Mezami!

For Tyler

2008-01-09T17:01:00.000-05:00

You are in my head like a drunken gale-full breeze.
You are in my head like the clamber of the heat pipes in winter. Easy to overlook you are there until the racquet is raised; demanding attention like a two year old with a kitchen pot.
You are in my head; stuck here like the sticky film on the jar that you can never get smooth after removing the label. Catching bits of flour when used as the rolling pin that I, as usual, have misplaced.
You are in my head like a casually hummed tune; leaking out the upturned corners of my mouth at inopportune times.
You are in my head like a schizophrenic voice providing commentary on my day; turning me into that bag lady traversing the street muttering to herself in foreign languages.
You are in my head like that rich and satisfying flavor left in your mouth long after the coffee cup is finished.
You are in my head like the salt that lingers on your skin after a sunny dip in the ocean; tasting it still two hours later when you lick your lips.
You are in my head like the warmth of the sun on your back long after leaving the garden.
You are in my head like the cool air shut up in my house on a ninety degree day.
You are in my head slowly pushing at me like my cat wanting to play when I’m trying to sleep.
You are in my head like the fish that swims just off the fin of the shark; Brave enough to get too close to be eaten.
You are in my head like silence. When you focus on it hard the crickets and rustle of leaves emerge.
You are in my head like flowers at midnight; a thing so out of place that you can’t help but to stop and stare.
You are in my head like honey in tea. It doesn’t make it what it is, but it’s not the same without it.
You are in my head. You. Just when I’ve convinced myself I’m OK without you, I realize I really don’t know, because you’re still there. . . In my head.
You are in my head like damselflies and sandcastles.
You are in my head dancing with the one who is always there; slowly waltzing, trying to figure out how to avoid stepping on each others’ toes.

Your Scars in Mind

2008-01-09T16:59:00.000-05:00

seven years
seven years she saw
ago
seared your scars in her mind
innocent errant maiden
slowly wrung out
by your selfish romance
empty words for
a hungry heart.
loved you she said
loves for you I say
you can’t
so she did
now she can’t
without your scars
hers
in mind.
I hear her scream in night-
mares of you dead
strangled yourself on your
Impeccably pressed ties.
still caressing your raised flesh
under her fingers
every slice of the blade
your arm her heart
trickled her artery
to your vein fed
she didn’t save you
couldn’t
but you just wouldn’t die
so she barely sleeps
wondering
if why it all was a lie.
even now as she loves
she loves
with your scars
hers
in mind.

Fabniese

2008-01-09T16:57:00.000-05:00

There was this girl, Fabniese, in Haiti that I did not know so well. She was a good friend of Zach’s. She sang with a group of high school musicians. Their band is called Lor du Syel. It means Gold of Heaven in Kreyol. This was an amazing group of young teenagers who had more hope in their future than their parents of even us. We were supposed to be bringing hope to the people of the central plateau, but in the end children like Fabniese bring hope to me everyday. It made me feel like an impostor. Simultaneously my church at home sending me letters lauding my faith and courage to leave my life to live in such a place and hope for these people and I learn from them about my fallen nature; ending up giving and leaving very little.
Fabniese was one of the shy types of girls who so rarely said much of anything and looked at her feet more than anything else. The most you would get from her was a look that made you feel like she was actually looking up at you from her feet. She always spoke softly.
The first time I heard her sing, I was amazed. The power behind her voice is incredible. Untrained? Yes. Skilled? Absolutely. As I began to pick up more Kreyol and understand a bit more, I started to listen to Lor’s lyrics. They were simple, worshipful, and cutting. I was again amazed at the spiritual insight of this small group of teenagers. I watched this band continually give of themselves, body, mind and spirit, to the improvement of their community; traveling long distances for concerts to raise money for this or that cause, putting their sweat into building or improvement projects, offering their music to our work teams, an amazing ministry of prayer.; traveling all over spending days away from family to play and translate the Jesus film.
Many of them were planning and studying for their BAC I exam, a ridiculously difficult exam they take at the culmination of their studies. They must pass it to go to university, which no one can afford anyway, or to teach. These are the only routes out of a life of subsistence farming. But despite these pressures. . . they gave of themselves.
Here is a group of kids who can’t read music leading people to Christ through their music. Their music is beautiful and I soon learned that shy Fabniese wrote most of the songs. Here is a girl who looks up at people from her feet, yet has so much power and conviction inside.
I watch people a lot. There and here. Thinking back on Fabniese, I now watch people who watch their feet and wonder what kind of powerful things they have inside them. Is everyone a Fabniese in their own way? I don’t feel any such power in me. Most of the time I actually feel quite powerless. I don’t watch my feet and could never be described as quiet. I am shy, but don’t come across so. Maybe Fabniese stores up what others let trickle out slowly; letting it all out in one big waterfall gush of sound. Or maybe everyone really does have power. We just can’t see it in ourselves.

Patience

2008-01-09T16:52:00.000-05:00

Branch on branch growing aches
Sandies and saltines both
Scratching itches and letting blood

He stands and broods

Gulls fly about and pick at shells
Pulling at pieces that once lived
Squawks and shrieks waves crashing
Lazily in earthly rhythym like
No time: His time. Wanting it
More and more as footprints
Expand years in the sand.

He stares at the sky.

Cats perch at the edge of the tunnel
Wondering after trains
Coming or going. Meanwhile
Dust settles on rails
Moss collects on walls
A licking of paws and mewing
Men standing checking wristwatches
Detritus slowly sinks to the
Bottom of the sea

He scratches his head.

Somewhere in Spain
A woman in a wide brimmed hat
Hits a wrong note – husband cringes
Swatting at her with a folder
Engines peal: backdrop to
Laughter of card games on green felt
Man standing in the corner counting
Losses carefully in his head
His daughter at the copy machine
Swaying to the tune of dissertation print.

Sighs and shrugs.

Carpenter ants in mounds
Build up build down
Flurry frantic frenzy
Carry wistful flakes of French bread
Shaded flannel loot
She watches in faded jeans
Stretched in the sun
Lies by waiting
Pulling hair - ants carry away

He stares off into the sea

A butterfly speaks.

2008-01-09T16:51:00.000-05:00

Poetry, like glass shards at an accident scene litters my life, both literally and figuratively. I can flip through any textbook I own from college and find bits and fragments of poems scattered in the margins and under the cover and across the title page. They are always written at odd angles and in pieces. Ends before beginnings and middles after the ends. One line bits, titles, ideas and thoughts that were thrown out by a scribbling of wasted of ink. A coward’s attempt to deny the thought even existed in the first place.
My notebook at work carries halves and wholes of poems and quotes in between arrest notes, stolen bicycle information and license plate numbers. Even toilet paper, napkins and old receipts fail to escape my written word. In the academy, there would be phrases scrawled on my thigh while in the restroom.
Over the last years’ slow spiral into darkness, words have all but disappeared from currently used items. Nary a thou, this, or thine to be had. All blogs, notebooks and normal avenues of verbal purging began to feel neglected.
My life is now a 7 car pile up and, as is inevitable for a trash collector such as me, the glass shards are once again everywhere. In the last two days I’ve been able to accomplish nothing without punctuating it by a scribbling pen against some obliging surface. It was awkward to begin with but once the floodgate of shattering opened the words just kept coming until I was once again writing or typing when I should be sleeping.
But that is just the literal. Poetry used to be everywhere in my life: The gentle snow outside during a particularly stressful exam; a random ladybug crawling on my notebook on a bad day; the strong stiff breeze that seemed to cry with you; the causes to smile when anyone wouldn’t.
A long silence…
A long pause…
Nothing.
I felt trapped.
Then it began again, just the other day, with a very wise butterfly. It was like it knew that my spirit was dying slowly of suffocation and that the world failed to notice. In the midst of facing ultimate financial tragedy, my body falling apart, and imminent heartbreak: He saw his chance.
He landed on the brim of my sunhat and, in that particular way that only butterflies have, slowly folded and unfolded his wings as if he had all the time in the world to flap his butterscotch colored handsomeness and stare at me. I could almost hear him saying: “Why so fast, why so fretful, why so worried? It really is this simple.” Flap. . . Flap. . . Flap. . .
It was like a river held back too long breaking free. Later that afternoon, I found myself staring at this perfect yellow rose. Just one, alone in the slanting sunshine. I watched, standing perfectly still in someone else’s yard, for way too long, feeling way too blessed. It began again like that. The poetry littered again like it had never left. And peace returned despite the fact that I have no reason for peace but for the reality that I’m sitting in God’s hand, quite safe, with him blowing air gently against my cheek to remind me so.
There was a bush that blew in the breeze under the sun just so; someone’s heartbeat under my ear as I fell asleep; a painting in Barrington; A whole afternoon of spilling words out of my spleen onto anything my pen could catch; my cat’s wet nose waking me up; watching the strangest cloud formation pass above a car moon roof; a poignant silence; an unexpected smile; an unlikely friend…

It's been a while: A preface to more.

2008-01-09T16:21:00.000-05:00

So, oddly enough blogger will post this at the bottom of what will follow, but it is a preface nonetheless. It has been a while. I have played this game with blogging for years: a flurry of posts followed by long silence until I feel either guilty enough, nostalgic enough, or have just stored up too much to write about that I can no longer contain it. Why am I back this time? I'm not sure. I know what the trigger is, but the underlying cause is uncertain. The trigger was most certainly a slew of friends just recently posting more and the ensuing guilt. Jenn, after long silence has filled books, and the breaking point was Tyler, who procrastinates almost as much if not more than I do, finally posting an update. I think it comes to the fact that there was so much going on, so much changing that as I wrote things in my journal and planned to type them up here for whomever was bored enough to read, that by the time I got around to posting, what I hoped to express had changed or no longer was.
It has been a roller coaster of a half a year. Many who know me, know that I talk of just taking off someday. Few know that early in the fall I actually tried. I get restless and feel trapped when in bad situations that I cannot change. I was driving home from work at 5am and just kept driving past my street. I wasn't sure where I was going, I just knew that it wasn't what I had come to call 'home.' I was deep in situations and problems that were bigger than me. In the end it was the picture in my head of sad faces my cat gives me when I'm leaving that made me turn around, and nothing else. There were dark times like those, where I spent nights crying and frustrated on my couch or in the shower. Times I didn't know where money was coming from. Didn't know how I was going to pay my bills, or where I was going to get energy to make it through one more day of uber super overtime and two jobs. I even got pulled over in Essex for erratic driving because I was crying so hard behind the wheel.
There were good times too. Times in the summer of sitting on rocks with people I love and staring off into the St. Lawrence River, where nothing seems too much to handle or too overwhelming to solve. Fun times at Renaissance festivals, or celebrating the wedding of friends. The mind blowing night along the Ipswich River, while watching an otter play, when my best friend became more. The many beautiful things he has given me that made many of the Poems I planned on posting obsolete.
It's not that I wasn't writing. I was writing. I just never brought myself far enough to share, because, I wasn't so sure I understood what was true and what was just smoke. So, here follow some thoughts and poems and other such things that I've been meaning to post for a long time now. Some obsolete, some still true. It's the verbal struggle journey from dark places to light. A rediscovering of myself, God, why I'm here, what I'm doing, and what it all means. Not that I've found the answer, but at least pieces of it.

0400 hours

2007-05-21T02:42:00.000-05:00

It was here I lost you
Here at four AM I lost?
Lost your kisses: stolen few, given many
Turned to anger and purged on page.

It was here I found him
Here at four AM I found?
Found him and him and him and him
Empty faces, empty kisses, filling the void
Sought anything to replace your feeling left behind.

It was here I ignored Him
Here at four AM I ignored?
Ignored the voice of wisdom: knowledge and foreboding!
The Christ who loved me before you didn't.

It was here He forgave me
Here at four He forgave?
Forgave your kisses: the him and him and him...
Even the empty voices shouting and whispering in my head.

It is here that I remembered
Here at four AM I remembered?
Remembered Him and you and them; God and simple men
Take back what I gave that'd been given - passed away.

It is here that I awaken REAL
Here at four AM I awake?
Wake to see love as it should be; given of Him
It could be I find RIGHT love - again.

It is here I found me
Here at four AM I found...

Something or nothing; and it doesn't even matter...

2007-05-20T22:32:00.000-05:00

I had a dream today that I was diagnosed with Cancer and given 2 weeks to live. I woke up and wrestled with several of the emotions that I went through over the course of the dream and afterwards. There was the struggle with: A. Do you even tell people? and B. How do you tell them?
A. was a difficult question to answer. If you love and respect your friends, wouldn't you prepare them for what is to come? Especially if you have such a short time as 2 weeks. I think of all the times that someone has died suddenly and how much more easy death is for people to deal with when you know it is coming. My grandmother was one of the most influential people in my life. We knew she was sick and would die soon for over a year. I miss her terribly, however, when it happened, half the mourning process was already over and we were relieved that she was no longer in pain. It was not as painful an experience for us as it could have been had she died quickly and suddenly. In my dream however, there was that selfish side of me that wanted so much to not tell people. How horrible would it be for your last 2 weeks of life to be spent with people walking on pins and needles around you. Everyone is sad and depressed. Like a long and drawn out goodbye, and I hate goodbyes.
B. was even worse. How do you tell someone that you will die? How horrible it must be to tell everyone. To watch everyone's face change, over and over and over again each time you break the news. To watch that look come into their eyes, where they close off a part of themselves from you, so not to increase your pain. I hate to say it, but when you look at 2 weeks of life left and then people shut themselves off from you so as not to burden you with their emotion, it would be even more painful and difficult to bear than having person after person cry all over you. I'm ashamed to say that in my dream I was a coward. I posted a note on facebook and here on my blog and that was how I broke the news. You either read it or you didn't. People could pretend they didn't know if they wanted or be melodramatic if they wanted. How impersonal. What a horrible way to tell people you are going to die....Yet it was the only way I could bear. The more I ponder it, I think the dream was accurate. I would do something that impersonal to treasure the last moments. How selfish am I?!
Then came the struggle with regret. All the things that I have wanted to do but haven't, wanted to see but haven't. All the places that I've wanted to go and haven't. My greatest hope is that God would allow me to experience all the multitudinous beauty of his creation that I have yet to experience, in the afterlife. However, I believe that the afterlife is simply eternity in praise of God and therefore that it probably will not work out that way. How sad is it that I cannot conceive enough of the full company of God and it's awesomeness to not feel sad to miss out on only experiencing his works.
But the worst of all was the realization of my lack of faith in the existence of that afterlife. I uncompromisingly have faith in the existence of God and redemption through Christ. However, there is this part of me deep inside, that wrestles with the idea of eternity and the idea that anything could happen after death other than peaceful nothing. I'm still not scared of death, even when the idea of death is simply a nothingness; a ceasing; an ending. It still sounds wonderful to me. Maybe it's simply because I'm a workaholic and have not felt truly rested in years, however a part of nothing is almost more appealing than the idea of heaven. I can't pinpoint where my lack of faith in the afterlife originates, but my best guess is simply that I have no earthly experience to compare it to, or by which to even imagine it.
In my dream I asked myself one very important question: Do I regret dedicating my life to Christ and the often frustrating and heartrending calling of God if there is no ultimate reward? After a while of contemplation of what my life may have looked like and the choices I may have made, perhaps the seeing of those places I haven't, the doing of those things that I haven't I compared that picture to the choices that I did make in my life that were driven out of my faith. And surprisingly, among all the regrets that I faced and felt in my last two weeks of living, I found that following Christ was not one of them, even in the face of no reward. My relationship with God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit has been reward in and of itself, heaven or no heaven, and I would never wish to take it away if I found there to be no heaven, hell, or anything in between. Even if my relationship with the person hood of God were to lead to hell (yes, I know this is a blasphemous idea), I would still choose to know them. In all the uncertainty and wrestling provoked by this dream, I am certain of this only: my God is still real, I have still experienced his power and love first hand, and I still love and devote myself to him. I have no faith in our fallen human kind and our ability to pass on accurately the messages of God even through the bible. I read in Timothy about the sanctity of scripture, however there is this corner of my heart that remains skeptical that our imperfect selves could manage to not screw up even one part of such a huge thing as the Bible; such a huge thing as describing the Godhead; such a huge thing as making sense of his prophesies and promises. But despite that, I do have faith in the love and devotion of God. I have touched, tasted and seen it. So, in the end, all other things being thrown away, I love God and choose to serve him for better or worse.

My conclusion is this:
1. I am pathetically selfish, weak, cowardly, and unimaginative.
2. God is phenomenally amazing, powerful, ultimate, caring, and (above all) Love!

April Nor-easter. Pissed off ocean at West Beach.

2007-05-13T03:24:00.000-05:00

One of the things I love most about New-England is the changing mood and power of the ocean. This day was perfect and no exception. We had spent a long tired day moving the day before and the ocean matched my feelings exactly....very uncertain, angry, a bit scared and feeling very unsettled and passionate. I love running and biking along this stretch of road for that very reason!

Entering the Church

2007-02-17T14:02:00.000-05:00

These caverns deep and dark
filled with a twinkling light
spit me wide as with a fellers' axe.
A clean swoop and I lay upon
a wound of deep red blood bathed
in caressing waves of undulating candle light.
The heart removed and beating wildly
despite cool granite laid upon
soothing contrast to the warm glow
of shadows dancing a dark veiled joy.
Contented passion rings off earthen walls,
men in robes vibrate the savior
deep into ventricular pores, filling
the chasm as candle light and sound
slowly fills these caverns with warm
and languid fluid, easing bones and blood.
The sigh is strung on organ chords
as my head falls back of its own will,
eyes closed, and lay with him
beneath the throne as rich walls echo
wild fragrant peace with abandon
beating like puffs of incense on the alter.

Alter Offering (Romans 6)

2007-02-17T13:37:00.000-05:00

The summer night
I let it go; so slowly fade
as the mist that just missed
a heat relieving rain
and I long after it as
I long for those cool showers
Letting that part rot and wither
and die on the pedestal I placed it
like watching a wilting rose
slowly consumed by it's own thorns
until it resembles rusted barbed wire
a stripped bare truth
and when darkness overcomes
the shadows cast are regal
like the rest. The proud night
blending lack of color and color
until you long for those petals
forgetting the pain of the stalk.

Upon the morning there is sunshine
I wait for it here;
Holding my breath and damning the sky
for its lack of rain.
On the morrow I will be cleansed
but for now I cower just trying
to believe in the son;
In the hope. By my side
he waits comforting me not,
Letting me kill the killer,
letting me feel the pain,
the pain of damning the lack of rain.

He sits so silently staring
at my withered, rotting rose
clutched so dearly in fingers light.
Ripping off the last joyous petals
exposing harsh hardness underneath,
slowly turning he wreaths it
in peaceful anger, pressing on his head.
Turning to my dying form his
face streaked with blood filled tears:
"Watch and pray so that you will
not fall into temptation."

I look to the fading mist
and long for what is lost.
He looks to a nearby hill
and there three regal trees;
strong and bound and crossed
and thinks of there what might be gained.
Though his be large and mine be small
sit we here in Gethsemane
thinking about the cost.

A Death Well Met

2007-02-17T13:17:00.000-05:00

I am not afraid to speak of death
and more do I revel in a death well met.
Too I find for the masses
it is not similarly so
There is a fear in the eyes of those faced
When night turns dark
and brooding. Glassy sleepless orbs turn
distant as if searching afar
people that might understand
savage language of their soul.
The hour where shadows fade to dark
smiles and laughter wiped;
hammers, chisels and plows
exchanged for philosophy

The moment shared when a distant future
became suddenly clear, like the click
of an optometrist's prescriptor.
And I saw myself bound and naked
against a cedar in the wild
Being lashed for speaking a name

Them crying selfishness my glory
like a kaleidoscope changes
with a quick flick of wrist:

Blood and gore and desolation
My death raped by movies
in their reluctance to let go
what I have already given.
A peaceful Joy now dragged through
muddy streets lined by specialty shops
designer clothes and emerald jewels
clutched in cramped hands, eyes coveting more.
I feel stares and horror washing over
and dragging through the undertow
the Hope that I'd sought to share.

Here in desolate place death
Is destruction
our generation that passes living
to cling desperately to life;
grips tightly with talons
that rip through truth and beauty;
flashing florescent "VACANCY" over honor.
We, a people who know not valor;
clambering for the front of the line,
the best seat in the house,
finest food, biggest thrill.
Like temper tantrum children
closing ears to grandma's whisper

Integrity!
Death is life and I live freely
Grandma I will not forget
I will stand, I will revel
I will OBEY!
I will not exchange myself for life.

My beauty may be your fear
but keep your claws out of my living,
for I vow to meet death well.
Never to prostitute myself
for a few more breaths
of tepid
lifeless
air...