I don't have anything to say

I don't have anything to say
I wish I did
I don't.
I wish I could
I won't.

Nothing.
Nothing to do, nothing to say
my bag is empty,

It's not that I forgot to pack
I'm not going
on this journey with you

That's why its empty

I wonder what to do now?

Smother it All in Butter

Something old, something new

something wrong, something true

A biting taste, a sarcastic twist

a nice array of brash bits

smothered all in....Quick!

fix!

the line before....

Think up something new

Of course

We can't always know the note that follows

an octave up

that sounded hollow.....

I'd like to smother it all in butter

and eat it like a piece of fresh baked bread

and then it'll be splen-did

So it was

When the Pain Stays

It moved in
lock stock and barrel
(whatever that means)
every suitcase and box
from it's last residence
it's silverware and knives
it's bed and it's cabinets
Pain moved in
it had come to stay
I didn't know how to escape, or lock it away
I went upstairs
and talked to God
I asked him how
He could allow this at all?
Pain grabbed my arm
kicked my shins
cut my side

I tried to hide
but it found me every day
I thought it would be there for good
so I took matters in my hands
pulled out plush comforters
and was swallowed in a pile
of chocolate, ice cream, and fluffy delights
I climbed a mountain,
stayed up all night
binged watched a show
wrapped myself up tight
and stared outside
wondering why and how it'd come
to stick by my side so close and fierce
wrenching my heart when I tried to smile
twisting my arm when I wanted to laugh
I tried to leave it out in the back
dump it all in the garbage can
so once more
when nothing else would do
I trekked up the stairs
to talk with God

Discipline

Discipline. Some people wear it like they wear a pair of uncomfortable boots. They suck it up and walk it out. They see it through no matter what.  There is no exception. There is no limit. It is what it is and there’s no use imagining “what ifs.”

It’s a terrifying kind of admirable. A sickly kind of glory. Blood streaming down your face as you finish the race with a gash in your forehead. Sweat covering your brow as you dance until you are sick then collapse after the final bow.

Grit. Determination. Perseverance.

Hope.

A stubborn relentless hope that dashes the shore again and again and again with its force.

It breaks upon the rocks day in day out sometimes barely audible then deafening as it thunders towards land driven by a storm.

A desperation for something better so keen that it repeats itself day after day after day. Hour after hour. The same path, the same mistakes, the same hope, the same plans, barely changing in its course. Tumbling, burning, ripping.

It recedes and returns. Always coming and leaving and coming and leaving.

And you can’t even see it, the dent it makes.

The way it’s painfully slowly minusculey weathering the rocks that line the shore.

Until it is smooth and there you stand on the edge of what used to be cliff covered in craggy rocks and razors that cut the bare foot.

Smooth, it’s smooth and washed back, receded into the land. The cliff broken down, tumbled into a hill.

All that discipline, determination, grit. It sanded back the resistance.

A Windy Wait

Rustling

       whipping

The wind pushes aside each leave

                     one by one

turning them over to the sun

                        thrusting aside branches

moving across the grass

    throwing aside my hair

A gusty playful blast

Up around my ankles

down to the tips of my fingers

An unseen river

rushing just to my left

Everything is pulsing

    moving

 pushing

     breathing

 thinking

    beating

                  lifting!

needing

to move

 to be

  more and more 

alive

with this day

ALIVE

I say

No stillness within

No stillness without

But I need

I long, I ache to hear God speak to me

so I still my soul to wait

for the still small voice

Hugging Pain

I accept the pain
I give it a hug.
Let it burn away the bitter and gunk
that's piled on me
I can't scrape it off
or scrub, wash or clean
but maybe the fire
will purify me
So I pull the pain closer
as God hold's my hand
I know, I know
He's got a plan

In the Night

A star guides me
The darkness pulls it in
but the more the darkness seeps
and blackens the earth
the brighter the star shines