Sometimes

Sometimes I write in a haze of fretting
Words misdemeaning,
Seeking to land on target,
Rest in the laver 
To spark the flame
Begetting life again

Sometimes I bleet
Like a wayward sheep
Stuck in my mind's underbrush,
Caught and locked up-
Until you find me and I'm freed up-
To roam with you unhindered
Hills and valleys, full surrender

Sometimes I think upon your love
It is said that the Word came
and became
A living dirt-born being
That among the stench of separation
You blew a fresh wind of freedom
Sacrifice, the most costly ransoming
Of the estranged with a ring

Sometimes I give up
My attempts to pen your kindness
To stand in your love
and never quit your presence
I look away from the mirror to You,
My Jesus. Your coming, giving, dying, rising
Love more than enough.

A place like home

Quiet pulse of the waves, the strum of wind in Linden leaves
Swaying of helicopteor seeds
soon to be freed.

Oh July, fading. Cool nights and bright days
The breach in my expectations
and Your ways.

Oh, heart, failing. Eye cried long ago, dreamt
Holding memories and kept
Grieved to be left.

To watch the yearnings drift into black and white
Tucked away, dusty and forgotten.
I cannot relive the season

Being here, now,
Is the reason,
the call.

It's the moments I truly
give myself
in love.

Can I love
Without demands?
Like the Linden seed, freed. 

In the return
May I be a friend
Who is a place like home.

An evening

An evening on Nokomis shores, summer's last ounce
the mallard sounds to announce
paddling until she's walking on sand
gracefully transitioning to land
waddling up the incline and sits beside me,
pruning on the grass sea,
her brown tweed with the purple stripped wing,
tucked like a fashionable clutch, her bling.  

Now lined up,
one, two, three
matrons of honor
hens next to me,
head tucked in wing.

Why are there so many religions?

Given up, my dear,

they were all given up.

Given up to their own ideas
Let loose to pursue the gods made by their own hands,
Gods made by their own deceitful hearts
Gods they could control
Structures of religion they could earn their desires with
Not to mention the demons that want to be worshiped

So there are many religions, made through the ages
Religions named and nameless
Structures of power used for gain and oppression
And, yes, there are many who are trapped,
Deceived, caught up in their religion,
There are many who don't know the Name of Jesus Christ, Yeshua,
The saving Name, through whom the Creator God has made the way.

Why were they given up?
A Roman citizen wrote "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.

For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.

For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen." (ESV)  Romans 1:18–25

Dear one,
Let me share my story.
I believed the ideas of god from my own mind,
What it meant to be a "good person"
Even though  I failed my own standards 
My god would forgive
apart from reality (but believed in)
Hoping I was secure, striving, working,
That upon death I would meet mercy.
This was an illusion.

Then I met the Living God
Through His book, the Bible,
And encountered the love with which He loved me:
He came to the ones who were given up.
He came for me.
Jesus has forgiven,
Now I receive His life.
I forgive as I have been forgiven, and pray:
Come to the given up ones.
May they be freed from the gods of their minds,
To trust and believe and receive.

Inspiration: Personified

Flame handed, reaching for the wisp of inspiration
To be grasped and put to flight

She being fleet footed, doe-eyed

Her departure illuminating sight

Drawing near, I feel the flutter

A wave of desire

There’s something effervescent

Yet tangible, living stripe of fire

Oh, your perfume! I’ve met you, I’ll not forget you

I’ll delight to write

The woes and raspings, crests and chafing

Dwelling in her light

This rain cloud apparition, droughting superstition

Barrenness aside, the ruminating plight

Obliged and criticized

Unlit and loosened like a kite

From the silent womb of morning

Until after midnight

Daily to pursue the dew 

Cultivating beauty, sure and right.

More [Inspiration]

Laconic? Be not 

End the drought

With a draught

From inspiration’s fount

The waiting seed freed from dormancy,

Freed to write

Growing past the self-effacing lethargy

Into flourishing, life-giving insight

Now, ignite.

Awaken: A prayer for my nation

cut across the rivets and rivulets
of time
to a gentler age
when elected men were respectful
and discourse was civil

thoughtfulness
you are not dead,
I recall you.

though the debate
is filled with hate
fill me with love
fill us

with love to bridge the gap
may not agree, but understand
never disdaining ‘the other’
but crossing the aisle for your brother

burnt out and enraged
blame and shame filling the page
the broadcast anchor
fueling a phobic anger

fear not,
I say again,
do not fall into fear
the labels,
party associations and campaign donations
taking sides
of sides
until the division has blinded all eyes

I bless instead and call forth unity
justice without impunity
full of weighty mercy

He who reigns rains on the evil and the good
to His Name my plea is understood
in this time and place
shine on this nation’s case
recall and restore and remake
unify
and awake
yes, awaken.

In Jesus’ Name I pray, Amen.