things i'm learning

the truth is that Jesus encountered suffering. That suffering comes.

the truth also is that Jesus is with us in it. That the Man stands in the midst of the flames.

the truth also is that he is a shepherd. not the thief.

I'll never get tired of grace

Of the way it sits
inside me. Spread open,
like blown glass and
never breaks


it's open space. the
wood floor in the darkness
and saying thank you
thank you
for things we didn't know
were coming


It's
farm and trees falling
below
the airplane's wing,
 and I
don't have to bite
Jessica's hand
anymore-
Reality does
tell fear a different
story

It's the surprise,
That
 i do not create
my life
that somehow I
keep getting
found

that
again and
again, even in
this cynical land,
there are
things
worthy
of
declaring

These Things Remain

Yesterday, and throughout the days
of this week
I've been looking for you.
I've done the usual
things:
 filtered the archived emails with
their threadbare words
Scrolled facebook to read
people still saying goodbye
three years after
Checked your blog.  wishing.

I feel this unexpected adulthood
taking root, spreading out-
holding our little town
in it's arms.
Do you remember
how the dusk felt when we sat
on our skateboards?
How our friend sang loud and alive while we grinned?
How there were those leaf piles you said
beckoned?

Do you remember how you wrote those song lyrics
alone in the middle of one late night..
and we found them
a full 4 years later
so our bones began to stop
aching?

Meanwhile,
my town has become a city
full of lights and tall buildings
new people
with their stories growing
into each other

And meanwhile, as grace would have it,
I continue to wake

This afternoon I can feel you
and you don't seem 22. (or 32 even.)
You just feel like my friend
whom I loved in college.. and will love
for the rest of my life

Hope

After the war is passed
and
the pieces
we are gathering up
in our arms, saying
'what do I do now
with this?'

my legs shake for strain
the climb suddenly finished
the long run
now passed
and we stand alone
 in this field
stillness closing in
like braying hounds

Am I glad? you ask
releaved? To know the long
journey, as I've known it, is ended?
that a further road is now opened?

I don't think so
not yet.
Let me stand
here first. Find the graves
remember the voices
and cry

perhaps then
when we meet
you will see me
inside my eyes
alive and
bearing fruit

















 

I don't really know
how I've spent six months
in this city without
looking up

Maybe its that i'm growing
less afraid
of falling in a manhole, and
maybe its that
we feel at home
in places where we
know
the same things
from several angles, but

lately, my sight keeps
getting caught
along the tops of buildings
Where windows wait,
folded into brick
Brushing blue air

these picket-fence
horizons that
catch the snow
in layers, and
fling our gaze
toward sky

Hello Ohio
I smile toward your
rain-soaked asphalt
27 years of knowing you
the way I know my own breathing

the road that curved by the church
where I steered my first car
into the parking lot. Scanning for friends
dizzy with the excitement of
belonging

The road that lay between our backyard
and the stable. The hill I would run up
and down by starlight, smelling like
horse sweat and dust

the highway between the cornfields
(of which I have composed enough poems by now.)
and which carried a thousand quiet dreams and
decisions made alone, elbow against the windowpane.

have you heard my voice saying
I miss you?

on fear, and the overcoming of it

the wallpaper had grey and brown kittens
my grandmother would pretend to pet
"the look so real", she joked

at night
the closet growled at me
whenever it was left open
(so I made sure to close it.)
hours ticked
while i sat, tight-shouldered
in darkness
my sister breathing soft
across the room

I thought
my stuffed animals were lonely
and needed to stay together
I also thought
the germs on my chapped hands
might kill me if I didn't wash
every few minutes
(and it would be
my fault.)

I didn't learn
to sleep
until I learned to rest
I couldn't trust the morning
until I trusted You

that's how I remember it, at least.

how, somehow, I began to say "it's
ok. I can leave the light switch alone"
("I don't have to recheck it")
To stand,
while the fear
splashed- hard,
filled
and then,
 ebbed past
While I sat- white knuckled
to the idea of Someone
Big enough to hold it.