Fences

Some people build fences
to keep others out,
while others build fences
to keep themselves in.
All that can be done is to
gently place a gift
at their gate, and hope
somehow it is seen, as
through pretty, pastel curtains
they discreetly peek…

Matthew 17: 1-5

"As They Looked on, a Change Came over Him"

Which
one Heaven,
which one Earth,
each’s seeming the
mirror reflection of the other,
each’s image and likeness
and raiment
transfigured as on
Mount Tabor – strikingly
white, blinding the
eyes of those who from the
waters and clouds
the voice of God
heard…

Cedars

(Matthew 19, John 2)

So this is my Shepherd’s gate,
the entrance to which certainly is not
what I had anticipated — the eyelet of a
needle for a camel to impossibly
navigate! But rather have emerged
the soft colors of gold and green, caught
in the autumn light of an
end-of-afternoon, cedar dream.
And a tear washes my cheek,
overcome by the unmerited, sweet
mercy which grace in beauty has
bathed me! Thus I realize at this very
late hour, was revealed the
delicate veil which gives access to
Cana’s wedding feast and
shaded bower…

Mark 6: 4-6

"And He Was Amazed at Their Unbelief"

His power was powerless, and
Jesus was astounded by their lack of faith,
because all they saw Him as was
a carpenter’s son, someone
who was just like they were, plain,
ordinary and poor, no better,
someone who once worked with
stone and wood, whose family was known
and who for years had shared
cooling waters from the same
Nazareth well, a carpenter’s son,
who had recently started to
actively preach throughout the
countryside, and who was
now more interested in how
a mustard seed could bloom as
a metaphor for God’s eternal
Kingdom, and who when
questioned about the
payment of Roman taxes,
deflected the attempt to trap Him,
saying to remit to Caesar what
belonged to Caesar and to God what
belonged to God…

Contemplating the Color of His Sacrifice

Sitting here,
The solitude around me
Is not just without sound. Its
Silence is painted
In blends of blood-red,
With nail holes and a
Spear puncture
Still softly oozing the
Aftermath of my sins, lo
Two millennia now His cruel
Calvary death, and
Even further back to when
The Serpent forked
Its tongue, and
Adam and Eve were
Cast outside the walls of
Eden’s heaven.