A Different Kind Of Speaking

Hate to clean dirty
Windows, ghosts of laughter
From dates and peanut butter.
They hover like white shadows
On the pane of child asleep,
Like handprints on home.
I see through them
And cannot get clear
Without them, the printed past
Of slapped glass, high five.
Broken soon the idol which stood
By jumping jumping jumping—
Clean, a pillar quickly broken
By joy joy joy down in my heart.
Those little floating hands, that
Smudge, a slight against serious,
A gift I wish to never wipe away.

Find yourself
A farmstand
Pickled white
In the shade
Of a biennial
Apple tree.

Find it open,
Yourself welcomed
With white oaks
And un-mowed orchard.

Find yourself
Curious, and popping
In–an old table,
A metal box of dollars
And coins, and wooden
Planks supporting:
This land’s bounty.

What’s a weed
Worry
Poor wildflowers
Sown in wonder
One by one
Waking up
The little heads
Curling out and cup
Their little eyes
Opening, stretching
With a yawn,
Ill-fated,
Innocent and young,
Obliterated.

There’s a gap
between the aluminum,
double-pane windows
that buzz and rattle
as the freight train
squeals through the city.
Imperfect and original,
kept in place by
rusted screws,
they hang in our building
just north of the tracks.
A strong wind can shake them,
and when they speak
they remind me
of the gap
between the man I am
and the man I will be
and the rattle of the train
which keeps me honest.

Running through
The rooms
Of my darkened
Mind, turning
The lights on.

He tears
Down each
Stronghold,
No sin
Is safe.

A victory
Lap, like a
Chariot of
Fire, victory
After flaming
Victory.

Yes, the winter
A reformation
A baby

Not in the sight of man
But your Heavenly Father
Who is in Heaven

Seeking the motivations
Of the self-exalting,
Self-deceiving heart.

O God of mangers
God of lullabies

Simple shepherds
and silence

You knew exactly
what we needed.

Forgive us
our clamors for what

We want, while we miss
what we really need.

Turn on the Light again
above the stable

And let it shine again
in our confused hearts.

Visit our busy lives
with quiet grace.

Still our hurrying,
and give us moments

When we see in the face
of Jesus Christ

How to want
what we need.

We long to be
at Bethlehem

Where he is born
in us, that we

May become
a crossroads where

Love is lived out
in his name

For the least and
For the lost.

Amen.

O, you homemakers
Meal makers
Bearers of life.

O, you pray-ers
You who dare
Become a pastor’s wife.

O, you servants
Carrying crosses
Bearing losses
Special, strife.

O, you led by He
And that ministry,
Life with no hedge
In the parsonage.

Life is a wonder
And a deal.
Much to learn
And love and feel
And see and sense
Beauty in all,
The poised page,
The comic call
To hide, and then
A great reveal,
Slow reminders
Of the real,
A duty near
And far to roam
And follow
Each tear home.

Repeated
Until nothing else
To say.

The long drip
Of gutters,
The soul
Emptied out.

What else,
A river
To the bottom
Of us.