A prayer (Isaiah 42)

Offended 

By

Suffering

Taut cheek lines 

The heaviness of the world in upheaval

The dread of my own lot

The riots, the tear gas, the looting, the shooting, the lies, the widows, the hope, the militia, the rumors, the protests, the street strewn with corpses

Where is the blood that doesn’t stain,

The life that doesn’t die,

The breath that doesn’t wane?

The king whose scepter is righteousness

Who hates wickedness and loves 

Justice

Show me this One that came 

Not to remove pain 

But to show the way through

The valley of shadow

The well-laid table 

Surely

Goodness and mercy on my heels 

Oh,  to ever be a firebrand 

marked by love.

Like a knife

His burnt humor, the hard and rusty edge that catches me, 

(For I wait for it)

The bitterness 

(Self-disparaging)

The mirthless laugh

(The eyes averted in pretense)

I pray:

Healing Balm, restore 

Don’t hang onto the old anymore

This one-sided argument

Half and third with moons apart 

And restless ego 

Blanched Misunderstanding, 

Except for such a lean-to frame, 

that heroic jawline and glinting almond eyes 

I’ll happily melt beside 

Oh, but your mother 

Wicker and unforgetting 

A thin smile beckons and grasps 

With hard edged demands 

I cannot but call on the Name

Whose heart scrapes my intuition 

Like a knife along a black bean pod

The Very musk of life released 

In this petitioning 

Among the lilies

Lily,

Stark silhouette 

A bulb of nourishment hence you

Came sprouted 

Deep hued leaves garlanding 

To a pinnacle of ivory

Trumpeted Petals 

Commend your rare and exquisite form

Softly vivid, with sharp edges 

Unto 

Undisputed beauty,

Keen and bright.

Not methods, not plans, but people

What the Church needs to-day is not
more machinery or better,
not new organizations or more and novel methods,
but (wo)men whom the Holy Ghost can use — (wo)men of prayer, (wo)men mighty in prayer.

The Holy Ghost does not flow through methods, but through (wo)men.
He does not come on machinery, but on (wo)men.
He does not anoint plans, but (wo)men — (wo)men of prayer.”

― E.M. Bounds, Power Through Prayer

I collect

I collect
Books
Of intentions