Sunday, February 26, 2017

This Year (Jan 5)

I'll tell you what,
Six hours of sleep feels so good.
I am still stiff and thick, but I want to kiss the window and wear a long,
soft dress. I want to come awake.

I want this year to be one of Your increase in me, of my life being crushed
so that I can be the precious fragrance of Christ.

I want to write songs that are more private, that are more public.
Songs that will carry mystery to the disinterested and clarity to the thirsty.
I want to be a bold voice for justice. I want to give me.
I want to rest and meditate and choose fruitfulness over bitterness,
busyness, and leave the definition of "fruitfulness" to You.

I want to eat and breathe and sweat and sh** and exhale righteousness.
I want to be so in love with You that anything less is laughable,
more absurd than Warhol tossing taffy.
I want to become raw to the holy, to let it burn me,
to understand why the whole universe is about the Name of Jesus.
You are worthy
You are worthy of Your Name,
Jesus. 





Italics: "You Are Worthy" (Brown, Younker, Curran)

Sleepless Travel Buddies (Jan 3)

Being here is very good. We bond just by being sleepless together,
and finding each other in crowds.
We celebrate each other's existence.

I am so thankful that I DID SLEEP, because if I hadn't I'd be angry. And afraid.
As is, I'm delirious and a little appalled, but there's a sweet trusting babyishness to it, like being born.



Purity of Heart (Jan 2)

I really want a pure heart.
I want to know what that means, because I suspect I'm calling it a bottle of Dasani, while You call it a thunderstorm, Niagara Falls, or the ocean.
Everything that is toward You is larger than we think.
Every aspect of Your character is endless and whole. 

Eternity (Jan 1)

Eternity.  I know it exists like the womb exists. Maybe with more certainty.
I thought that sounded poetic, even though it may not be true.
Although I think it is true.
Eternity is set in the hearts of men, by God.
The womb is set in the abdomen of women, also by God. 

Thursday, February 23, 2017

Use Your Safety

Remember to use your safety.
It is not for blind indulgence.
It is for healing,
awareness,
and preparation.

Thursday, February 16, 2017

The Sign of Jonah

Matthew 16:4 NIV

"A wicked and adulterous generation looks for a miraculous sign,
but none will be given it except the sign of Jonah..."

I dreamed I had crocodiles inside me. My abdomen was a parched bed of earth, and we poured a bucket of water over it. As it soaked down into me and the dirt turned to mud, many small crocodiles began to squirm and wriggle about. It was painful. I was torn between wanting more water, enough to release them and let them slide away, and wanting to endure their activity until the mud dried and they grew quiet again.
One croc, near the surface, was so large and painful that I reached in through my navel and found my fingers inside his stomach. I felt around until I knew the tissue was his, and then I dug in and tore him to death with my fingernails. His writhing was awful. Although I couldn't feel his teeth, the stretching of his open jaws and the rough spines along his body were terrible. When he died, I realized I was still stuck with his body inside me; it would tear me if I pulled him out. His body lay transverse from above my left hip to under my right ribs.
Happily I woke up after that. I don't know what I "should" have done, or what the "sign" means. I'm inclined now to choose water, to dissolve myself to mud and set the crocodiles free. It seems a very, "If your right hand causes you to sin" kind of situation.
How do we deal with our sin?

Wednesday, February 15, 2017

January 15, Sabbath

Happy Love Day to us!
Show me Your face. Look at me and speak to me in such a way that I'll know how to think, feel, and behave. I'm usually horrible at following. Help me breath deeply, evenly, quietly. If I do nothing else, if I simply match your breathing, that is enough for today. Even if we don't make it across the floor.
Help me believe that.
Wax on.
No one has shoulders like Yours. And milk and honey are under Your tongue. Share them with me? Spread me out until I'm light as a bird, and quivering. Until the little knots can be rubbed away with one touch.
If we can't enjoy each other, what is the point of it all?
Put Your ear to my lips.

"...They will drink and drink
and be as if they never were."
-Obadiah 16b

"I think you are the first sip of new milk."
-Jess Yu

"These walls of one window will open into something
wider still..."

Friday, February 10, 2017

Threes

Three things that make me feel encumbered, yet invincible:
Shoes
Gloves
Sunglasses


Three words that bubbled up in my vocabulary last month:
Travesty
Abomination
Sacrilege


Three alternate lives I'd lead:
Masseuse
Innkeeper
Nun






Thursday, February 9, 2017

Tom's Voice: Two Poems

I.
For a week Pooh Bear ate bran instead of honey. He grew lean and ground his new-found claws on concrete. He gargled with salt water every night, and again on Thursdays at three.
He dined the second week on swiss cheese, washed down with strong black tea, tannic and hot, grumbling and humbling and snapping his fingers to Louis Armstrong.
On the third week, he packed a knapsack with Pecan Sandies and hiked the Matterhorn, plodding till the air was thin and the planets close as moths. Then he stopped, and munched, and spoke - and the voice he used was Tom's.

II. Haiku
Pumice stones sand heels Tom in the Dry Tortugas Heals sand by speaking


Tuesday, February 7, 2017

Dialogue, Feb. 7

Me: God, I need to see You. O God, I need to see You.
God: I'm here.
Me: 
God: Look at Me.
Me: Huh?
God: I'm right here.
Me: (mumble)
God: I've got all the time in the world...
Me: What, right now?
God:
Me: Rats. I actually wanted to sleep.
God: Not yet. Look at me.
Me: Thanks. Ok, yup. That's better. Thanks.
Me: How about I sleep now?
God:
Me: ...OK, so...
God: What do you want?
Me: I'm not sure how to answer that. There are about three true answers. I guess I want to want You, if that counts...
God: It does.
Me: But that means I have to stay up and be with You for a while, doesn't it?
God: Possibly.
Me: You mean I need to cooperate... i.e. the shortest route is surrender?
God: You'll just have to trust Me on this.
Me: (long, slow breath)
God: Can you drink this cup?



--
Thank You, God. You won't leave me to starve on my own juices. Even when I hardly want You, try to pray but hardly do, You answer. Calmly and persistently.
You understand how it is. But You also understand that only You will satisfy me, and You answer Your own magnet within me. You want my highest good, my deepest pleasure, more than I do myself. 
You see through my palliative fantasies and have compassion on me. Too jealous and too kind to give up.
You know that in wanting a man I'm only wanting You. You know that in rolling impossible brokennesses over in my mind, I'm really asking, "Is the impossible really possible? Can anything ever change? Can redemption strike here?" 
I do want to want You. And I want You. And I need to see You. 
O God, I need to see You.