Saturday, April 26, 2014

Prayer, April 25

Jesus.
Why is it so hard to talk to You like I used to?
How can we be friends? I feel so lonely.
I feel trapped in smallness, ugliness, pettiness.
I keep rearranging my room. Trying to get rid of things. Why?
Is it really because I'm preparing for something, or am I just growing stagnant?
Where is the life You showed me, that would call for everything I had, beyond what I felt capable of? Isn't that life always Today? Is it charmed, or in disguise, and I just don't recognize it? Jesus, help me. I'm brutish and belligerent and I can't seem to help myself. I get depressed and irritable. And lazy. Yes, lazy lazy lazy. And careless.
Do I really believe You are Who You say You are?
Then shouldn't I be living differently? Show me how to live like a river.
Always flowing in, out. Not begrudging any season. Feeding, making a habitat, SPEAKING. Please anoint my tongue. Please use me in spite of myself.
Please make me larger, not smaller. Even if I am never a mother. Even if I never marry. I have to prepare for the future by living today. What is my purpose? What is the goal? What kind of attitude, what kind of trust glorifies You?
What do I hold onto too tightly?
What am I afraid of? Travel. Ocean. Witnessing. The city. The wilderness. Myself. Oh, I am so so afraid of myself. Help me forgive myself, Lord. Help me forget myself. Abandon myself to You, You who made me. You will not waste my life. Here it is again, in Your hands. Please help me serve others. Help me desire You, relish You, come to You. Not forget that You want my heart. Your heart really does want mine, You want me to be content in You. Help me believe that, hear Your voice over the lies. Show me that You love me. You always show me; help me see.
Help me get past the sludge. I want to hear You and respond to You, whatever it is. I want all this to matter. Every day. Every moment. Make a saint out of me. The transparent kind.
God, I want to join some vision, some large and noble goal. I want something large and demanding and beautiful, to give myself to. But how well am I preparing? What did Elisabeth do? What did You do? 

Sunday, April 20, 2014

Easter Influenza

Who knew fever breaking was like water breaking,
cold sweat, wet bed,
What has happened to me?

Am I born again, resurrected?
The struggle is enough to leave me wasted,
keelhauled, tarred and feathered,
crucified.

Bleary-eyed. Here am I, born and quaking, open-mouthed
to scream, as if the air is not for breathing.
Savior, bedfellow in sickness,
You harrow, You hallow hell with me.




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Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Finches

Finches asking questions flap
around my window. It is open. I am not
hiding from this day, I decide. Again
I nurse my feet with tea tree oil, shift
the seedlings to the sun.


Thursday, April 3, 2014

Had (better) Matter


Yes, but we are all human.
Hoopla. 
Humble commune, sludge, the nudge 
the nether end the bend 
of citrus trees, and sit us down on wed 
rocks wet rocks granted 
granite smudge. Fountains 
bluebs, bluebers, tubers, roots. Coots magoots. 
Hoodles. Hoodlums, 
Soof, the roof, the underage belly 
of the gub-gub, float me on the rim of a straw hat, 
mad and maddering, nattering, 
bedlam. That's a pink cupid, boogers. Botterboom, 
the room next to the room, the tomb of Natamycin. Doom and gloom 
and thanks for the flowers, stank up the hallway made my lettuce 
taste like pollen. Falling into ceremony, hegemony, ruthless good. 
A good broom used to sweep the moon, 
the neat, the knap, the grappling tumbling back. Have to pack.