Psalm of Disorientation

Oh, Lord, my desires are disordered.
I've made an idol and fallen into worshiping my plans over your good ways.
Send out Your light and Your truth, and lead me.
Wake me with remembrance of your goodness.
You have not failed, Your power has not waned, but I feel cast off and forsaken by You.
Years of waiting have left me feeling bitter as Naomi; call me Mara.
Oh, Lord, how do I remember Your promises when I am in captivity and the walls are still destroyed?
Your city is in ruins, but You say it will be fruitful and filled with abundance. This is so far from happening it seems impossible. You say to me "I have taken care of Your needs and I know Your desires."
(It's in the bag).
Yet now all I hear is silence when I cry, "How long O Lord."
Why the echo chamber?
What is precious about these decades and these tears?
Have I forsaken the vows of my youth? Have I not followed you above my own desires (as best as I can)? Have I not left houses and family and friends and familiar lands?
I lay all my longing before you.
I believe you are still capable.
Your arm is not shortened, it can save, in Your way and Your time.
I surrender again.
I repent and renounce my vows and plans.
Your will and Your way, O God of the breakthrough. God of angel armies. God of deliverance.
May I see your deliverance and answers. And may my sisters rejoice with me too as You bring their fulfillment.
Oh, Lord, where I have felt judgment and labels, I receive that You give me a good name. You give me Your good name.
Oh, Lord, where I have given up hope, I receive Your beautiful inheritance of hope that does not disappoint and Your love that does not fail.
Your love does not falter, wilt, diminish, or fade.
In the deep ache of long carried desire, I reground myself in Your long-suffering, that You are still waiting for Your bride. I join You in the treasure of waiting. Thank you for knowing my ache.
From a heart that has grown sick and bitter from a desire unfulfilled, bring Your tree of life.
Meet me in the waiting.
Shower me with rains in the desert. May I bloom with joy and gladness at your appearing.
Weeping may last for the night but joy comes in the morning.
My mourning will end. My sackcloth will be replaced with robes of gladness. My mourning will turn to dancing.
I have sown in tears and I will reap in joy, carrying my sons with me.
The loneliness that leads me to You and none besides.
None but You will satisfy.

Changes

"Prayer not only changes people,

 situations, 

and even the course of history,

 but also 

those who pray." 

-Patrick Johnstone

Holiness

A glass sea stretching 

A throne,

Beckoning

This is the gaze you were made for 

To see and be seen by 

Rippling light
Like water
An interplay 

Of movement 

Across existence; space and time 

Atoms undulating in unceasing thrums

Lightening 
Motion, energy connecting 
Yet separate, 

Part yet apart 

Who can understand the Holy

An overwhelming otherness

A gut punching awesomeness

Awe-struck 

Glory

The most captivating sunset, 

The sprawl of the Milky Way

Aurora Borealis- dancing northern lights 

Or an Eclipse, 

Full moon rise 

Each scene radiating
Reaching 

Beyond beauty to a deep knowing 

Inflecting wonder 

Reflecting Creator

I’m blind 
Until your Light 

Gives sight,

Revealing to me 

Your majesty 

Your promise: the pure in heart

Shall see God 

“Let there be light” spoken to our hearts

Revelation of the knowledge of glory

In the face of God 

The fruit of light: A prayer

God of every growing thing, as I peel the Lychee, would you show me layers of your goodness. 

God of seeing, who sees and saw, and brought forth a husk of pale mustard and dusty rose, a shell of protruding diamond matrixes, a pineapple honeycomb exterior hiding a milky globe bursting with sweetness, a seed of new life. 

God of sunset colors, of patterns and protection, sweetness and new life, come into the the places where I see only a shell and not the hidden fruit. Where I may not appreciate the colors because there are spikey defenses, and I am easily offended. 

God of spiritual fruits, seasons, and ripeness, work in me to bear a harvest pleasing to you. 

Solomon Says

For the Action-minded

Non-philosophizing

who just want to do,

Who are told to wait, to think,

to make up a theory

initiate a sequence, prefabricate a protocol, a construct of a deconstruction with a critical explanation of how things integrate -- explicate

an expression?

What about those who just want to make a difference, 

who are practical

about extension; applying knowledge in the general direction of the need 

To feed

the ones who need to eat, to be freed,

to restore, part by part, heart by heart, 

not to hedge in endless ruminations spectacular speculations of this and that, حادي بادي [heads or tails] to infinity, it's just a Degree, a degree off in centigrade drinking the Kool-aid of meaning, deconstructing feeling. 

It's beyond frustrating how we play with lives, 

living for the Nobel Prize, 

talking to each other in our ivory towers above the peons, 

insulated and progressive, 

self-satisfied and attentive for the next big Fellowship, Conference, 

Publishing papers, recognition, favors, and endless loop of plagiarizers. 

Nothing is new under the sun. 

Acceptance

I don't get mad at her; she's just doing what she always does, surviving. Doing her best; and if it's a wisp, or a bouquet of roses, or a injunction before a proposition, it's enough. I'll always accept her.

Denial

A tearing a part, a slow kiss 

of goodbye 

from the middle of the uncooked pie

spoiled by the British Mandate, raped by the Sultanate

the wounds so deep of undoing.

Unlatch the attach-

ment, the desperate needing,
care and feeding,

The Anxiety anxiously railing and grieving the severed hand.

These cast off limbs with phantom pains,

patterns of denial engrained. "If I maintain the dillusion, I'll be safe." I won't be rejected and alone. 

Instead, sit with it. Question those perceptions.

Maybe even acceptance, enjoying the present.

Still my gut quakes with clots of shame. 

Everything's changed.

I notice it, with compassion.