cry yes

Back in college, I read global news every day. I was hungry to know more about the world, to be engaged in humanity’s struggles. At some point, the number of problems got too huge for me to process, and now I’m pickier about what news I read. I don’t want to be bombarded with stories designed to put me in a spiral of despair, but at the same time I don’t want to be in ignorance!

These days, the news reminds me of our great need for a solid foundation on which to build a reconciled world. The work of reconciliation between persons and peoples and creation itself is too difficult to build on anything less than the rock of reconciliation with God! At the same time, we mustn’t sit around on the foundation singing nice songs and pretending the work is done.

I didn’t write this poem for Advent, but it seems appropriate somehow. As the darkness of winter reflects the darkness of a desperate world, so each little candle we light illuminates the One who brings light to otherwise impenetrable darkness.

Entering into our flood of pain and failed solutions, the Christ child is God’s great “Yes!” in a world of human “No”.

Continue reading “cry yes”

On the Brink

Sometimes in the darkest part of the night
I play my old cassettes to fill the overpowering silence
A familiar cadence of thoughts blares out, ready to lend meaning to any moment

Those tapes remind me of who I am, what the world is like,
How hard to slam the door on the way out of giving a damn –
You know, all the important things

Continue reading “On the Brink”

Manger Song

When we find our wells of Peace have run dry
The world, within and without, misaligned
Into despair, the Incarnate Child
Brings his Hope and his Way Continue reading “Manger Song”

Delight

A young child dissolved in giggles at his very first joke,
repeating the punch line in sheer bliss

A red-cheeked adventurer standing high above the town
on a sapphire-blue morning, enraptured in the frosty air Continue reading “Delight”