This Place
The racing starts
As soon
As I pull in
Why does
This place
Bring duress
Why does it
Initiate fear
They're just kids
I've done this
My entire career
But facing them
Facing co-workers
Daily
Freaks me out
I cringe inside
I quake
Fear overwhelms
How many of them
Share a portion
Of my story
My pain
My brokenness
Yet feel
All alone
In the midst of it
I see it
In their sad eyes
The windows
To their souls
I see it
In their desperate
Attempts at attention
They need
Someone
Maybe me
To notice
But
I can't bear
Their horrors
On top
Of my own
And that
Shatters me
Again
Every day
2/4/20
Dreams Distilled
Warm tendrils of breath
Where aching resides
Desire quakes
Promises are gnats
Swatted away
Dreams distilled in bottles of Jim
Where anguish blooms
Watered by tears and liquor
Accusations made
Truth festers
Emotions are gangrenous
Where is the healing
The prophet, the sage
In print and sixty six books
That people evade
Strength resides
Anesthetic pours
Free, free, free
Leaky Savages
Memories unfold
leaky savages in my pain garden
Sorrow creeps in gloved
pantomiming gentility
obscuring reality
Smiles shatter resolve
a pointless masquerade
All leaky savages in my pain garden
Dancing round
placating
posing
pointless
And I succumb
sour-faced and desirous
of something infinitely better
Power beyond leaky savages
and pantomimed gentility
Truth
That's it
I want truth
Don't you
Image by: Julian Bock
The Floundering Continues On
Deception lures us via innocence
It laughs at our ignorance
Dancing its schemes
Chanting its fallacies
As we are victims of the ruse
Too good to be true always is
But what was the motive
Failure on our part
Distraction from the goal
Chuckling it leaves us careening
Stuck in mammon's grip
Tired of the plummet
We latch on
But thorns shred and energy fades
Strength to battle wanes
Hysterically fear giggles
And hope collides with despair
Single motherhood leaves much undone
Everyday is a siege on peace
Angst renewed at sunrise
Doesn't dissipate at bedtime
Worn knees salty tears
Still alone
The fountain of dreams has dried
But the floundering continues on
Always the Light
Snide shadows haunt me.
In my room.
Alone.
At night.
They beckon me.
Come.
Fall.
Trip.
Grovel.
They are a snare to my sanity.
A bludgeon on my attempts at purity.
Shattering resolve.
Annihilating control.
Sneering at me from corners of my past.
They taunt.
They caress.
They deceive.
But I am alone.
In my room.
At night.
Alone.
Resistance is the only escape.
But frailty sometimes sheers bits of tenacity.
And fall I do.
Trip I do.
Alone.
In my room.
At night.
Those moments reveal the severity of grace.
The severity of devotion.
Without grace I am a snide shadow haunting myself.
So the light must come.
It must redeem me.
Alone.
In my room.
At night.
Sometimes on the floor tears streaming.
Sometimes in bed guilty and ashamed.
Always the light is the answer.
Always the light dispels the taunting snide shadows that haunt me.
Always the light.
Always the light.
Bitter Tears
She cried the bitter tears
of failure and defeat.
They rained down her cheeks,
acid in her heart
burning, blazing, seething.
She raged within
knowing
no one cared to hear
without.
Futile, she sobbed,
It’s all futile!
Dreams dashed
on a cash register.
Why must it always
be about money?
Why did heart
mean so little?
Anger threatened to consume
and she raged back,
crying out for God’s salvation,
His hand to move
these insurmountable mountains
of mammon,
a god she refused
to worship.
Yet, Caesar still
required
what was his.
She’d cut her wrists
and bleed for them,
as that’s all
she has to give.
But they don’t want
her blood,
her heart,
her energy.
No,
they just want
to watch her fall,
to laugh as she
curls up in a fetal position
and shakes her head
wondering what else
she could have done.
Failure screams at her.
It calls her names
and
she responds,
having heard its voice
so many times.
Despair feels like home
and home feels like hell.
I love you
What if all God ever wanted me to write was as simple as “I love you”? What if that truth could sink in deeper than any sorrow we've ever known? Think about your daily inner dialogue, do you regularly tell yourself that you're unworthy? That you're fat? That you wouldn't date you?
What if the people who have hurt you stopped having so much power over you? What if you learned to wholly trust in Jesus’ name? Seriously, what if all God ever wanted me to write was, “I love you”?
Would that change the way you view yourself? Would it make you go on a quest to discover how God sees you? Would it make you actively pursue that vision? Could it have the power to rock your world back toward the power God intended you to have?
Why have we allowed the enemy to steal our worth? Why have we allowed him to convince us that the way others see us is bigger truth than God's perspective? How has he so cunningly deceived us? And why do we continue to let him do so?
What if all God wants you to grasp is how high and deep and wide His love for you is? Does that change anything for you? And if it doesn't, just yet, how can you allow it to? How can you open up your heart and let the fullness of Christ's love for you sink in?
What if all God ever wanted me to write is “I love you”? Would you take Him at His word? Or would you laugh at me?
Concocted Reality
The enemy blurs the lines until we are lukewarm and useless. Until we serve time and mammon instead of Christ.
These were my 2 am thoughts.
Truth is not meant to placate but to stir to action. Yet, it is bent and twisted like a pretzel to represent folded arms of prayer, but no one's really communing with God.
Concocted reality is far less painful than, "What is truth?" Aay, Pilate?
Concocted Reality
The enemy blurs the lines until we are lukewarm and useless. Until we serve time and mammon instead of Christ.
These were my 2 am thoughts.
Truth is not meant to placate but to stir to action. Yet, it is bent and twisted like a pretzel to represent folded arms of prayer, but no one's really communing with God.
Concocted reality is far less painful than, "What is truth?" Aay, Pilate?