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? 

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.




---

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.

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.

Cygnet Ring

We were very tired, we were very merry—

We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry;

And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear,

In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there

And Old Saint Nick came home, arms akimbo,

Saw Agnes carved a cygnet, and Richie cut his hair.

Sing loudly, Bon Jovi, Burl Ives, Imogen.

Write me a letter, send it by mail,

Send it in care of the Birmingham Jail.

Give my heart ease love, give my heart ease,

Build me a castle,

Quicken Thou Me.

---

Lines 1-3: "Recuerdo" by Edna Saint Vincent Millay

Line 4: "A Visit from St. Nicholas" by Clement Clark Moore 

Richie cut his hair, ref. Wes Anderson's, "The Royal Tenenbaums"

Lines 8-11: "Down In the Valley," trad. American folk song

Line 12: Psalm 119:25, KJV

Prayer, March 16

Jesus,
I need You to remind me who I am.
Help me be fearless again.

HA!      Ha HA!     It can be done!
O Theo, it can be done.     Callooh, Callay!
With You, You wild thang, nothing is impossible.

How can I know You, Holy Terror?
Why do You love me?
Show me You love me, again and again.

CHASE
ME.

Amen.

Fool

"Do not spray into eyes

I have sprayed you into my eyes."

I let You in

and pica astonishes me.

Rabid

rabbit in spring

     leaping

wild-eyed for more than mating

some kind of grand ringing

in all this. The chimes from the neighbor's back deck

at night. The Cheshire Cat smile of a moon.

The longing to scrape earth in my hands

taste bitter grass, split the clouds

spit and laugh

soften stones between my two arms.

Kiss frost from the window

shear my head

or cover it.

"You made a holy fool of me

and I've thanked You ever since."

---

"Do not spray into eyes..." alt-J, "Taro"

"You made a holy fool of me..." mewithoutYou, "In A Sweater Poorly Knit"