Songbird

Winter is somber beneath grey skies,
Autumn mouldering in scattered leafpiles,
Summer's ember a mere memory,
Spring a songbird long flown south.

Sheol opens his mouth and closes his eyes,
So the dead earth comes as no surprise
Here in December's darkling days,
When life's dim flame is guttering out.

The year's last sharp moonsliver
Is smothered by cloudwisps
Here in the last, darkest hour
Before the final dawn.

Wind whips anything it can,
Driving the enduring chill
Down through skin, down through bone,
Down, down, down to the depths.

It is hard to remember the songbird's breath
Here in a land of cold, dark death,
But her return does not depend
Upon our belief or remembrances.

Make no mistake: She will return.
As surely as the dancing spheres
Bring dawn and winter's end,
We will hear birdsong again.

A Prayer Before Writing

Our Father, architect of all that is,
You formed gas giants and ribosomes,
Alligators and daffodils,
Optic nerves and salt crystals,
All by the word of Your mouth.

When You had finished,
You looked on Your work with joy
And called it good.

O Lord, we would follow your example.
Like children building sand castles
In the shadow of the Taj Mahal,
We see your wondrous works
And long to make beautiful things,
To speak worlds of our own making
Into marvelous existence.

And so we humbly ask
That Your Spirit would inhabit our efforts,
That You would empower Your people,
Made in Your image,
To write new songs and scenes,
To weave words into marvelous tapestries,
To shine beacons into the world's dark places,
To seek out the truest paths,
To tell good stories
That echo back the best story:
Your story of love and loss and redemption.

Bless and direct our efforts now, O gracious Father,
So that when we look back on them,
We can call them very good.

Afterdeath

I wait in the parking lot
Until I can finish sobbing along
To songs about the Resurrection,
Then walk through the parking lot,
Admiring the waning blue moon
As she wanes on the western horizon --
We will not see another such for years --
And go inside to numb my fresh grief
Among orderly lines of code.

(My friend, Father Thomas McKenzie, died yesterday in a car crash on I-40 west of Nashville. I hope to meet him again when the earth is remade by its glorious Redeemer.)

Incomprehensible

 In a jagged-edged caps-lock world
Where angry strangers rage-tweet "F*@% YOUR FEELINGS"
You wept with the heartbroken.

In a world of flaming deplorables and molten snowflakes
Where hate spews like sulfurous geysers,
You embraced the untouchable.

In a fake-news alternate-fact world
Where expedience trumps evidence,
You told the truth no matter the cost.

No wonder that the Light shines in the darkness
And the darkness does not comprehend it.

Lunar Lover

Moonlike, your moods

Wax and wane

Night by night,

Each phase lovelier

Than the last,

Mysterious, heart-catching,

Sometimes cloud-shrouded,

Always stareworthy,

Never boring or old,

Fascinating me even when

Cloaked in shadow.

Loving My Enemies

Did you love the scribes,

The Pharisees, the Sadducees

Who spilled your blood 

By Pilate’s well-washed hands

At the dump on the edge of town?

Did you pray for them

Before raining seven woes on them,

After, 

Or neither?

Were they the ones you wept over,

Longing to cover them

With strong protecting wings?

You were no hypocrite, so I think

You must have prayed 

and wept for them

In those few precious moments 

In the middle of the night 

When no one clamored

For your attention 

Your miracles

Your teaching

And you could be alone

With your beloved father.

If you could do that

For men who hated 

everything about you,

Who mocked and scorned you,

Crowned you with thorns,

Spat on you and ripped

Your back into a slurry

Of blood and torn flesh,

And hung you naked to suffocate

In a public, shameful place,

Despised, rejected,

Acquainted with grief —

If you could love them,

Then surely I can love

These fearful hand-wringing

Reactionary nutjobs 

Who invent conspiracies 

About stolen elections,

Who deny our responsibility 

To steward the world you gave us,

Who would rather suppress dissent

Than see justice flow down like waters,

Who think they’re victims 

Of a new Holocaust

Because they tweeted something offensive 

And got dragged for it.

O Lord Christ,

I cannot love such a love

Unless it is your love in me.

Remove my disdain,

My sarcastic judgments 

On these brethren,

Your adopted sons

And my fellow servants.

Cast out my demonic pride

And replace it with your grace.

Help me to see their pain and fear

And to weep with their weeping.

Let my speech be unerringly kind,

Seasoned with salt,

And rare enough

To be significant.

May I be quick to hear,

Slow to speak,

Slow to anger,

And may everything I do say

Be born of Your Spirit in me.

Love them through me

With your divine love, O Lord,

For you know my own

Is cold and insufficient.