Pilgrim’s Path
Psalm 121:2
("My Help Comes from the Lord")
A carpet of golden
yellow, a spiritual journey sown by the
breath of the Creator’s
hand Himself, and there
I behold the faintest outlines of
a path, and ginkgo
petals beckon to cushion
the soles of my feet – and to assuage
any underlying fears and
autumnal doubts of where
I am, and where
righteousness leads.
But for the Mercy of God
Matthew 7:1-3
(“And with the Measure You Use, It Will
Be Measured to You”)
As if by a lightning flash
across the sky, I am illuminated in
all my nakedness! As if by a
sword, I am eviscerated
and ripped asunder, my quarters
tossed to wild dogs fighting
neath this table of raging thunder!
I am to be measured by
how I measure?! I am to
be judged by how I judge?!
All is hopelessly lost!
My cup once full is now
carelessly spilled, the
oil for anointing wasted, and
all the finest, aromatic
perfumes egregiously misused.
It is too late to unbury all
the bodies I buried. It is too late
to do anything to assuage
the hurt. The battleground lies
scorched under a blazing-
hot sky, and all I can see
are reapers picking at bones
littered ‘cross this field of
hard-bitten, unforgiving desert,
where banshees screech
that my heart lacked the human
compassion of eyes, and
wolves and ravens now jostle for
any entrails remaining.
On Being Incarnate
And so from His poor birth
in a Bethlehem stable, He would come
to walk from dusty village to
village, or to be transported in rough
fishermen’s boats from one
bleak shore to the next, teaching
always about the messianic advent of
the Kingdom of God, all at the
same while His Father
was blowing galaxies and
trillions of stars from His almighty
palm to the far corners of an
incomprehensible cosmos, where
Jesus’ earthly redemptive act
could possibly also there apply – like
when the loaves and fishes
He amazingly multiplied, and
His salvation extended to
forms and natures of Creation
yet to be identified…
Ode to Jesus
So much of You
is mystery,
so much of You is
Bethlehem stable and
Calvary Cross.
So much of You
is shadow,
so much of You is
Light o’ercoming doubt
of Thomas.
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…