Steal My Heart

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.