eight::nine

You can't tell anyone anything
without them telling you something else.
It may not be that no one listens or hears,

yet how often does anyone?

With empty an stomach

who has an ear

but the one trained by fasting?

We're training--

without conscious knowledge

--quickly to run out of food,

to dry up all our waters,

and then will it be a choice to fast?

We'll still bitch and moan

and really have nothing to say,

the water flowing from the rock

wasn't enough to bid us silent.

Oh, we might even say the right words,

confess the correct creed,

listened at some point to a sound revelation,

but at the change of the breeze

everything is wrong.

The wrong song and poem and direction.

The beautiful temptation to walk away

from the self-giving love we were called by,

that easy stroll that leaves us in paralysis,

even though moving we are numb,

the further we travel the more deaf.

"Blessed are you

for great things have been revealed to you!"

This was not sarcasm,

yet our flesh can't tell the difference,

or rather makes irony out of things straight-forward.

Has this been worthwhile,

this thinking and grasping,

praying for a good word,

a truthful expression?

I want love to be in my thoughts

and on the tips and palms of my hands,

permeating the recesses of my spirit,

else all this is vain.

Might it still be vain--

am I one in the grumbling desert crowd,

or have some of us escaped its murmur?

Soon I will learn upon Peter's turn of the key,

the day we go to sleep beside the sea

on the hill with stationed cross.

(Numbers 20:1-13, Psalm 95, Matthew 16:13-23)

eight::eight

This world is becoming a desert hospice.
We will soon find ourselves waiting to pass.
We might have moved over the hills
into the promised land,
but gave over our voices
to princes, presidents, prime ministers,
executives and senators.
So now we are wandering and waiting.
But not for the wrath of God,
for God has already granted us pardon
upon openness;
even those once outside have faith.
No, our wrath is our own
in the hands of incompetent and evil powers,
our forgetting right desire
and grasping after whithering things.
We could have had milk and honey,
abundant fruit and bread,
but instead we chose machines
and outgrew the land,
making it desolate and dry.
And if we try? I don't know.
Yet a hospice implies care,
and care is born of love
which births hope, too.
Somehow, though we're waiting to pass,
we are being given life as well.

(Numbers 13:1-2, 25-14:1, 26-29, 34-35, Psalm 106, Matthew 15:21-28)

The Coming Waters

The waters will soon wash us away,
the clouds, dark and shining with flashes
will cover our mountains and valleys.
May I still be found on the mountain,
on the side of the hill
listening to a voice soft and still.
Certainly into sin I was born,
among the sins of a nation and nations,
among gases killing the world.
The seas of consumption,
and prideful assumptions.
thoughts of domination and greed.
Into this world I was born
and though I would have died anyway,
even more shall we all die.
I'm sorry to think such a thing,
to write and say such things,
but my mind keeps thinking.











Forgiveness is our only hope
to be able to walk on the coming waters,
the consumption of our flesh.
And we must become internal,
not to forget the outer parts,
but to realize all is actually one.
Yes, all these coming storms
live with the calm breezes
though they know not each other.
Help me, Lord, to forget what I needn't know
but always remember your goodness,
your still small voice in the thunderous rains,
even the perilous drought.

(Numbers 12:1-13, Psalm 51, Matthew 14:22-36)

eight::six

Today if the Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord. The majesty of God has come among people, has been placed in the flesh of people.

I was supposed to prepare for this day. I had planned to for some time now. I didn't. This is the first year I even knew it was upon us, the first year I knew it's significance, and I balked once it was finally on the eve.

Is it good that I am here? For I have thought of deification. The hope of me, a man, becoming like God, like Christ, deity and flesh together, had reawakened my senses, but at times I still find myself numb. Is it good for me to be there, in that numb place? Do I there remember my great need for mercy and grace? Have I wandered a bit to find myself walking again toward the holy mountain?

I know God is good, that God has revealed God's self. When will I learn, however, that I am a part of that revelation? Is not deity to be revealed in and through me?

Forgive me, Lord, of my forgetfulness, my obvious departure from your beautiful way. Holy Spirit, fire of God, burn in and upon me anew, to see again great visions, to walk again the way forged for humanity.

(Daniel 7:9-10, 13-14, Psalm 97, 2 Peter 1:16-19, Luke 9:28-36)

eight::(four)five

Yesterday my best friend was married. It was a beautiful liturgy and celebration, an event that brought people together. I was supposed to give a toast at the reception with time going by quickly, but had I the chance, I would have told the story of how Amos and I met in a class called Plato and Aristotle, how we are friends in a sense that we bother understand, the Aristotelian way in which we are working towards a common end, a like telos. And now he will be doing so even more with his wife, Kaci, whom I think is wonderful for him, and he for her.

The lectionary texts yesterday even pointed toward the importance of their marriage. The Jubilee ordinances were proclaimed to the Hebrews, an economy that calls for the poor to freed, for justice to rule for the entire creation. Amos and Kaci are people that care about such things, and even more, are working for them with such things as gardening and starting a local farmer's market. The gospel text displayed a negative story about marriage. Herod the king had an unholy marriage and out of his humiliation and the nastiness of his brother's wife who was now his, he had John the Baptist beheaded. Marriage in our age is not something taken seriously. It is often done for the perceived need for pleasure of two selfish people, as opposed to being entered into in order to faithfully participate in God's economy of justice. I believe that Amos and Kaci know this and will work in this economy. I pray that as a single person I can participate in it, not that one must be married--my mind is simply focused on marriage at the moment.

(Leviticus 25:1, 8-17, Psalm 67, Matthew 14:1-12)

Further, today we are struck by the realization that as important as things are in our lives, much is vanity, vapor, and our work simply passes by. I was again stirred last night by a re-realization of my desire to justify myself. How vaporous that is. I have nothing to prove but that Christ has proven all things, that the Triune God is an abundant Love who provides. I haven't the need to store shit up, be it physical possession or ridiculous intellectual victories or "respect".

And such must be the call from my inner being to be still and silent. It will be a new silence, one that I have obviously not yet learned. But I hear the word. Now may my thanks be to God.

(Ecclesiastes 1:2, 2:21-23, Psalm 90, Colossians 3:1-5, 9-11, Luke 12:13-21)

eight::three

Who is he to say those things,
to come in here with words and deeds
we could not conceive of ourselves?
He was among us,
but now it is as if he is above,
and we cannot have anyone as such.
His listening must be a lie,
a waste of our time
to ears tuned elsewhere.
Let's continue to sing our own song,
to keep our own days,
from now on will ignore his way.
I wonder if he thought
anyone would truly accept him,
or could live near him.

(Leviticus 23:4-11, 15-16, 27, 34-37, Psalm 81, Matthew 13:54-58)

eight::two

I am about to go into the dwelling place, alone.
May it have been built for me to come out with a newness that is good this time.
Let the old and new be brought out, existing in a perfect dance, a reminder and a gift.

(Exodus 40:16-21, 35-38, Psalm 84, Matthew 13:47-53)

eight::one

Send me someone with a glowing face.
I think I'd probably listen.
They would tell me what to look for,
and where,
and I would go.
Not someone with a scheme.
Their face would not shine,
though they may oil it up
to get after the effect.
One anointing is different from another,
however,
and I think it would be possible to tell.

Blinding light that gives sight,
descend upon my nighttime,
and filter my days.

(Exodus 34:29-35, Psalm 99, Matthew 12:33-46)