness. You are the figure in the ground of ultimate reality.
Let go of everything: sin, desire, self-knowledge.
That tree in Eden was chopped down ages ago.
You belong without being bought.
You were found before you sought.

You will bless your home of flesh and blood.
You will revere the night spirit and the dawn air.
You will trust the desert.
You will stop when they scream for you to do something.
You will stop and praise all this useless beauty.

And your life will be a brilliant brilliance,
A Holy of Holies
In a temple not made by human hands,
Untouched by lies.

He tucked his arms into his robe.
He looked away and smiled with secrets
In his closing eyes.

When atoms split a thousand suns arise.
When atoms fuse a thousand thousands more will charge the skies.
Poets, physicists of the soul, show us the blinding image in God’s eyes.

Aphorisms

2010-01-04T22:35:00.002-05:00

If you are spiritually dry, these are your options: get a wet blanket; smolder uselessly; or burst into flame.

You can forage for fortune cookies, or you can feast on the bread of life.

A married person is someone who is in a relationship with the present. A celibate is someone who is in a relationship with the future.

When you don't want what you haven't got, say nothing. When you want what you haven't got, say nothing. When you have got what you want, say nothing. When you have got what you don't want, say something.

If you want to know a secret, then you don't know enough about yourself.

With fear, there is always plenty of time. There is no time with love.

Writing good poetry about how terrible life is, is easier than making life less terrible.

Don't make the same mistake twice. There are other mistakes you have yet to make!

Don't be fooled: overearnest sincerity is a mark of immaturity.

Chastity is a joke, but it keeps life from becoming a tragedy.

A single is someone who is in a relationship with a dream. A loner is someone who is in a relationship with an illusion.

Madmen write maxims. Sane people live by them.

Lone Pilgrim Blues

2010-01-02T23:59:00.003-05:00

Oh lordy Lord
I'm a-lookin' for you
Oh lordy Lord
I'm a-lookin' for you
Come the day we meet
I'll know what to do

Hey brother friend
Where you goin' today
Hey brother friend
Where you goin' today
Well you see these roads
I'm goin' another way

I'm a bastard son
Lust is thick'nin' my blood
I'm a bastard son
Lust is thick'nin' my blood
Gimme peace and love
Everything that's all good

Look at me, woman
I've got nowhere to lay
Look at me, woman
I've got nowhere to lay
Home is just a game
I ain't got time to play

Been prayin', Lord
Prayed in church at night
Been prayin', Lord
Prayed in church at night
Well I don't believe
But I'm prayin' right

Oh lordy Lord
I'm a dead duck
Oh lordy Lord
I'm a dead duck
No amazin' grace
Gonna change my luck

Hey, children, oh
See a lonely ol' man
Hey, children, oh
See a lonely ol' man
Now you know his tale
Run as fast you can

On Christmas Day
I was ramblin' the road
On Christmas Day
I was ramblin' the road
My mama ran to me
She wouldn't let me go

Oh mercy me
I believe I been found
Oh mercy me
I believe I been found
Jesus didn't lift me up, no
He threw me to the ground

Oh lordy Lord
You found me again
Oh lordy Lord
You found me again
Now if that's a fact
Why'm I wand'rin', then?

Go On

2009-12-31T17:21:00.005-05:00

This is my prayer for the people
All the people (and the other people too)
In between the times:
To the place where time won't turn
We will turn and go on
Turn and go on
Turn and go on
We will be the people
We have got to turn on
For the first and the final time
We are resolved
To avoid the automatic ceremonies of destruction
We are convicted
With the evidence of a cosmic spring
We are converted
In the blinding light of homeless eyes
When the aphrodisiacal scent of news begins to tease
We will be chaste
We will be poor
When our hungers urge a little more
And when we are called down the mountain
To burn
To drown
To be swallowed up
To evaporate
We will obey
Because life is stronger than pain
And love is greater than wrath
When our very bodies resonate with the overtones of war
We will produce silence
We will defy aggression when it comes disguised as liberation
Violence dressed as duty
Greed cloaked in prosperity
Vengeance tarted with justice
There will never be another word about nature
Detached from nature
Not another word of loveless truth
From pious morons
We will say no prayers that we cannot answer
God is watching us
Watching in us
Hearing us and in us
And makes the watching-hearing itself
And God says
This is not the first night
You weren't there on the first night
And it won't return
It turned to go on
Turned to go on
Turned to go on
There is a new first day
And it's got to turn on
For the first and final time
When there will never be another tomorrow
When the present hour is as precious as the first
When the child that runs around us
Will not grow old
But become a child again.

Sunrise

2009-12-31T14:13:00.002-05:00

Yesterday I sat
Sleepless in a cold sunrise

Isn't it funny
My world turns a thousand miles an hour
The light speeds over eleven million miles a minute
But the sun rises so slowly
If I don't sit still
The earth and sun can't catch me

Today at sunrise
I was in another world
I was fast asleep

Out, Angels, Out

2009-12-27T14:08:00.003-05:00

Out, angels, out -- into the world:
With your banners now unfurled,
Bearing the name your maker gave you,
Sharing the word you know will save you;
Out, angels, out: alow, above,
Through the narrow gate of love.

Women, be strong, be fierce, be proud:
No more wait to be allowed!
You are the chasers of your pleasure,
Making the moment, setting the measure;
Out, angels, out: alow, above,
On the rounding road of love.

Children, become the light you are,
Carried from the morning star!
Welcome and talk to every stranger;
Your daily bread is in the manger;
Out, angels, out: alow, above,
From the rising sun of love.

Men, come at last -- your will is done!
Halt the dogged ring you run!
Glory and truth need no defender;
Peace will come when you surrender;
Out, angels, out: alow, above,
Cross the perfect way of love.

Angels, appear, unclothe the soul,
Body, spirit naked, whole!
You are the sign you dreamed of seeing,
Hope fulfilled in your own being;
Out, angels, out: alow, above,
Down the bending path of love.

Bethlehem Is Waiting

2009-12-20T23:55:00.002-05:00

Hollow breezes blow beyond the sleeping ear
Quiet blizzards bury up the year
Sinners marching for salvation now stand still
Stranded in a city on a hill

Gilded trees and roasting fires and merry song
Wishful things to speed the night along
Travelers wear the way to their ancestral home
Longing to remain, resigned to roam

No more reminiscing for the old time gone
See, I do a new thing in the old time
Bethlehem is waiting where a child leaps for me
Bethlehem is waiting, young mother

Touches, scents and flavors, warm undimming light
Joys you kissed and lifted into flight
I am under every word you strain to say
Praying for another yesterday

I'll reveal a story from the new time found
Uneffacing glory in the new time
Bethlehem is waiting in a memory of me
Bethlehem is waiting, dear mother.

Sneaking Suspicion

2009-12-13T23:19:00.004-05:00

I've got a sneaking suspicion, gone straight to my head,
Straight to my head
Got a sneaking suspicion, gone straight to my head,
Straight to my head
Got to beat it back, or it'll ruin me half for dead

Made a deal with the darkness when the sun went down,
When the sun went down
Made a deal with the darkness when the sun went down,
When the sun went down
Said "Take my soul but leave me this little town"

Saw the good times going bad,
Everybody's luck soon or later ends
Saw the good times going bad,
Everybody's luck soon or later ends
If we can't be lovers I don't wanna be your friend

Now I'm wond'rin' how it goes with my precious soul,
With my precious soul
Now I'm wond'rin' how it goes with my precious soul,
With my precious soul
A hundred friends fell in my empty hole

Don't you come too close, oh please, I ain't no good,
No I ain't no good
Don't you come too close, oh please, I ain't no good,
No I ain't no good
There's no point talkin', though you wish we could

But a sneaking suspicion, no won't leave my head,
Won't leave my head
But a sneaking suspicion, no won't leave my head,
Won't leave my head
There's another life to lose when love goes dead

It appears to be a long time, such a lonesome time,
Before the morn
It appears to be a long time, such a lonesome time,
Before the morn
I'm sleeping till the Son of Man gets born.

December Dreams

2009-12-06T23:37:00.002-05:00

December is here, but not the freeze
Cloaking the day in early gloom,
Enticing the fragile winter bloom,
Begging us pity the naked trees.
I ambled beclouded in a fume
And dreamed (in a dream that could not be)
You left your right hand, believed in me,
And rested your head. I will assume,
Experiencing what I feel
And knowing that other dreams will come,
They're only projections coming from
My shadow. But if they are not real,
Someone explain how this was done:
I've fallen in love with everyone.

Mrs. Daniel

2009-11-30T22:47:00.002-05:00

I write a song of days to come,
For Mrs. Daniel,

Whose beauty is dawn
And dusk--unmistakable;
Gentle, yet profound.

Forgive me if it's not for me to say;
A smile, seen like the sun, is not a secret,
And her man would not conceal
His gift from God from anyone.
Amen, in fading light I write a song
For Mrs. Daniel, the gracious one,
Protector from the sea.

She speaks to me the sound of settling skies.
Her eyes uplift the day in which I'm dreaming.
Watch her radiate the glow of eager motherhood
Across a humdrum home. Call her Mrs. Daniel,
Lady of ten thousand lakes, a garden, and a church,
A sister to her sisters, and to a city strafed by sin.
She sings a crystal tear of happiness,
She whispers, with her flute, echoes of the new creation,
Woven with the broken bow and splintered spear.
She does not fear the enemy within,
Or the furious circling nations.
Only say, "Be still,"
And then she trembles.
Whitened wonderer walks with hope
And an advent heart of merciful innocence
Past the siren sadness ... and her name is Mrs. Daniel.

June 8, 2003

Parable

2009-11-29T22:23:00.004-05:00

She rubbed her tummy like it was a talisman
And she had become a fuzzy monster grape giantess
Pointing to her fruit, her fruit

Everybody wants to pick the grapes
Sweating under the low-hanging moon.

She rubbed her eyes and held her head down
And though she kept her mouth shut,
Before she knew it, she set everybody on fire

And she made sounds you couldn't understand
And they all grabbed her pink and scaly wrist
And they all wanted to slay the snap-dragon
With a gut full of currants

It's no fun picking raisins
Drying in the sun
Flaming from a pool.

I found them guarding the giantess
And sneering at the snap-dragon
Who was already dead.
They were standing on an overgrown hillside
Their feet were tangled in trampled vines.

Whose the sweetness? Whose the greening power?
Woe to those whose loving-kindness lasts but an hour.

An Annunciation

2009-11-28T22:55:00.002-05:00

I am your hello
You are my hi
We are overshadowed by the spirit

The earth is your shape and its secrets your fashion
The fire is your hair
The water is your liquid face
The air is in your silence

The word is your body
Space is the width of your smile, light its brightness and darkness
Time is the curve of your lips
Heat is the flicker of your tongue over mine

The sun is your heart
The moon is your soul
The stars are your eyes

We are the galaxy
We are the journey
We are the destination, ours is destiny

Art is your speech, teaching me to see
Music is your sigh, high and soft
Science is your intuition
Beauty is our every act of defiance

Psychology is your impulse
Health is the ring of your laughter
Hope is waiting with you
Home is our faith
Eternity is our perfect embrace

Fear is what you took away from me
Death is a stranger you disarmed with kindness
Night is the thrill of hearing our names over mingled breath
Day is what remains after the night explodes

The past is our invention
The present is our inspiration
The future is our creation
Love is our imagination

The question is irrelevant
The answer is Yes.

Callista

2009-10-25T22:36:00.003-04:00

Callista, goodbye,
Keep open your eyes,
Your future is finally here
It's not what you will but it's still
And it's yours and it's clear
In some other season
Had we governed reason
Our hands and our faces would meet
And the seas you water
Would dry up, my daughter,
The seas never touching our feet.

Most beautiful friend,
The time is the end,
And time has no meaning no more
The forges of fury
Are beating the plowshares to swords
The world has gone wrong
And you know you belong
To an unrevealed age of life
Let bad fall to ruin
And yield to the human,
A new birth of spirit from strife.

The stories they tell
Of heaven and hell
Will diminish and cease to be true
A little revenge on the gods
Who dared wrestle with you
They, the conceited,
They, who deceited,
Could never set you in the stars
Who love themselves only
They deserve to be lonely
And sightless and frozen and far.

But your vindication
Brings no consolation
The beauty you found they have missed
Your flag is unfurled at the top of a world
That does and does not yet exist
Callista, you're turning
Your God, she is yearning
The two of you one and apart
I hear you cry softly
How moving, how costly
To follow the prize of your heart.

O virgin, O mother,
We sing for each other
We watch across infinite space
A harmony passes -- it whispers
In silvery quavers of grace
Much more I would give you
If I could be with you
To ease, to lighten, to share
Your burden, O maiden,
So heavily laden,
That you and you alone must bear.

Callista, goodbye,
Keep open your eyes,
Your future is finally here
It's not what you will but it's still
And it's yours and it's clear
In some other season
Had we governed reason
Our hands and our faces would meet
And the seas you water
Would dry up, my daughter,
The seas never touching our feet.

New Moon

2009-10-20T00:10:00.003-04:00

I saw the new moon--
Could sense its slivery silvery self--
Didn't need the sun to light it....
I'm de-lighted
Deeply, watching, shivering;
Sometimes it hides,

But it is!

And it is today--

Hiding!
I will go rising and hiding, too,
Where it is spacey and anechoic.
Room, room--I will find a vacuum!

Does it make you mad that no one sings of you?
Does it make you sad that no one paints your face?
Are you not the font of sight and sound?

Those who play, they say
The impossibility of silence is the future of music.
I'll add if I may,
The impossibility of darkness is the future of light.

Na na na, hey hey hey,
See how I play?

Moonfall, fall away.
Echoes in shadows betray the day.

You are the new moon
Dear missing one
Flying between me and the sun....
Go on, be gone
With your coy decoys--
I can lie low like you
Or do nothing as you do--

I shall lie high!

You can't see me resigning
Sore and nameless
(O honest silence, O!);
You'll never see me crying.

And though you pull and push and pull,
I'm not bound to the earth

I'll take to the air

And kiss you

Thievishly, feverishly
There.

Good night, new moon.
You will see me soon.

Night Prayer

2009-10-13T01:42:00.002-04:00

Creator and muse
Of my fractured longing,
And inaudible harmony
Of this brittle song,

Mine is the heart you will miss
If you hear when I sigh like this

The more that I speak of your name
The more you ought to be ashamed
That heedless of your call
That after all
The echoes sink into the abyss
You aren't who the saints proclaim
But after all
Anonymous

Appear! Appear!
I need you out here
Sit in the shadows I cast
As I vegetate in some invisible light,

Senseless, poor,
Plugged up and disconnected,
Neither awake nor asleep

Maybe there is nothing I can do
You have crawled into a fish

I wish that you were not
So far away inside of me.

Oh, but for you,
Whatever you wish,
Let it be.

Momentary Prayers

2009-10-12T18:10:00.005-04:00

Great day for a ride through Vermont
going to the office.
Life is so good. Seriously. No more studying for a while. Yay!
overwhelmed with the kindness and generosity!
Border Deaths Are Increasing
Go Sox!
purposely avoiding the news today after yesterday’s loss.

please sign and send to your friends
For my Detroit friends ...
happy Canadian Thanksgiving!
It is National Coming Out Day and I pledge to have heartfelt conversations for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equality.
Enjoy a day off watching men throw around pigskin with the hubby....

looking for Halloween horror? you may have never heard of The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, which i myself just learned of recently. i mean, why would we know about it ... it's only 2 times the size of Texas.

The only thing that makes the Sox losing not ruin my day is the sight of my husband putting a crib together. Five more weeks til our little darling makes a debut!
four weeks from my due date and wondering whether they will go fast or slow.
Maybe it’s time to turn on the heat?

the social net is a matriarchy
marching with the Red Bandana Brigade
hoping Rebecca has a good race, that the DC makes a big difference, and that David and Neil enjoy their wedding!
hipster dad drinking a sparks at the tot lot.
1, 2, Freddy’s coming for You!

having a much needed day to herself
busy turning his life into a story and his stories into a life

We are hoping/trying to recruit some of these leftist marching musicians for Immigration Reform Rallies and Vigils.
Marching band performed on the Red Line tonight on my way to Cambridge
reminded of why she hates taking the T on Friday nights
getting married ... TODAY!!!!!
Reconsider
Columbus Day

I just ran into John Porcell in Davis Sq.
He and his girlfriend just moved to town, funny world.
Willa and I went apple picking at Honey-Pot Farm in Stow (with Loren, Linda, Maya, and Clay).
On the way out we stopped in Maynard to visit Sue.
Okay, Nashville, I still need to find a job.
Anyone know of any openings?
Beautiful Zimbabwe, beautiful Zimbabwe.
We shall never forget you, beautiful Zimbabwe!

"Hope is the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul"
"What oxygen is to the lungs, such is hope to the meaning of life"

never been so happy to be at home eating leftovers and doing homework in my pajamas.

cannot believe how cute
her new portable, external hard drive is
not impressed.

a man of means by no means
is looking forward to seeing "Death of a Salesman" and having a nice dinner!
is angry about unnecessary layoffs
is ready to ask the "right" question to the Governor
is insulating the basement – mmmhh ... fiberglass
is enjoying the birthday wishes! Thanks! Slowly mending from this virus, but mostly shaking my head at the display of such cynicism already in our media from Obama being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
picked up a van load of donated food from Whole Foods and brought it to the food pantry.
Accomplished 3 loads of laundry and pretty-clean downstairs (including noodging the kid to clean up his stuff), mostly on one foot. Now, I must eat a small village.
missed my flight. Stuck in Dulles hell.

In the midst of a rather Job-like period, hoping that all that optimistic attitude that usually keeps me going won't run out.
Dear God
forgive me.
I'm wearing socks with flip flops.
How low can I sink....
doctor says it's not the swine flu but a throat virus that's going around with a fever and cough, fun, fun, fun, mandated bed rest for a few days because i'm contagious! ugh, i hate being sick!
My mother is still in the hospital.

Life has returned to some sense of normalcy.
Meow, meow. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Love is patient, love is kind, love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way, it is not irritable or resentful, it does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.
How long can I keep this shit up?

so tired....

Enjoyed my very, very cold ride.

Everybody Loves You

2009-10-06T00:56:00.003-04:00

She asked me "Where you goin'?"
I said "I'm goin' crazy"
Her I'd think of followin'
If I weren't so lazy

Remember your last birthday
I called from far away
It wasn't like last Thursday
It felt just like the first day

The moment when all of the stars started shining for you
Like time was just beginning
That's why I'm a-singin'
Everybody loves you
Earth and sea and heaven, too.

You know where you can find me
Look for the feet of sheep
Your garden's gifts bring kindly
Together we will sleep.

You're beautiful and pleasing
A palm among the trees....

... I'm sick of writing, teasing
The time is ripe for seizing!

I just can't wait anymore for your face to appear
You can't be here in spirit
Your voice, I need to hear it
Everybody loves you
Isn't mine the love most dear?

Baby, I'm a rich man
And that's the problem here
No one can love like you can
But your love is too severe

You say we're good for nothing
Why do you talk so rough?
I'd give you anything or something
You only want the one thing

The one thing that I haven't got, what I never will be
You say it's an obsession
And damn all my possessions
Everybody loves you
Don't you wish it could be me?

I'm thirsty for your water
My salty tears don't fill me
The breakers make me totter
Lift me up to where it's hilly

I'm mortally afflicted
Goin' down into the pit
In silence lie convicted
And from your heart evicted

Remember those times when I headed the line to see you
I thought you wanted praising
My hands to you I'm raising
Everybody loves you
Won't you let me love you, too?

You know I never see you
That's just the way it is
But, oh, I still believe you
I'm confident of this

As gentle as a mother,
And, fatherly, as tough
We must love one another
And put all fear to smother

I'm done with death from below -- give me life from above
Forgive me my complaining
I'm thinking of remaining
Everybody loves you
And, yeah, 'cause you are love.

To Francis, to Clare

2009-10-03T23:20:00.002-04:00

Dear brother, show one how you loved the Son
In her. You knew the Lord gave her to you,
Who left all hopes and homes and callings, too,
Because you loved your Father found above
The earthly frays of fate. What curious ways
The Lord saw fit to fan your living blaze!
It has been said you walked with her and wed.
How did you long, or read the Song of Songs?
How did you build the place where she belonged?
You were the bridegroom just as much the bride,
No, twice the groom; God's love of her the fair
Joined her to you and, in you, Christ in there.

Dear sister, show us how the love of Jesus
Espoused you, mind and heart, to him, the blind
And barefoot troubadour. You left behind
The love of mortal men for something more
Eternal--fertile, like an endless year
Of spring. Was that the love that made you hear
The word your Lord sang through the clown ignored?
Insane, they brayed, because you dearly prayed
To be a beggar's bride. Then, to have paid
With golden hair the dowry! Sister Clare,
You stole your body in the name of God;
Now teach us all to love like thieving Francis,
Your brother, father, son, and willing clod.

May 30, 2003

A Grief Unobserved

2009-09-11T20:43:00.003-04:00

Ma has a heart of fire
Flashing, it cannot burn low
Dad hates a crook and liar
Give him a yes or a no
My sister is growing a little son
The images fascinate everyone
Purer love he'll never know
My brother is living in Babylon
I asked him where all these years have gone
Eye has not seen, ear has not heard
Some grief has gone unobserved.

David passed through the waters
With the companion he found
David crossed over rivers
Called by his name not to drown
Darkness in the morning hour
David climbed the top of the tower
And he would never come down
James asked his mother why he was there
David was of the water, not air
Eye has not seen, ear has not heard
Some grief has gone unobserved.

Maybe I believed you too much
Loving you, I risked dying
Idols are dangerous to touch
And on a cold bed I am lying
Hoping for sleep that's restoring
Only to rise before morning
And wake from pedestrian dreams, crying
I pray for the world, I pray, love, for you
Maybe there's life we never knew
Eye has not seen, ear has not heard
Some grief has gone unobserved.

Eclipse of the Harvest Moon

2009-09-06T21:01:00.003-04:00

I. On his nineteen years

These days are sadly sweet with much to-do;
I shape my share of thought, to share with few.
I speak with salience, saying what is true,
But all I say is not all that is true.
So with the mind and mouth, so with my make;
I'd fain to move and mold as I would take.

II. To his family and one he did not know well

A man and lady follow for the one;
They follow still, and nineteen years are done.
I am that one, a being grown but limp;
Who walks so high he often seems a simp.

A couple never known to me in face
Gave rise to one I knew in time and place.
I trust they followed her, as did we all;
But no one finds her now, because of fall.

We say we knew her, but not known too well.
The autumn leaves refused to bear her tale.
Her name is set in stone and not the wind,
And I see newborn spots upon my skin.

III. In the fields, chasing the eclipse

Assorted people felt me out this day;
As I was sought, I sought to push away:
Away I went to shapely darkened fields
To watch the moon disclose her waxing yields.

I knelt and lay in close on cooling earth,
An unseen shadow raised from evening birth.
I brought a song to sing of moons and knights,
And dreamt of dancing with the lunar light.

The harvest moon with fullness in the sky
Eludes description though it hits the eye:
No redder ruddy reddish reddened red
Was surely dreamt, but how comes light from dread?

I let my thoughts be raped while lying still
Upon a shade of green which darkness killed.

September 1996

I wrote this around my nineteenth birthday. The title describes exactly when. I had learned recently that an acquaintance of mine from high school died in a motorcycle accident. She was the first person from my senior class to die (one student had committed suicide a year before graduation). She was so bright and alive. Her life had yet to begin and shine, and now it was done. I collected my thoughts and composed this piece. I've left intact the grammatical oddity of the question in the penultimate stanza, but I've changed two words for clarity's sake.

The Gift of Desperation

2009-08-30T11:00:00.002-04:00

Used to be so happy, why, I couldn't tell the time
We never asked the reason or how the meter rhymed
We ate and drank and fit each other till we woke again
A hint of desperation clued us even then.

Something in the way you walked, it talked to me with force
Something else in how you smiled -- that smile, it wasn't yours
It wasn't mine, oh mercy, to restore your soul to you
A spell of desperation left me wandering, too.

Saw you at the window, oh, you've lost your lucky star
Wondered how you knew the one when billions there are
Things were hidden from you even when you set to see
And a wave of desperation carried you to me.

Offered, I received you, who were my portion and my cup
Took your name upon my lips and turned the bottoms up
Then we saw the altar -- we had to turn away
From the smell of desperation, the odor of decay.

We're ready to be broken, and you know you wish we would
Still you don't believe it would do us any good
The wretched in perdition got nothin' on us two
It's the hell of desperation, makes living hard to do.

Everybody's drifting, goin' back to what they did
They got a glimpse of glory, then they ran and hid
You can't avoid temptation, don't try and hold your breath
It's the sting of desperation before the sting of death.

Sometimes I gotta wonder, where we gonna go
Yearning for a lover is the only thing I know
What makes the lover lovely is what I'm looking for
And the pangs of desperation make me want it more.

Baby, please forgive me, see, I guess it wasn't you
But something beneath that our shivers of desire pointed to
Understand, it has to be the end of the affair
I took a vow of desperation and married my despair.

Well the heavens are a-rainin', a wind is on the move
The city sends to sleep a son with something left to prove
Baby, when you find out you got nothin' left to be
That's the gift of desperation sent to you and me.

Someone's Prayer

2009-08-23T20:35:00.002-04:00

I want to see the faces, not the masses
Or what passes for a celebration
In these sacred places. If I must, I'll
Crawl into the alley with the people
Living lowly speaking gospel, drinking
Wine and welcoming the lights beyond the
Blue horizon. City heights, or empty
Valley lanes below the sun, or even
All the homes I knew before: exclaim the
Hidden names of life and make me shiver
With the child I love, the girl I adored.

I want to know what's real despite the doubters
Shouting louder than the dreaming silents --
Let me roll the wheel. My name is nothing
In the streets, a kind of alien blessing
In the jazzy traffic. Noises never
Know the others; lonely are the yellers
Seeking looks, not seeing farther than the
Image in their eyes. The music begs for
Hearers of the names in town of hermits,
Begs in suburbs of social clowns who aren't
What they claim. No deeds can save their names.
I pray that others hear what they have done.

August 5, 2002

This poem is a little rough, a little incomplete, like the person who wrote it and reads it now with fresh eyes.

It's Still Alright, Ma (I'm Only Repeating)

2009-08-17T00:00:00.002-04:00

Sitting in an empty room
And sowing words into a womb
And sending it addressed to whom
It may concern -- I can't assume
That anybody's feeding.

After tilting, armies of the right
Congratulate themselves despite
The fact there's no such thing as black and white
It gets so hard to pray at night
When inspiration's fleeting.

Life's the same but not the aim
I'll change the rules and then the game
But it's alright, Ma, it's not like cheating.

Your lover called you fifty times
You tried to fit Paul Simon's rhymes
Into the scheme, but all the crimes
Of passion forked your tongue and made your lines
Sound stiff and funny.

I heard the cost of freedom fell
There's no demand; it's just as well
For while it's true it's sex that sells
A hundred million prison cells
Are making better money.

So when the cops ask who I am
I'll ask them "Why do you give a damn?"
And it's alright, Ma, they'll only stun me.

The madonnas on the golden thrones
I heard them say "It's not well known
But you can wring blood from a stone
And you can feel it in your bones
When evil comes to meet you."

I told the queen "That's cruel but fair.
So why are you just sitting there
With vacant eyes that stare and stare
When men are coming everywhere
To humble and defeat you?"

Then her kid said "If they did
Who cares? I'll take the hit.
But it's alright, Ma, they will bleed, too."

Twelve thousand people clenched their fists
Tattooed a peace sign on their wrists
I told a band of anarchists
It's strange to grant the atheists
A blessing for their cursing.

For seven weeks I stayed in port
Refused to eat or drink or sport
Then forty days of rain fell through
I had to raise the sails for new
Adventures in God's mercy.

In the cove there's not a sound
And you might think the world was drowned
But it's alright, Ma, it's just immersing.

I'm walking away from the park
They're shouting Shakespeare in the dark
I'm spitting canned heat on the ground
Tonight you can be lost or found
This time it's time for choosing.

When you shut the door and go to bed
With just you or one more instead
Remember we were always friends
If you believe love never ends
Then don't act like you're losing.

So if you think I've had too much to drink
Or not enough and need to take a wink
Well, that's alright, Ma, the story is amusing.

Ugly Man

2009-08-16T00:07:00.003-04:00

I want to be an ugly man
So I can hold a humble pride.
Won't fashion make or wardrobe plan,
Won't need a ring, won't have a bride.

And this is how I want to feel --
Coarse like a hog, odd as a mule,
An ox who always drags the wheels,
Who wears a bow but bears no jewels.

And when at last I'm ugly, can
You be so kind to tell me, too?
And stare at me, if you can stand;
Don't let good manners hinder you.

Look long enough, look at this dun,
Until there's nothing else to see.
Look all your life, you won't be done,
And that is what will most please me.

May 29, 2003

To My Own Mary of Magdala

2009-08-03T00:15:00.015-04:00

What are you trying to say?

Your words are difficult and
Fragile as a painted eggshell.

This is not the news I want to hear.
This is not the news I want to bear.

You destroyed forever all I hoped would be
Sending softly leaded nightmares
In the middle of the dawn.

We walked the warming days
Shared in your imperfect vision
Through tears and peers into perdition
You pulled me through the darkness
To follow the sun unsetting.
It really wasn't our decision.

Now the sun is years and lives away
I turned and looked
You didn't stay

Sometimes you infuriate me
With your joy and with your riches
With your closeness to the secret
With your liveliness

Wrapped inside a thickly woven cloak made just for you.

How will I forgive your happiness?

No, I don’t want what I cannot hold.
No, don’t send me down the road.

What are you trying to say?

Go, and go which way?
Go, and go to whom?

Leave me in my room
Head turned down, body shrunk
Wishing, witless, that I never saw you grieving
That I never listened to your still demanding
Or invented some offense
That could have kept myself from you for shame.

Here I’m writing words like these
While standing on my knees
And I don’t know what I’m trying to say
Leaving letters along the way.

And I don’t know what I’m going to do.
See -- the sun, it follows you!

John 10:34

2009-08-02T18:05:00.003-04:00

Swimming inward
I lost everything I wanted
Stripped in the cold stream
Fluttering in water
A hard, sunken stone
No light, no sound
The water alone clothes me
With dissolved salts.

Midnight moonlight,
Wavy shimmer on the surface of your sea:

Where are you? Are you in me?

"You are what you are.
Become what beholds you."

Straining to speak, breathing out of nothing
Desire spills over
I am baptized with a kiss of fire
Moments are woven across the godless distance.

With the turning of years,
I am writing the words of a song I cannot hear.

Come Home

2009-08-01T13:54:00.002-04:00

I want you, child, I want you for me
I want you, child, I want you for me
You ought to know who set you free
(Listen to me!)
Come home

I'm a blindin' light, I'm a king without a queen
I'm a blindin' light, I'm a king without a queen
Done the greatest things no one's ever seen
(You want to know what I mean?)
Come home

The rich man is bad
The poor man is sad
I let down my mother, I don't know my dad
Come home, child, I want you for me
Cross the desert sands, cross the desert sea.

Oh me oh my, wedding days have come
Oh me oh my, wedding days have come
Gonna live it a lot, no time for some
(Put out your thumb!)
Come home

You can round the world, from Arabia to Rome
You can round the world, from Arabia to Rome
If you ain't with me, you're on your own
(Get on the phone!)
Come home

The fat old sun burns
The full moon returns
You don't know or love me, but maybe you'll learn
Come home, child, I want you for me
Just for today and eternity.

We gonna die, child, spirits hand in hand
We gonna die, child, spirits hand in hand
You gotta die to survive and make a stand
(You understand?)
Come home, oh, come home, child, I want you for me
Ain't nowhere else you want to be.

At the Crowded Dinner Table

2009-07-30T22:10:00.003-04:00

At the crowded dinner table
The room's too small for elbows.
The guest on my left
Asks for the salt at my right hand.
I lose the taste for it
And hand her the shaker.

At the crowded dinner table
From the farthest corner
Someone waves at me
And wants my attention
And wants the sour cream.
I want to give her neither.

At the crowded dinner table
Of this farewell party
The emcee calls for silence and a toast.
Tomorrow's on my mind
In thirty tarnished pieces.
I push my seat, unquiet.

At the crowded dinner tables
In a busy bistro
I'm getting a filling for my sweet tooth
And my newspaper says
A billion bodies hunger till it hurts
And my waiter comes again with the menu.

At the crowded dinner table
In the home where I lie at night
I hope no one sees me
Sitting on my soul
And holding my breath
While God is starving.

Midnight (Psalm 63)

2009-07-17T00:54:00.002-04:00

On this bed
I trade my life
For unrescripted visions
Of a feast of your rain that will flood my soul
And flush my shadowed body
With your power:
Hold me now.

Only One

2009-07-13T20:32:00.002-04:00

Shall we walk, shall we rest?
Shall we be each other's guest?
Shall we speak of everything beneath the sun?

For a moment, for an hour,
Let us feel each other's power
Because for you and 'cause for me there's only one.

And if you go, don't be long
You inspire this song of songs
Washing over memories in an endless run

Think of me, I'll think of you
I'll think of others better, too
When friends are gone my thoughts will turn to only one.

The ripples on the afternoon lake shimmer
I hear a glimmer of the tune
And there you are
Clear as a star
A dish to race the spoon!

Over coffee, over dinner,
You've gone grayer, I've got thinner
News that never will be printed on page one

Build your house of stones and bricks
Oh, it's the end of politics
At this table I will drink with only one.

The falling of the evening tide is slacking
I hear your call to come inside
And there you are
Clear as a star
Your eyes are open wide.

When the sun falls to the moon
Skies turn black and chills come soon
Reminding us our life together will be done

Once again it's me and you
There's nothing else we'd rather do
But hold each other tight until we're only one.

On a Dangerous Night

2009-07-12T15:52:00.005-04:00

I slept through shining hours
In a house divided,
Waiting for the world to end
Until my fury passed.

Well the yoke is not ease
And the burden not light
And I don't want the weight,
On a dangerous night,
Of this dismal disease.

You saw me sing alone
And lose the words before the crowd.
You heard me hold my groan
When witchy women acted proud.

There's a fire in the breeze
And I'm fixing to fight,
And the passion is great,
On a dangerous night,
Forcing men to their knees.

"Lead me not into temptation"
Did not lead to celebration;
I would not accept direction--
Mulishly refused correction.

If to love is to feel
And to feel is to touch
Then the fear in my flesh
Means your love is too much
And my sin is too real.

If you will, you will see
And you'll hear, if you might
All the things tempting fate
On this dangerous night
And the things tempting me.

If yours is beauty, let me see it now
And not the idols I erect--
But not when I have scoured my eyes.
If yours is truth, then let me hear it now
And not this march I cannot stop--
But not when I have broken drums.

And when nothing could please
But would vanish from sight
In my treacherous state
On a dangerous night
You appear and you seize.

You made me turn to you,
The moment I condemned the world.
You waited for this meeting, and
You used my angry loneliness to give
You one more look.

We sat the darkening hours,
You and I,
Attention undivided,
Ah!--until the rain fell like an answer.

And I wanted to feel
And I wanted to touch
And to taste with my flesh
Of a life more than much,
Of a love that is real.

If you will, you will see
And you'll hear, if you might
All the things tempting fate
On this dangerous night
And the things tempting me.

Afterthoughts, Afterimages

2009-06-30T21:14:00.004-04:00

When I was down I saw my shadow all the time.
The sun was everywhere except inside of me.
Now every day the sun is drowned in grayest sea,
But my horizon's drawn with silver lines.

The germ inside the seed, it grows -- it does not know.
And why when one and one are one it equals three,
Makes sense to me, I cannot tell. Its mystery
Is safe inside her womb with hopes full-sown.

There, when I mixed memory and desire,
There, when I was preaching icy fire,
There, when I fixed up within the hours,
There, when I was speeching from the towers,
There, when I believed in Judas' blues,
There, when I walked in Bob Dylan's shoes,
There, when I relieved myself of strife,
There, when I balked at renewing life,
There, when I objected to your joy,
There, when I was scheming to destroy,
There, when I, dejected, dropped the load,
There, when I was teeming to explode,
There, when I was waiting not expecting,
There, when I insisted on rejecting,
There, when I was hating every tale,
There, when I persisted but would fail,
There, when I begrudged the couple's kiss,
There, when I uncovered animus,
There, when I had judged the multitudes,
There, when I had smothered beatitudes,
There, when I refused to welcome you,
There, when I confused both What and Who,
There, when I excused myself and cried,
There, when I would save myself and lied,
There, when I divorced the soul and heart,
There, when I re-ran from end to start,
There, when I forced friends to part from me,
There, when I began to end to be,

There appeared an image,
Smiling brightly flying,
Human almost holy,
To dispel the dying
Moaning echoes welling
Where the chorus should be swelling.

This is what will happen
When the Lover bids you love.
The rest is badinage.

God's Words

2009-06-16T23:57:00.004-04:00

I want to say your name and make you live.
The breath is moving through and waits for me
To hum my throat and lift my loving tongue
And shape my lips to give your being mine.
Then other names of mine will know yours, too,
And they will learn to speak you as I do,
Announcing you, pronouncing you with love,
Your goodness given grammar in their care,
The mystery of your meaning coming true:
And why I am when they say "I love you."

Eternity arrived with your hello,
The day you came to be when you could say
The words that made mine want to reach your ear.
I want to say your name and make me yours.
"Go on," I say, but lack the will to speak.
I lack no wish and yet my lips are weak.
Repeat the unrepeatable -- create!
But all my words have spilled into a mess,
And while they make you think and make you cry,
They circle around my mind and, crumbling, die.

You have to hear before you dare to speak
The lightest words before the deepest speech.
You have to read before you hope to write
The life you want to put inside your love.

The streetcar rattles down in New Orleans
And takes you where the music covers sins.

I only wished to stop and say hello;
A moment may be all we have to know.
The wind that blows the hair across my face
Will carry, too, your laughter: wordless grace.

From an Upper Room

2009-05-31T17:45:00.003-04:00

Sitting on a street bench, acting homeless
Thinking 'bout the women I never knew
Trying hard to pray, my prayers thoughtless
How can anybody pray without you?

Life is getting tighter, people sounding
Bored and boring; my spirit's in the lurch
Everywhere the careless sins are mounding
All I want to know, friends, is where's the church?

Someone's gonna help me, someone broken
Free me from the bond of the upper room
Getting to my head the word soft-spoken
Shattering this heart of untimely gloom.

I'm going to the land of power and glory,
Bidding John the Baptist a short goodbye,
Going to retell a living story --
If I only had the guts just to die!

Outside on the town the trees are blowing
Unexpected rain, it comes softly down
Some can know which way the winds are going
Others only feel the force and the sound.

Stranded on a one-way track to nowhere
Giving all I've gotten or none at all
I make believe I'm home and never go there
Practice how to stumble but not to fall.

Sitting on a sidewalk sideshow corner
Thinking that the future day nearly looms
Gonna pray for her but never mourn her
Nothing left to see in the upper room.

Risin' Blues

2009-05-24T16:23:00.002-04:00

The lovers of God were all wondering when
They would see Jesus in glory again
And Jesus rolled his eyes and said "Foolish young men!
You'll never know, but it's all right -- you'll have my Spirit."

And moving on up to the clouds of the sky
Jesus was taken and it caused them to cry
But two outlaws came and told them "You're looking too high.
Your Jesus went a-ramblin'. Don't fear it."

Dreaming all the time, I'm searching for the clues
My body it's hungry, my soul's a purple bruise
I live in the house of the rising blues.

A man from two worlds in a house painted white
Kisses his wife and daughters good-night
Then picks up a Bible and the Bill of Rights
And sighing prays to God or to Lincoln

While under his feet a legion of pigs
Roots in his garden and orchard of figs
And a creep calls to the window "Death to the Whigs!"
And he wonders what the neighbors must be thinkin'

Every single hour there is nothin' but news
Our circuits are loaded, we're gonna blow a fuse
Livin' in the house of the rising blues.

The architects of the invincible zoo
Built camels by committee and elephants, too
Led the creatures to the gate but could not get them through
Now they sit and curse and wish they'd studied magic

Alexander the Great sat down next to a bum
The bum looked at him and asked "Why have you come?"
And Alex said "I need your prayers, now give me some!"
The bum replied "Well, isn't that tragic."

People workin' hard, people pay their dues
People wanna live, but they don't know what's the use
Livin' in the house of the rising blues.

Jesse James went to the chapel and left with a wife
He loved her more than money and more than his life
Then one day a banker pulls on Jesse a knife
And says to him "Your woman has unmanned you!"

Jesse gathers his horses and men for to steal
Stopping him, his weeping wife says "Think how I feel!"
But Jesse says "You cannot help the way I deal.
Try to be happy bein' unhappy, can't you?"

Walls are closin' in, I'm drunk without the booze
I need some kiss to wake me, but I don't know whose
I live in the house of the rising blues.

The deaf, dumb and blind men didn't want to be healed
Snubbed doctors and pastors, the best in their field
Said "The wages of sin can never be repealed"
And shuffled with the prophets to the temple

I walked with the homeless to the twentieth mile
Kids were turning cartwheels and backflips in the aisle
Camera crews and cheerleaders were tellin' us to smile
Oh, I wish that it were only that simple

My last friend gave me some brown walkin' shoes
You're given your friends, you really can't choose
Livin' in the house of the rising blues.

The dark horse rides a quiet carousel
The puddles are pooling and the fairgrounds smell
They say heaven is three days away from hell
But who knows if anyone has been to either

I live with a girl who once brightened my day
She's tall as an angel and light in her way
She says she's my friend and my friend she will stay
There's nothing left to do now but to leave her

Some of them lovers go in threes and twos
Some stay alone and hope the others lose
I live in the house of the rising blues.

Psalm 143

2009-05-19T21:46:00.004-04:00

God who hears, hear me!
There is no one else who can listen.
There is no one who can be trusted to listen.
Speak to me because you know,
You make right, you are loyal and true.
What I ask you to do I could never ask another.
I could die to be made right, but I want to stand and live before you.

Some devil has snared me.
The demons have beaten me and brought me down to the ground,
And even below the ground, deeply dead,
Where in the darkness nobody knows me, and nobody ever did.
My spirit sits still, vanishing into a vacuum,
And my heart is a burned-out star.

It didn't used to be this way.
I know what you have done for me,
Recall so many things that worked out wonderfully.
So I reach out to you, dry inside, so dry.
God, I want to drink like the desert drinks the rain!

Now, speak to me now, God!
This spirit cannot survive on its own.
Show yourself, show me or know I will fall and never rise.
Like a lover wake me with your gentlest kiss,
And ever will I lay down with you.
Set me on my way;
For you I rise and watch and pray.

God, free me from my foe!
I have nowhere else to go.
Your will I want to know,
You are the one, my need.
You bless, you breathe, you lead,
You guide me to the mead.

God, you are God. Give me your life.
You will make right this soul gone wrong.
You are the love of loves.
Destroy these demons.
Destroy this death.
For I am yours.

Rise, Let Us Be On Our Way

2009-05-17T22:59:00.002-04:00

One year ago I graduated from Boston University School of Theology with a Master of Divinity degree. This was my valedictory address, prepared for the convocation and hooding ceremony. Given at Marsh Chapel, Sunday, May 18, 2008.

***

I would like to share with you a poetic meditation based on the Gospel according to John, chapter 14, verses 25 to 31. Before he was arrested, imprisoned, tortured, and executed, Jesus shared one last meal with his friends. Jesus knew this could be the last time he would be physically present with his disciples. And yet during this meal he promised them that they would never be left alone, for God’s presence would remain with them always. Jesus promises his friends that God will send them the Holy Spirit. Jesus also leaves them his peace and bids them to have courage, for he has already overcome the worldly powers opposed to God. And then in verse 31 he says, “Rise, let us be on our way.”

Rise, let us be on our way.

We are a people on the move. We were made to be sent.
For this we have been taught. For this we have received the Spirit.

Now sense the Spirit ringing your mind with light and coursing your heart with warmth. Feel the Spirit harden your hands for the work to be done.

Rise, let us be on our way.

I am going away, and you are going away. The place you are going to is not here. This place is not your home. It is your time to go. It is your place to go. The world can little afford the absence of your presence.

Now break out of bare ruined choirs and locked upper rooms where you sit with closed hearts and closed minds behind closed doors, and break into life and confound this bounded world. Bear God, bear soul, bear peace. Bring the sanctuary into the street.

Encounter and transform; be encountered and be transformed.
May our love for God humanize us. May the love of God sanctify us.

Rise, let us be on our way.

Do not say you do not know where we are going.
We are going; heaven knows where we are going,
but we’ll know we’re there.
And we’ll get there; heaven knows how we will get there,
but we know we will.
We will. I may not get there with you, but we as a people will get there. We’ll know we’re there. Some call it the Promised Land. Some call it the beloved community. Some call it the reign of God. Do not say you do not know where we are going. Lift up your eyes to the hills and behold the presence of the mountains.

Be well and be at peace, for God is with you.
Do not fear, and do not cower. Who has power over you?
Jesus says, “You have power with God.
So walk with me. Walk with me. You want me to walk with you.
Will you walk with me? Do not say a word, be the word; let there be less talking and more walking.”

Rise, let us be on our way, and we will dare as the world watches us make a place out of no place and turn over every sinful certainty. We will see the circle widen. We will have no small God. We will have a beautiful Jesus. We will have a Spirit that witnesses with our spirit but blows wherever it wills. We will reach out to our cultured despisers who scoff at the Spirit and show them that we are delighted by diversity, unbothered by relativity, and intoxicated by glory. We will risk our life with passion.

Rise, let us be on our way past threats of death, past the idolatries of ideologies, beyond the godless fundamentalisms of the believer and the unbeliever. We will stop telling and selling violent stories that cannot save.

Be on your way, you loyal rebels. Disobey the command to go to war, the command to protect your privilege, the command to shun the stranger, the command to be afraid. Disobey the world so that the world may know how much you love God, who loves the world more than we can ever know. Disobey so that you remain in the world but not of the world, but disobey because you are always for the world. Disobey the world because you obey the Spirit of life, the God of love. Disobey the world because you are the world’s greatest lovers.

Will you love with me? Will you rejoice with me? Will you go with me?

Rise, let us be on our way.

It will be hard, I know, and the road will be muddy and rough.
It leads to heartbreak, it leads to hunger, it leads to rags and spare change on surly streets, it leads to burning sun and freezing moon, it leads to prison, it leads to the hospital, it leads to the gates of delirium, it leads to shattering insanity.
And it leads to the grave.

And still we rise!
Be on your way, you nation of priests, you school of prophets,
you children of Dr. King.
Rise, you young seminarians, let us be on our way.
Rise, you children of Africa, Asia, the Americas, and Europe, let us be on our way.
Rise, all you glorious children of precious dignity and sacred worth, show your beautiful, different, natural colors to the world.
Rise, all you thirsty ones, and cause justice to roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. You know that truth is served when truth is done in love. And when you do love, you, too, are in the way and in the truth and in the life.

Be on your way to see the sick and the poor and the pained and the lost and the lonely and the loveless and the captive and the shut-out and walled-in, raced-in, sexed-in, gayed-in, and all the tired, tired, tired people, and see yourself inside their homeless skin and see reflected in their sad and broken eyes the incorruptible, indestructible image of the God who made both of you and never cease to cry out far and forever, “Rise!”

But we remain for a while. We exist between the times. We have seen Thursday’s joy become Friday’s tragedy. Now we are a people of Holy Saturday longing for the dawn of Sunday all over the world. We believe Saturday does not last forever. Saturday is a book we write between death and life.

Soon we will close the book of Saturday. And we will not remain here.
We will rise. We will rise. Rise. Let us be on our way.

Empty Tomb Blues

2009-05-06T16:31:00.002-04:00

I got up one morning on the wrong side of my mind
I said I got up one morning on the wrong side of my mind
I didn't want to tell you, but these blues won't get behind

Some walkin', some runnin', some ridin' -- I just stand still
Some walkin', some runnin', some ridin' -- I just stand still
The angels have deserted me, and I know one day you will

My master's up and gone, my master he's not here
My master's up and gone, my master he's not here
He told me to have faith -- he left me holding emptiness and fear

My friends got nothing, those folks lost their home
My friends got nothing, those folks lost their home
And they've been down so long, no one will let them roam

Some dream of queens and kings -- I only dream of you
Some dream of queens and kings -- I only dream of you
But this dream of mine's not yours, so what good's it gonna do?

I ain't blaspheming -- I'm like God's only son
Said I ain't blaspheming -- I'm like God's only son
I'm bringing you true love, but no one loves me none

I'll keep singin' a mean old nasty song
I'll keep singin' a mean old nasty song
The women ran and told me things I thought were crazy wrong

Do you love me? O God, you know how I do
Said do you love me? O God, you know how I do
I loved you all I could, I loved you all I knew

I got up on Monday on the wrong side of my mind
I got up on Monday on the wrong side of my mind
Pray Sunday comes again before the devil steals his find

I lift up my eyes to the hills, skies are all cloudy and blue
I lift up my eyes to the hills, skies are all cloudy and blue
I see the shade is falling -- O Lord, help me do!

One More for the Vine

2009-04-20T22:16:00.001-04:00

The simple stories have not died,
The songs of youth, they are not lies.
Oh, April! Days of passion come
And truth is served when truth is done.
As love is crying all the while,
The miracle is in your smile,
Oh April, under loss and grief,
The surest sign of whole belief.

And, branch by branch, the lordly vine
Embraces you and me and mine.
No feeble graft: we are absorbed,
We know our name, we know the word,
We know the one that conquers us,
Who gives the kiss of peace, the just.
Oh, April, April child, your day has come,
The month for falls and cuts--all to be done
Upon the vine that crawls to us so we may grow
Just as we perish, and to be more than we know.

August 5, 2002

Father to Son

2009-04-12T12:30:00.002-04:00

Those rooms are made for mortal sleep. They are not yours,
Nor are they mine. I would not build a house with doors.
Push out of bed, push out of the room. While ears can range
The body never rests in death, but constant change.
Now go and find your brothers, hiding in the gloom,
Who love the light and truth but fear too much the tomb.
And if you see a room that doesn't need a door,
Please tell the ones inside it what you're knocking for.

May 31, 2003

***

One of the Easter poems I have written. I will trot out the others anon. I wonder whether I have an Easter song in me this season.

Looking Inside the Tombs

2009-04-12T10:51:00.007-04:00

The last entry is fraught with ambiguities. First, you have to know a little something about Holy Saturday. (I have been blessed to study with one who knows more than a little.) Then, there is the soupy language. What exactly is a dangerous love? How could one presume that all are Christian and have a Christian understanding of love, and even then, how could one presume all Christians would understand what a dangerous love is? I cannot pretend myself to comprehend the danger of love as the disciples of every age have done.

Further, I am not quite sure from whose perspective these lines are given, and I do not know to whom they are going for certain. Is it a man or woman speaking? A straight or gay person? Is it Peter? Mary Magdalene? Me? J. Alfred Prufrock? To whom do these lines go? Jesus of Nazareth? The God of Jesus? An absent lover? An unrequited love?

Perhaps the perspectives keep shifting. I have been listening to Dylan's story songs, especially "Tangled Up in Blue" and "Abandoned Love." Or there could be multiple perspectives being presented simultaneously.

Where are we? Jerusalem, or Boston? "Nine forty-seven on holy Saturday night." Is it 2,000 years ago, or was it just last night? Who knows whether it matters. And God knows what is really happening here. Confession coupled with imagination, or imagination coupled with confession, leads a writer to say curious things. The most cagey artists never really tell you what they're confessing, and there's no telling what they're imagining. Now I understand why.

So I decided to play with the ambiguities. Against my better judgment, I have conflated eros, philia, and agape. Further against my better judgment, I have also played with the thoroughly discounted legends shrouding Mary Magdalene. (Pope St. Gregory the Great got it wrong.)

And there it is. The piece works well because it resists a single meaning while bearing a wholly overwhelming feeling. But it also fails for me because I resist it. I don't want to engage it. I don't know if it's virtuous or blasphemous ... and I don't want to know, either. However it is, it hits too close to home. Hints of joyful love behind me, hints of glory before me. But in this moment, neither is there. What is here is not pain, because I have been too privileged and too clever to be caught by real pain. What is here is only a lonely, lonely longing.

I look through keyholes into tomb-rooms, hoping they are empty, but hoping secretly I will find someone. Why? So I can be courageous? What will I do if I find someone inside? What have I ever done but turn away?

Every day of my life is a Holy Saturday, and I am the cemetery custodian, keeping death and new life at arm's distance.

Holy Saturday

2009-04-11T23:10:00.003-04:00

Nine forty-seven
On holy Saturday night.
My soul lost its heart.

A dangerous love
Covered us until yesterday.
Now you are gone.

You met my midnight
And made a sun of mercies
Burn the horizon.

You feared not to walk
With the wind on the water
And bid me to sail.

Friends who see despond
Don't know what I understand:
They cannot touch me,

For only you could!
In your hold would I be still,
Not still by myself.

I dreamed of your flesh
And dreamed that I tasted it,
Warmly in my mouth,

Kissing my own god,
But awoke to the gray day,
Kissing my own ghost.

I am lonely, lonely,
Longing for you
On holy Saturday night.

Sad Song

2009-04-10T10:44:00.002-04:00

I could not care when I was close to you,
Whose love turned quick when it could not possess.
Was yours no love? Was mine no care?
The round ill fits the square.

What stealthy air disturbs my sleeping room,
Where shadows' corners keep the voice that makes
A madman of a happy child?
The round confines the square.

She means much more to me than I to her;
My words get lost in laughs and beery breath.
If I can't speak, how can I see?
The round defies the square.

And no one shows me how to offer up
The presence of my absence. With a shrug,
My gods put God to doleful death:
The round condemns the square.

***

April 26, 2003

Passover

2009-04-09T23:17:00.003-04:00

Crooked sounds are coming down the darkness
Bruising homes of empty sounds and spaces.
Loud or little, in the air within, without,
Is noise. Will spirits sing tonight?
The silent cover heads and hearts to listen.

Watch and pray, we say as friends, forgetting
We are always crashing secret gardens.
Or, we sleep like sickened children, keeping
Hostile dreams that youth despair at seeing.

One by one, the noises sink, pervading
Lousy angry men and flustered women.
Youths in hiding in the streets or shabby
Shelters where they squander money falter
On the broken glass and shrillness hovering.
All these bodies flit confused, without a sigh.

The silent keep their faces clean, their
Hearts at rest for love's command: decrease.
Revealing cymbals, horns, and violins,
They wait no more: the sacred song begins.

***

This poem I wrote on August 9, 2002, two days before I left my home in North Babylon, N.Y., for Baltimore, where I lived for the next two years on my pilgrim journey.

Jesus Blues

2009-04-06T11:54:00.002-04:00

They say you love me, say you're loyal and true
They say you love me, say you're loyal and true
But now I'm hung up, 'cause you mean it, too.

They see you in the starlight, see you in the blood-red moon
They see you in the starlight, see you in the blood-red moon
If I had their sight, I'd say you're coming soon.

They see you in the clouds, gonna break up the sky
They see you in the clouds, gonna break up the sky
If that's the way it is, I think I'm gonna cry.

You gave me riches, gave me every day
You gave me riches, gave me every day
Why'd you go on giving what I've got to give away?

You healed the dying, fed the poor some bread
You healed the dying, fed the poor some bread
Seems so hard of heart to judge them when they're dead.

Don't you love the sinner, don't you hate the war?
Don't you love the sinner, don't you hate the war?
Don't you see I prayed, then I sinned some more?

Take me if you want me, take me, I don't mind
Take me if you want me, take me, I don't mind
But mercy, will you like the soul you find?

Some call you Jesus, some call you holy Christ
Some call you Jesus, some call you holy Christ
Whoever you are, we better think twice.

I'll sing my gospel, I'll sing my blues and rhyme
I'll sing my gospel, I'll sing my blues and rhyme
O brother, have mercy; Jesus, take your time!

***

I wrote this song on Dec. 20, 2006, when I was in an Advent frame of mind. But it seems to me more fitting for Lent and for Holy Week, in retrospect. Or it could be ultimately a song for Pentecost. Maybe you can take it whenever you find it, however you find it. Take it for its blues and take it to your broken heart. Just don't take it to the bank. Anyway, I thought it was worth posting right here and now.

Foolish Song

2009-04-01T22:35:00.003-04:00

Attend to your sight, put away your romances,
Pray from the darkness, the better to praise the light.

Keep closed the door, it will not confine you,
It cannot contain me, or what we suffered for.

Trust in the foolish, the things that are weak,
Things we remember only when boom turns to bust.

Love has disarmed you, and power is yours to deny.
Now that you're ready to perish, be born from above.

And speak of your friends with secretive speech,
Seek as your own their most infinite, intimate ends.

And when Gog and Magog come to sweep up the sands,
Keep your lamp burning and set your face like a dog,

Until firebells ring from the heavenly night,
Deafening all but the saints in the city who sing.

From a Sitting

2009-03-31T22:29:00.003-04:00

Move with the movement,
Anchored and always floating,
Carried standing still.

Sail on to the shore,
Meeting earth, leaving water,
Touching and parting.

Let breezes drift you,
The thick waters of the air
Lapping at your edge.

Circle round the sands
As you cup your little steps
To a kindly crawl.

Waves beyond your ear
Are dashing stubborn swimmers.
You are safe tonight.

Rest, the ship is tied.
Rest, for you are not the tide.
Rest inside the cove,

Watching the seashine,
Hugging the sandy carpets,
Learning fishers' prayers,

Sleeping with the sky,
Rising with a virgin sun
From untame water.

Sail, the light is bright.
Sail, the day is long enough.
Sail until you're here.

Prayer in Anger

2009-03-29T21:22:00.003-04:00

I have had my fill of candlelit vigils and sights subdued.
We are not a confederacy of candles, but a nation on fire.
Let it blaze!

We are not alone, but we are not together. Where are we, friends?

I want to see my enemy. I need to see my enemy.
And my enemy needs to see me.
We march and they hide. We march, and we hide.

I want to break the digital windows and force the virtual doors.
I want to pray like a prisoner and sing like a criminal.

Keep the eschaton. An encounter will do.
I will see you. Good God, I want to see you.

Jesus, revive this sublimated life.
Show us the way of radical subordination.
We have not even begun to be good.
Nobody knows whom we serve.
Nobody is watching because everybody is staring.

But the enemy is waiting to be served.
And all eyes turned inward will jerk around to the image blown out.

Lord, give me your burning coals!
Make me a weakling, a fool!

Good God, I want to see you.

Reason to Cry

2009-03-22T20:24:00.003-04:00

Tell us about the pilgrims who fell and never did go on.

These are the souls who never came to Babylon.

Tell us about the pilgrims who survived.

These are the souls whose cries brought them to life.

The doves drove into darkness while guitars hummed on the air.

You rubbed your eyes, your body shook, you hid inside your hair.

Who told you not to cry?

Who made you feel alone?

Who takes your sleep and lies?

I'll bring them far from home.

You fear to feel anything I feel and see anything I see.

You don't believe. The you in them has killed the you in me.

I'll help you live with friends

Who don't know who you are,

Who justify their ends

And make you their North Star.

Then maybe you can listen with your fingers or your feet,

Intelligently touch the mind, step smartly on the street

Within the light parade,

The waste land made a world

Again. The stage is played

Upon, all tongues uncurled,

And soon you'll speak a living tongue you do not know

And faster sprint to Eden from the Inferno

And feel a hotter fire

Than what blazes in your veins.

The life my blood will sire,

Life for which your labor pains,

Will speed the different shades of sun, ignite the air,

And warmly crawl along the floor and up the stair.

It shines inside your soul

When friends ask for it to.

But when you feel like a black hole,

Recall my prayer for you.

And learn to look before, beyond, and through the bolted door

For visions speaking fe y esparanza y amor.

I trust your teary eyes.

They say you will not die.

I say they will not rise.

I know you have to cry.

For I have felt everything you feel, and seen everything you see.

I hope you trust my joys enough to give your griefs to me.

I've come to you for this.

I'll wait to hear you sigh.

I'll wait until there is

No reason left to cry.

Open Your Lips

2009-03-15T22:08:00.005-04:00

You want to give a kiss. That's what you say:
"It pulls you into flight; you fly away.
It fills the night invisibly with day."

But what you really want is to be kissed.

And why? A kiss makes life. The warm breath flows
Into the molded dust, and the dust stirs.

But shall the pot inspire the potter?
Or Galatea carve Pygmalion?

You want to give a kiss; that's what you say.
"I'll give you all I have then give you more.
My soul, your soul, each in the other's core."

Except your lips are shut. Your body lies
There battered in the sand. The waters roar.

How can you give love when love is something you never had?
You cannot think you know the reasons for the kiss.

For what you really need is to be kissed.
Who will open your lips?
Who will blow hard and blow deep in the mouth of death?

You need to be created anew. And maybe you will. Do you want it?

Do you will it?

Then lean into her face. Look through her eyes.
Be close, then close your orphaned eyes and breathe.
And let your breath be covered with another.

And who knows what it will mean? Or what was there?
The being, not the feeling of what seems
To be so meant to be in gilded dreams,
The being. And who knows what it will be.

Who knows but that you'll say goodbye to crying.
Who knows but that you'll change, but without dying.

Who knows the worth of being here like this.
Who knows the key encrypted on a kiss.

***

Spiritual but not religious: you might as well say you are hungry but not accustomed to eating.
Religious but not spiritual: they feed but are never nourished.
You are a spirit. Your spirit has a religious instinct.
Satisfy spirituality in religion.
Be religious so that you may be spiritual.
Be both so that you may be a true and faithful servant.

***

The temptation of silence: to believe you are called to be quiet.
Silence is not quiet. For that matter, silence is not silent.

The sin of quietism: to fail to yield your tongue to the One who opens your lips.

***

Watch the river flow, and know there is some place for you to go.
Being still is not staying put. Keep moving to be stable.

***

Anonym: A notion which has no name, or which can not be expressed by a single English word (J.R. Seeley).

There are no anonyms but God. For the rest, hear your name and be saved.

Pause, Then Play

2009-03-13T23:32:00.005-04:00

Sing, because someone is tuning.
Dance, because someone is leading.
Pray, because someone is gracing.

When you rest, you are never resting.
You are being led out of temptation.
When you laugh, you are laughing forever.
You are being delivered from evil.

This is what the sage said:
Remember to play.
This is what the sage sees:
Men and women who forget how to act like children.
This is what the sage means:
They who disinherit the least will inherit not the least.

And we disown ourselves when we split into an inward child and an outward elder.

Ascend the stage. Approach the light. Prepare to breathe.
And mark your steps. Adjust your sight. Be there, believe.

Then pause.

And the Word became flesh that your flesh may become a Word.

Then play on.

Going and Coming and Becoming

2009-03-12T23:20:00.005-04:00

Take me on a journey whose destinations are moments.
This is the way out of the endless peregrination to no purpose.

We are tramps. But you will make us pilgrims.

You do not need to take me where the breezes blow.
Make me the breezes blowing.
You do not need to guide me to the watercourses.
Make me the water flowing.

We are plastic dolls. But you will make us sinewed souls.

For the long long loneliness, a friend of friends.
For the slow sore insomnia, a dream of dreams.
For the deep damp desolation, a sun of suns.

O take us on the way into the meeting place,
Where who we see we see in silver sharpness,
Where who we hear we hear in golden roundness,
Where who we touch we touch in bronzed warmness,
As infants overcome in daylight's panoramic brilliance.

We are old and nearly frozen.
But you will make us young and nearly lava.

Love Minus Zero

2009-03-08T16:31:00.005-04:00

Feel the hand of God gently pushing you aside, putting you where you will be.

It is not where you want to be. But it is all right, and it is very good.

And you are allowed to cry about it.
You are allowed to laugh about it.
You are allowed to wonder about it.

Be awakened. Be stirred. Be looked upon.
Some won't let the gaze of God enlighten their brow.

You are down and out, but you are never alone. The poverty of the body will uncover the richness of its spirit. You are here with many pauperized lovers.

Remember everyone who relies on your prayers. Can you see them?

Look upon the sinners and sinned against with compassion: Did you know that God is looking over your shoulder at them? God will look where you look. God will touch whom you touch. Because you are the temple of the Holy Spirit. Grieve for the sufferers who have no companion but darkness. Then come to them, moist-eyed, and be their light.

Be directed by graceful indirection. It is all right, and it is very good.

From the church to the house to the park to the street, you are learning how to be human. You are learning how to be God.

There is no limit in the life itself, although the living must diminish;
You will become eternal, body open-ended, when your labors finish.

Can you count the ways God says yes?
In every affirmation, and still more in every negation!

Get on the road by which the blue clear river flows.
And you will lack for nothing on the way.

Eternity and Other Things

2009-03-06T00:02:00.003-05:00

He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity's sun rise.

William Blake, "Eternity"

But you want to hold on to a piece of that which lasts. Well, you better get in line. And know this: if you get in line, you will wait for time everlasting and collapse into the abyss. It is no matter when or where you get in the line—you are in the line. Because eternity is before what comes first and is after what comes last.

Step out of line, my friend. You should not want so much. Learn to become a better kisser instead.

What, is a kiss not enough? Then get your wings and learn to fly with the contentment you have been given to feel.

Step out of line. Soar into the spiral. And find yourself some good sunglasses.

***

Christian theologians were the first lepidopterists. All well and good, but I can hear Jesus say: physic, study thyself!

***

Who burst your bubble? It was you, you yourself. Is that reason enough to prick the others? It is no reason, for there was no reason at all in what you did in the first place. There, there is original sin: finding a reason for nothing. Was that King Lear's ghost that just shivered past?

***

When something is found along the way, it is yours.
When you are found along the way, you are God's.

Examination of Conscience

2009-03-05T00:01:00.004-05:00

Your competence is not a substitute for compassion. Your competence will not cover the poverty of your charity.

Jealousy! Is it useful to you? It is good for nothing. It makes you curse the others for singing in the rain while you stand stubbornly under your umbrella.

You heard someone's footsteps approaching behind the door, and you flinched again. Who was it? You will never know. But you keep waiting for the footsteps. You camp in the room behind the door. But you won't answer the door. You call this hope?

Courage: it is to reject your suspicion that others are not interested in you. It is also to call upon others and risk having your suspicion validated.

You waited to have your name lifted up before you left them: greed, even for wooden nickels.

Your eyes are suns. The one whom you can look directly in the eye is the one whom you can blind and burn. Be careful.

But do not be too careful. The one whose face you avoid will freeze.

Quick, in the name of Isaac, a miracle: laugh, laugh well, and laugh within earshot.

Did you obey? Did you defy? Did you make it possible to do both with excellence?

Did you live? Did you die?

Did you love?

Goodness, Find Us

2009-02-28T22:39:00.004-05:00

Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone.

Mark 10:18

You do the right things, but you are not good. Even if all you did were right things, that does not make you good.

God, does the world, teeming with long-dead souls, look that strange to you? How peculiar does it seem when, even on its brightest days, it needs saving?

How strange, too, that you give us the feeling that it needs saving. A world perfectly beautiful and completely broken. And inside, the brief feeling of an eternal warmth rushes around the flesh with the blood, only to remind us, in the brevity, that something is seriously out of the right.

It is not right, and even if it was right it is not good. What a strange effect grace sometimes has upon the soul to stir your lowly image to such stern and lordly convictions.

One of your servants said a good man is hard to find. But we know goodness when we see it. Then let goodness find us all. Another erstwhile servant of yours says it always has and will again.

Bid your angels to look over our shoulders. Bid us to look upon every man and woman and child with love and feel with conviction that everything is broken. No profession of love will ring true without the confession; there is no truth without the feeling for the thought.

Hear us in our hour of endangerment. Hear us while we strive to live, and be our refuge.

Let us receive your grace and see your goodness now!

Burning Into Ash

2009-02-25T22:55:00.004-05:00

She never sounded so forlorn or despairing.

She does not believe in your words of love, does not know how. She says you say them to be kind. She does not believe in love anymore.

The love that gave you her flesh, the love that gave you her blood: she does not feel it in her, she does not feel it being given to her.

She feels she is worthy of nothing, neither your time nor your devotion.

Her words are thick. Her face is drawn downward into a nervous slump.

She looks around her shrunken world, an invisible cage barely shielding her from incomprehensible violence. She cannot see the way out.

She stays up late to listen for a voice of reassurance. She cannot hear it.

Every night is dangerous. Her dreams terrify us. Who are the enemies assailing her from within?

It is early Friday, and she is crying, afraid of the ghosts. She is crying, because she is becoming a ghost.

And the eighth day is far, far away.

She is burning into ash, and her embers are swiftly drifting away. She is disintegrating into dust too fine to grasp.

Surely this is not the work of the Holy One! Surely this is not the offering she is to make! For who she is, is being stolen from us and from God.

Truly, do you see your sparrow falling?

Stir up her embers and fuse them into a livid coal. Give her the light and heat that she may share it with you and us. Make her live so that you may use her until her time surrenders to eternity.

But let not her body and mind be profaned by this demonic immolation. Lead her not into a living oblivion.

For ashes she must become, but not to be scattered to no purpose. Let her be a sign, an act, a person who by braving this burning becomes the way for us to go.

A Reproof

2009-02-21T23:14:00.002-05:00

You prayed for those too hurt to cry but forgot the way to feel.
You forgot the way to cry.

So now, this blue in shades of brown -- does it surprise you?

"I desire mercy, not sacrifice": then why are you so cruel to yourself?
Why are you afraid to bear your most godly vulnerabilities?
This is what the world wants of you.
This, the Lord requires of you.

You do not love the ones you're with.
Very well: then see if pity passes over.
It will not. It will find you underneath that black cracked visage.
And it will pry you apart.

For why should not your God kill out of mercy? Yes, if it be the only mercy left that you can feel.

***

Everyone lives what they believe.
But I promise you will live on whom you believe.
Who are you, if you are?
Not every belief will survive.
You will live on if you live on whom you believe.

***

Now, stop your prayers! For truly they never were.
Will you dare to speak to me? Will you dare to look at me?

You have entombed yourself.
I led Jesus to the stable, to the temple, to the river, to the desert, to the seaside, to the mountain, to the city, to the hilltop, and to the cavern.
I never led him to the tomb or the crypt.

You are not going away. You are too graceful to stumble into the abyss.

Look not for what you want.
I will give you Who I give.
You will give the Who you are, for I am a beggar looking for your joys and sorrows.

Look up. Look over.
Look upon the one whom I brought you.
Hear the word: "I love you."
Look upon your other, too, with love.

Before Sleep

2009-02-19T00:03:00.002-05:00

Now make me still for the unquiet day to come.

Let this surrender of body and soul feel sweet. Let this slumber be silent.

Then make me rise again for the ever-living surrender, and help me wake the wide-eyed sleepers.

On Sexuality

2009-02-15T10:57:00.005-05:00

This is a note I wrote in August 2008 as I was reading a book by Geoffrey Robinson, retired auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Sydney, titled Confronting Power and Sex in the Catholic Church. It is fitting to repost it here today.

Some propositions on sexual identity and practice, with an eye toward celibacy:

Sexuality is thoroughly a part of human nature. This holds true even as one holds that human nature and, hence, sexuality, is socially constructed.

Gender and orientation are core aspects of sexuality. Therefore, gender and orientation are thoroughly part of human nature. Human nature being unified but by no means uniform, no varieties of gender and orientation should be considered “intrinsically disordered.”

Sexual inclination and sexual expression are interdependent but also independent of one another. They are neither fully separable nor identical. Sexual inclination is not fully realized without sexual expression, but it is not determined by particular form(s) of sexual expression. Sexual expression is dependent on and is an indicator of sexual inclination, but it is also dependent on other aspects of sexuality.

Mere sexual inclination (i.e., orientation) has no bearing on the moral value of sexual expression.

The meaning and purpose of sexual intercourse is generally but not universally unitive (strengthening the love of the couple) and procreative (creating new life). Therefore, while both the unitive and procreative aspects of sexuality must be present in marriage as an institution of the whole human race, they need not be present in each and every act of intercourse, nor even in every marriage. Indeed, this is neither practical nor desirable.

To take a broader view, sexual intercourse is generally but not universally the ultimate expression of sexuality. Sexual intercourse is not the exclusive means by which the highest aspirations of sexuality (i.e., love is strengthened and new life is created) are achieved. Therefore, while sexual intercourse will always make manifest the most sublime expressions of human sexuality, it need not be the ultimate expression for every human being. To demand this of the act is neither practical nor desirable.

To go even further, some human beings will never express their sexuality through sexual intercourse. Not every person is called to be married, much less to be a parent. And not every person is called to be in a long-term sexual relationship marked by exclusivity, intimacy, and mutuality. But if unitivity and procreativity need not be present in every consummated marriage, then it need not be present among persons who choose not to marry or enter sexual relationships. Yet even among those who do not marry or enter sexual relationships, the highest aspirations of sexuality may still be attained.

Mere sexual inclination places no limits on the capacity of any human being to achieve the highest aspirations of sexuality. Neither does sexual inclination wholly determine the form(s) of sexual expression assumed by an individual human being.

To use the language of the Church, every child of God is called to a particular sexual vocation. Gender and orientation have to do with sexual identity; marriage (with or without parenthood), celibacy, singleness, etc., have to do with sexual vocation. Discovery of one’s gender and orientation is the beginning, not the end of the discernment of one’s sexual vocation. Mere sexual inclination neither qualifies a person for nor precludes that person from any particular sexual vocation.

The vocation to ecclesial ministry is a direct gift of God to the Church (i.e., the people of God) and an indirect gift to individuals. Such vocations are therefore subject to confirmation by the Church. On the other hand, sexual vocation is a direct gift of God to individuals and is not subject to confirmation by the Church. The Church does well to remain agnostic on matters of sexual vocation, instead offering guidance for discernment using all the spiritual tools at its command, and a readiness to bless genuine sexual vocations.

There is no clear correlation or causal relationship between particular ecclesial vocations and particular sexual vocations. If this proposition is valid, then two conclusions follow:

Not every person called to priestly ordination is called to celibacy. Put positively, a person called to priestly ordination may also be called to marriage.

Irrespective of ecclesial vocation, not every person is called to marriage. Put positively, a person who serves outside the clerical ranks may yet be called to celibacy.

Once again, a sexual vocation is a direct gift from God the Holy Spirit. Therefore, neither marriage nor celibacy is a superior practice to the other. The former is a witness to God’s incarnational and immanent love; the latter is a witness to God’s eschatological and transcendent love.

A sexual vocation is a charism, and it cannot be mandated. Therefore, celibacy should not be a condition of ordination to priesthood. Finally, because a sexual vocation is a charism, it should never be despised. Therefore, celibacy should not be regarded inside or outside the priestly or religious orders as aberrant or unnatural. As a unique form of sexual practice it is well within the diverse range of healthy, loving, life-giving sexual expressions that comprise all of human sexuality.

'God Does Not Like You'

2009-02-14T17:46:00.008-05:00

Listen to me! You have to consider the possibility that God does not like you. He never wanted you. In all probability, he hates you. This is not the worst thing that can happen....We don't need him!

Tyler Durden, Fight Club

Chuck Palahniuk's antagonist gives us three premises and two conclusions:

Premise 1: God does not like us.

Premise 2: God never wanted us.

Premise 3: God hates us.

Conclusion 1: Being not liked, never wanted, and even being hated by God is not the worst thing that can happen to us.

Conclusion 2: We don't need a God who does not like us, who even hates us.

With qualifications, I can accept all three premises and the first conclusion. The second conclusion does not follow from the premises. We do need a God who does not like us, and we do need a God who even hates us. Indeed, this God is the only God we have.

And here's the key that opens the door to these seemingly absurd sentences.

David Tracy says it is the central metaphor of Christianity. We may never know or understand God even with this metaphor, but we'll never understand God without it, so we who believe by it better be about the job of making its meaning clear.

It is an affirmation of such ineluctable starkness that it calls roaringly for apophatic declarations of equal starkness.

With it, I can consider the possibility that God does not like us. By this metaphor we adduce from God a quality of being-in-relation of a different order from liking. It is an order that is not only different, but also incommensurable. Liking is bounded, capricious, and partisan. The God who merely liked us could not give us life. The God who merely liked us could not save us or sustain us. It may be true that God does like us, but this does not make God that with which we are ultimately concerned. If we are to speak strictly of God as that which relates to ultimate reality, we must discard all that is superfluous to ultimacy. Our God does not have to like us to give us life, to save us, and sustain us. God could like us, but God does not need to. Liking does not add to deity. But it could detract from it. I will take the step further and suppose that where ultimate reality is concerned, boundaries, caprice, and partisanship are inimical to the God of boundlessness, steadfastness, and impartiality Christians confess. God cannot like and still be God. The central metaphor of Christianity exposes the limits of liking and points toward a reality at once more transcendent and immanent.

With the central metaphor, I can accept that God never wanted us. By this I do not mean an idle metaphysical musing over how God never wants for anything. Let's go past that to a more bracing personal reality. God desires persons, but God's desire for us is not a desire of us. And God's desire for us is not the same as the desire in us that leads us to embrace, possess, and reject persons with finite passion. God creates us without wanting us. Indeed, God cannot create by wanting. And so on for redeeming and sustaining us. God desires without wanting. God's eroticism is not concupiscent; this makes God's friendship and self-giving possible.

With the central metaphor, I can even admit of an indeterminate probability that God hates us. But let's be careful about how we mean that. We are because God is. Who we are is in relation to who God is. The I-Thou relation is a relation of Whos. It is a relation of human and divine persons. It cannot be an I-It relationship, a relation of Whats. Because of sin and the fall to violence, we are what we are, and we are not who we are. We cannot relate to other persons, and surely we cannot relate to the ultimate Person. If, in our Whatness, we do not accept the life that God has shared with us, and if we do not share with others what God has shared with us, because we cannot and will not -- if we reject the God Who Is, what else can God do but hate the What we have become? I has forsaken Thou, I has made its understanding of Thou an It, and I has actually become an It. God is wrathful at this. But this is not merely the heated hatred such as humans show toward one another. It is the cool wrath of anathema. God will not be made an It, and the God Who Is will not relate to our What. Given the Whoness of the central metaphor in the person of Jesus, how else can God respond to our denial but with another denial?

In a peculiar way we agree with Tyler Durden, an anarchist-nihilist who is not burdened by Christian metaphysics. It is not a question for him whether God can like at all or want at all or hate at all and still be God. He knows his God does not like us. His God does not want us, and his God hates us. The questions do not concern him, nor do the answers. All that matters is the right response to such a God and the world of God's making. And his response is to get pissed off, take off one's shirt and shoes, and prepare to fight to the point of destruction.

In a world addled by violence and tempted by terrorism, it must not go without saying that Tyler's response is the wrong one. So let's push the key over all the tumblers, all the way into the lock.

Tyler Durden rightly rejects the God of our projections and rails against poverty of life. But he wrongly construes ultimate reality. He supposes that granting and glorifying life requires a wanting of life, and from the shape of things it appears to Tyler that God has wanted us as capriciously as we want others. Indeed this God is worthy only of rejection. Tyler reasons that God has denied us first, and so we must deny God and all that God has wrought.

But the reality is that, with Tyler, we have denied a God we never truly knew or understood. Because God is love.

Tyler's first conclusion is sound. Being not liked, never wanted, and being hated by God is not the worst thing that can happen. Being unalive, being unfree, and being bounded in hopelessness are worse. And these are but symptoms of the worst thing that can happen. Because God is love, the worst thing that can happen is not to be loved by God. And so we must reject Tyler's second conclusion. We do need the God who does not like us and might hate us because this is precisely the God who is able to love us into life, freedom, and boundless possibility.

Out of pure love this God tells us who we are, whether we like it or not. This God, in whom all things are possible, desires us without possessively wanting us. This God says the Word that makes us who we will become and will reunify the hateful What which we are with the Who we must be. God does not like us; God loves us, and by this love we live and move and have our being. By this love, we will be with God.

Now when I talked to God I knew he'd understand
He said stick by me and I'll be your guiding hand
But don't ask me what I think of you
I might not give the answer that you want me to

Peter Green, "Oh Well"

What God Has Joined

2009-02-13T22:16:00.003-05:00

Mark 10:2-12 is not just for married couples. This is a political statement binding on all God's children. See Romans 8:35-39 and Ephesians 2:11-22. Reading Mark's teaching episodes in light of these two readings, one may dare to allegorize what appears to be a straightforward examination of domestic relations as regulated by God's covenant. And then we find ourselves examining the human-divine relationship.

The teaching on marriage and adultery in Mark, followed immediately by Jesus' admonition to the disciples not to keep the children from approaching him, would appear arbitrary were it not for the impression that these episodes as juxtaposed are saying something about covenant itself. God has joined every person to God, and God has done this by joining the human race together. Any attempt to split the human union on account of age, class, race, sex, and other human factors is an assault on the human-divine union. Any person, male or female, rich or poor, white or brown or black, may be guilty of abandoning God by abandoning one's fellow child of God. Jesus refuses any efforts to hold the least of God's children at a distance from God and the peaceful reign of God.

And God remains a jealous God. To separate others from God's love is to effect one's own break-up with God in favor of another partner -- namely, one's own self or one's preferred persons or one's preferred in-group: same difference. This is what God despises and what Jesus calls "adultery." There is no God but God. You cannot leave God for one's own preferred selves and remain faithful to God. Either you love God and neighbor and preserve union above and below or you hate your neighbor and cheat on God by running off with the in-group you have made your lover -- orphaning the rest of humanity in the process.

As it was for the Hebrew prophets, the marriage bond was for Jesus a useful image of the bond between God and humans. This bond is characterized by exclusivity and permanence, and to a lesser degree, mutuality and intimacy. There is debate among scholars, but I find that Jesus leaves little wiggle room for divorce. If one holds the view that Jesus is saying something about the human-divine covenant through his severe interpretation (and correction!) of Mosaic law, then anything but an absolutist view on the indissolubility of marriage becomes incoherent.

What God has joined, let no human being separate. Well, God has joined all together to God so that God may be all in all. What God once may have permitted because of the hardness of human hearts can no longer persist if God's creation is to find ultimate fulfillment in God's reign. The authentic word of Paul in Romans and kindred word in Ephesians speak to me a word of already-achieved fulfillment and final fulfillment to come. And while that ultimate fulfillment may be delayed in coming, it will not fail to arrive.

Therefore, from the ancient witness comes the challenge to act as if one believed it was really true that God will not let the covenant be broken or the blessed union of souls dissolved.

"Between God and the soul there is no between." Even Julian of Norwich's declaration can be read as a political statement. Her indicative, when viewed through Pauline eyes, becomes an imperative. There will be no between, and no human being will thwart God from drawing all souls into union with God and each other in eternal relationship. Therefore, human beings who believe in God do best to be vigilant against those who, to paraphrase Lincoln, would seek to dissolve the covenant and divide effects by negotiation.

Such vigilance is what this soul, despite muddled thinking and weak resolve, seeks to practice.

Go to the Mirror

2009-02-09T22:57:00.002-05:00

... he is like a man who looks at his own face in a mirror. He sees himself, then goes off and promptly forgets what he looked like.

James 1:23-24

Go to the mirror. See who I want you to be.

Linger here a while. Look with new eyes. Look with my eyes.

Do not stare. Do not glare. Do not pore, and do not adore. Go to the mirror.

Look not with your pride. Look there with my pride.

Look with me. Take a look at yourself. Take a good look at yourself.

Do you see what I see?

I see what is mine. You have never seen yourself as anything but yours.

You are not your own. You belong. Have you ever looked at yourself as if you belonged?

Until you do, you are not really you.

Until this moment, you have looked at what you are. Now look at who you are.

See who I want you to be.

You will be who you will be because I am who am.

Remember who you see. For you must love the one you see. You do not have to like; to like is far too cheap a sentiment. But you must love.

Go to the mirror. Look at yourself with love. Look at yourself as if you believed you were loved.

Look at yourself and believe that I believe.

Go to the mirror. Linger a moment there.

You see yourself, and you will see me there.

I will proclaim the decree of the LORD, who said to me, "You are my son; today I am your father."

Psalms 2:7

Near and Far

2009-02-08T00:31:00.002-05:00

In the end, did I draw them to me?

When you gave me brothers and sisters, did I adopt them?

The thing I feel in my solitude, is it your warm breath under my skin, or is it the sedative of some devil?

So near, so far: The distance between you and God is no greater than the distance between the averted eyes of you and the person next to you.

I go to your many houses, those of stone and glass and those with no walls. To cross over -- to enter the holy: that is the beginning of worship. To go back -- to bear the holy, being holy: that is the end of worship.

Today, I am at the threshold of the sanctuary, the membrane of the living circle. I sense you are there, in the light, and I want to touch you. I want you to touch me.

There, at the threshold, I remain. I am slumbering almost below the ground in the cool darkness. I almost want not to be disturbed, ever again.

Except, someone says: Sursum corda!

If I do not enter the sanctuary, how can I go into the street?

Without accepting the dare of worship, there can be no risk in the witness.

When will I dare again?

You did not command us to make your house a hermitage. Keep us from liking our loneliness.

Teach us to love what we see.

After all, love really does come at first sight. But for many, first sight comes after ages of unseeing with opaque eyes or downturned eyes. For many more, there is never a sighting.

So near, so far: The distance between you and God is no greater than the distance between the averted eyes of you and the person next to you.

Be thou my vision, Lord, that I may say before I die that I loved somebody.

A Counter-Reading

2009-02-07T10:47:00.005-05:00

From Psalm 55:

If this had been done by an enemy
I could bear his taunts.
If a rival had risen against me,
I could hide from him.

But it is you, my own companion, my intimate friend!
How close was the friendship between us.
We walked together in harmony in the house of God.

I am well aware that the accepted reading of this psalm is that of a prayer for justice. Someone has been wronged by a companion, a comrade, a fellow brother or sister. One has been betrayed by the other.

But while reading this psalm I have had a Nathan-meets-David moment. Suppose it is I who is the false friend?

Sin is the distance between who we are and what we are. I can read this psalm as an unwitting prayer of lament for my estrangement from God and from my true self, the person I was created to be.

O God, listen to my prayer, do not hide from my pleading, attend to me and reply; with my cares, I cannot rest....

O that I had wings like a dove to fly away and be at rest.
So I would escape far away and take refuge in the desert.

Sometimes God hides. Most of the time we are the ones who do the hiding.

I tremble at the shouts of the foe, at the cries of the wicked; for they bring down evil upon me.
They assail me with fury.

When you are a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Sin hardens our heart and casts a veil on all that we perceive. A rose shows us only its thorns. A soothing word only clangs in our ears. The good and true and beautiful appears meaningless and ugly. All the world is ours, but when we are caught and crushed in the vise-grip of fractured relationships, we are stuck in a crumbling nutshell.

I would hasten to find a shelter from the raging wind, from the destructive storm, O Lord, and from their plotting tongues.

Sin corrupts one of our most precious gifts from God: the power of imagination and its corollary in our senses, the power of perception. Indeed, there are winds and storms, and they blow where they will, for purposes unknown to us. Shall we judge them to be raging and destructive, on the evidence of our perceptions?

For I can see nothing but violence and strife in the city.
Night and day they patrol high on the city walls.

It is full of wickedness and evil; it is full of sin.
Its streets are never free from tyranny and deceit.

Of course, there really is violence and strife in the city of man. These are the visible marks of sin, for which we are responsible collectively but usually not culpable individually. Make no mistake: we are sinned against. But which is greater, the transgression or the source of the transgression? Understand this: our own thrown-ness, our common ownership of sin, becomes so heavy and loathsome that we project it falsely onto others, blaming our friends and loved ones individually for every fear and anxiety that assails us. Our lying perceptions are the precursors to our violent interfaces with the world. And our wayward perceptions tragically become the reality from which we cannot flee.

Adam and Eve committed a transgression in the garden, but God did not banish them for it. They were expelled for denying their responsibility. This is the sin that leads to all transgressions.

As for me, I will cry to God and the Lord will save me.
Evening, morning and at noon I will cry and lament.

Sometimes God says no.

He will deliver my soul in peace in the attack against me: for those who fight me are many, but he hears my voice.

God answers our prayers in ways we can never fully predict, and never according to what we expect. One might imagine that those "many" who fight this tortured soul are not enemies out there or other external forces but rather a part of that soul as the demonic, which is to say destructive, forms of culture we have embodied.

And even in the midst of our demonic condition, there is a voice that cries out loud and true from within our fractured selves. This voice, God will hear.

God will hear and will humble them, the eternal judge: for they will not amend their ways.
They have no fear of God.

We believe God, and yet we reject God. We promise to change, but we cannot change. We tremble before the holy, but we cast off God recklessly. We are confident in karmic vengeance, ever denying that deliverance may require us to be delivered up.

The traitor has turned against his friends; he has broken his word.
His speech is softer than butter, but war is in his heart.
His words are smoother than oil, but they are naked swords.

We never fail to see in others what we fail to see in ourselves.

Entrust your cares to the Lord and he will support you.
He will never allow the just man to stumble.

But you, O God, will bring them down to the pit of death.
Deceitful and bloodthirsty men shall not live half their days.

God will save who we are and do away with what we must not be. God will reunify who we are with what we are. Those demonic forms that we embody falsely, these will be brought down to the pit of death. God will put self-destroying tendencies toward deceit and violence to death. May it be done quickly!

O Lord, I will trust in you.

May it be so.