Ready to Make Friends with Poetry? ⟶
Jesus and I are on an outing the week before Easter. We pull up to a strip mall; He unbuckles his seatbelt and I turn off the ignition. As we climb out of the car and walk towards an open door He remarks, “Oh, a Christian bookstore; let’s see what they’re selling.” We step inside…
I’ve been awash in words of late, missing out on the wind waving through steel branches, blue and white sky. Eyes too crowded to take note of the weather which goes on without me, whether I watch it or not. A glance through the dining room glass speaks loudly in all caps. I am listening….
“The path of the righteous is like the first gleam of dawn, Shining ever brighter till the full light of day.” Proverbs 4:18 When I began this year, God gave me a word–“adjust.” Last year I spent time ‘abiding’, year before that it was ‘dwell’ (very similar) and the year before that, my word was…
I want to fly these dumbbells up, down, up, down quick! The momentum of each lift rising at my side pushing past perhaps what’s safe or wise in the name of what? Speed or yes, the checklist-exercise- done! When I slow instead, face the window and raise these weighted arms slow, slow, slow-up; slow, slow,…
It all began with my suitcase. I recently returned from a five day trip to Texas to see family and friends and attend a writer’s conference in the Austin area. I packed way too many clothes and shoes. And books. (One always miscalculates the amount of ‘free time’ to read while on a trip.) In…
“For who knows how, Better than he that taught us first to Plough, To guide our Mind and Pens for his Design? And he makes base things usher in Divine.” John Bunyan, the Author’s Apology for His Book, Pilgrim’s Progress I wrote at the beginning of this year about starting small, starting now when leaning…
“The seed catalogues are a further promise of warm days to come. I class them as fiction and love to read them. Oh, the beautiful roses and tall spikes of delphinium and the flowering bushes-not to mention the carrots as big as telephone poles and the peas that practically shell themselves… We get some pretty…
“Samara,” she said and the words took flight in my hearing, invisible windborne flora soaring across my thoughts. She spoke of wings, a divine creation spinning towards earth to plant itself like a stubborn weed-fierce and stuck. Imagination took root, sending me flying home towards Webster’s– ‘some-are-uh’ – and there a black and white drawing…
I wish I could collectthe light, landing its shadowson this page as it creepsever brighter through the gray. Pour it out to wash my heart,salve the wound of thispresent heaviness, the sighsthat never end. Hold it lightly aloft, prayingno sharp wind orquiet, steady breezesnuff it out, for weneed it so Father, carry us,ferry us through…
“It is possible to enjoy Me and glorify Me in the midst of adverse circumstances. My light shines most brightly through believers who trust Me in the dark.” Sarah Young, ‘Jesus Calling.’ I grew up in Southern California, the land of pavement, palm trees and perpetual sunshine., All that blue and bright color became…