windows

i bleed my favorite colors into the depths of their little eyes

it's the secrets we hold closest to our hearts that never see the light of day

so maybe if i carve a window into my ribs, they can

stick their grubby, glorious faces up against the glass and the dreams

will swirl in a wind of bright dust that has never faded

and it will be hard. because there have been times where i have trusted people

like when she told me she would - but never did. time after time. and  even though

my throat was sore from heartblood crying,

she never knew. and him? he wrote me a letter acting as if everything was normal

until the last line when he said he was leaving forever

the people that i trusted most? i was twelve. and they left me in a parking lot all alone

this heart has been thrown to the ground and even the echo never comes

they are still small enough to fit within my sapphire shadow

so i take their trifling hands and tuck laughter into them in the form of

minor miracles. barefoot in the front yard, telling him that it's not right to lie,

his voice clearcuts across to my chest with an apology, achingly humble

then it all passes like the tide washing over the footprints on the shore

as we return to our game of tag

so even when i have to wipe the window in my ribs with a dirty cloth,

it is wetted with living water from the hole in his side

they are still so small, and the mustered hope in my soul is brighter than lightning,

teaching them that our fathers' callouses create safe havens

the fire plants a garden of ash for the strength & glory dreams to break forth

every swollen death in your kid heart will throw you against all that you know

but you will laugh with peach juice running down your chin on the hottest summer day you've 

ever known and when the breeze strikes the sweat, you will find all the life

that has sprouted from chasm repentance and crescent belief

/x

way out on county road 2

i push against invisible walls
that are heavy-laden with false hopes
the crops were few in the years of drought
that came when you fell into broken habits once again
i sat on the wet ground by a house of former glory
and wished that i would be willing to be torn down
to make room for the sweet clarity of fresh growth
the steps are more mold than solid wood
and the carpet is now made of dust and covered
with the sprinkling of the old ceiling giving up

out on county road two, there are
houses that are no longer homes and a girl
stretching her hand with freedom away from the ties of
fault lines of heartache that wanted to linger
i drove through a quiet town in Colorado but it looked like
Kansas and i almost felt lonely
if it wasn't for the way that the clouds twisted the light
into a strand of hope and the goodness of death
the path has been set and the hosanna has been cried
you can feel the churning when you place your
hand on the grave of what we surrendered
the brink of the third is set in my spirit
and the unwept hurt finally exhales into the
birth of healing

tomorrow we'll be sun-soaked, today i am hope-soaked

bump into rough billows of clouds,
tasting the powdered sugar from the heavens as if
winter was only a light dusting on top of my summer.
i sweep the kitchen with the door open,
and everything shivers from the bitter wind
but i am stuck, stuck, stuck -
in a daydream?
look closely. the cacti in our bathroom is dying from the cold,
and there is no space where the sun hits just right
for them to live.
he thumps his chest to clear a cough from his throat,
and the sound irritates my own lungs.
we are all eager, eager. maybe
if they use the right machine, they can suck the
hypocrisy from underneath my ribcage,
right near my spine, where it is caught on a truth
i was just trying to give to make things better.
brush my hair out of my face, but
my fingers get caught in the knots of conviction
trying not to stumble and morph into
condemnation.
every day, down monaco street parkway,
i gaze as long as i can at the branches of the trees,
trying to see the green budding underneath their
white coats.
this is a dream that keeps sprouting in my soul,
no matter what storms break against the shore.
sandcastles wash away, but i am founded upon a Rock,
and maybe that's why this hope
triumphs when it is strangled. i heard something, once, about
how death was defeated. i think, maybe, this is like that.

/x

hard into holy

i am coughing up blood, the color of confusion

the beat in my chest feels more like a knife turning

there are spots when i try to look at your face

clarity has abandoned the weak

feelings tell me that truth is just russian roulette

a game of chance, a game that leaves you hoping

but Something tells me we all know that's a lie

it goes deeper than the serial doubter's doubts

a steadfast stone, solid,

unchanging.

always true, no matter the circumstance.

peter looked Him in the eyes and declared

a feeling to be fact. knowing and kind,

He prophesied three crows.

only three, and by the third, he was pale and sore.

weeping over fragile foundations.

if He is God and He is good, comes sorrow under the shield of anger, then why does He let bad things happen?

you are still small, i sigh a laugh, even though my ribs

creak under the small movement of that.

because He is just? because actions have consequences? because He is sovereign?

we are eternal beings in finite bodies trying to decrypt

a message most of us are unwilling to hear.

you are not enough.

my splintering flesh is evidence,

as i stumble into walls of all of my mistakes, and trip

over rotten actions, still yet to be surrendered.

when have i ever been enough? born a sinner, the old man ruling.

but He is enough. 
that is all it takes to still my heart. the knife stops churning.
the arteries are cleared. my hands steady.
there is no hesitation in His spirit,
and He gives to those who are willing to break and believe.

the murmuring of the earth speaks of glory,
and i am finding Love twinkling in her eyes when she sits beside me.
i watch as he runs under the dark winter sky,
the Star in him shining brighter than the ones above.
i am amazed by His redemption in the pain.
give me hard. give me holy. let me see You.

/x

sitting in michigan x

i wait for a call that almost sounds like home

but it is the weeping of the sea as she rolls 

over the shore and aches as she pulls back

the layers are revealed, and the grown 

turn cold shoulders

yet i am still small, kneeling in the sand, 

shells piled like jewels 

in my hands

the sky is sobbing and i am trying

to figure out why

everyone here cannot see the gift

of a God who cares enough to refine

there is a pulling in my chest, 

right between the bottom of both my ribs

calling for the chance to be pierced 

hard enough to bleed

they are all searching. searching for

something to fulfill. and i -

i am constantly racing to unclog as if 

i were a drain overflowing with junk.

here am i! i want to scream. but even

that conviction isn't quite reckless enough.

i can never seem to feel the right

thing at the right time. i am

the clock that chimes three minutes too late.

/x

i don't need you to love me

the light feels thick from the stars, strangling me into
a muggy heartache.
you don't have to love me, i murmur, always always
twisting in the night. you don't have to love me.
but no matter how many times i say those words,
i can't quite make my feelings obey in submission.
in a lot of ways, i want you to love me.

i want memories where the heat of the moment
lights up our faces, casting gentle shadows.
the blurry memories. the ones where you can't quite
remember what you were laughing about, but you
just remember your heart was in high tide.
it doesn't have to be a lover's kind of love. she
talked about soulmates, and how they can come for
those moments where time stands still.
in a lot of ways, i want to believe you were one.
because when i throw a glance over my shoulder,
certain pieces of time peek at me like glitter in the
sunlight.

but i don't need you to love me
for me to love you.

/x

hey punks! lately my favorite feeling has been the freshness that comes when you move on from old feelings. what about you? 

everything is okay (even when it's not)

soft. it washes over me like

sunlight, like a ghost like the way you

don't say my name anymore you

never said my name.

they say let it rise, it is okay

to burn.

so goes the fire, but i

disengage.

no steps back but my nerves crashlanded 

now i'm running my hands through the flames running

away.

pillars of smoke look like clouds and 

suddenly it's a Tuesday we're naming the

heavens. a glance of gold don't blink twice

the burning tiger is

dead.

smoke meets my lungs and i cough

maybe i'm just getting over a cold my hands

are cold why is the sun so bright

intentional amnesia except misdiagnosed

because i still remember everything i still

remember the way we laughed.

nice to meet you my name is Alright

my name is you're right i'm not but i can't

acknowledge that.

x

happy tues to fellow nines 

(and the rest of you!)

all my love

vague

this is my moment.

i run my hand through the soft, cold beat of the clouds. turn my head to the left. i see glimmers of blond. something strong.
now i'm running through a murky brown. flashes of white, twinkles of black. there's a window in front of us, and it was a beginning though you were the only one who knew it.

clench and throw all i got. but i don't. i just roll my tongue around in my mouth, and try not to be too honest. no one needs to know. they already know. i wish they didn't. why did you come?

there, on the roof. she tried to tell him something. but words? not this time. yell it loud, baby. sometimes that's what your soul needs more. it's better than a hook to the punching bag. probably because that's where i get my knots, right in my lungs. nothing like a good slap of air to knock it all loose.

this is my moment.
i remember the small things. i hold them in a pocket, only for me to know. the flashes. the feelings.
isn't it funny how there are some things only you know?
handfuls of time only you have experienced?

no one else.

it's only october. only only only only. it feels like it's been a thousand years and only a week at the same time. i've never had the kind of memory people call good. there are some things as clear as day that have happened over a year ago. and then there are some things that happened just yesterday that are already taking root in forgotten land.

i was just on the train ride in the airport, going back home. but there were too many people in the train and my back was to the pole so i had to be steady on my feet. funny how you think you have it, then you're stumbling around.
i can't make sense of any of it.
the walls of the tunnel flash by, and there are all sorts of colors and smells and places. marbles in a basket. he was tall. she was short, and had a sheepish grin. a laugh slipped from my lips, and was lost in the pollution of noise.

already gone.

this is my moment.
why am i so afraid? why do i feel so small? why can't we just say the things we feel?
why are things so complicated?

if every moment is our own, why do we act as if it is someone else's?
that's not selfish. is it? i don't think it is. but right now, i can't make sense of anything. there are shades of blue that give me the deepest sorrow and the deepest joy at the same time. everything is meshing.

vague. yeah. that's what this is. but that's how i feel.

forgotten how to write

i've forgotten how to write / it seems.

i pick up that familiar guitar in my hands, 

expecting to say something of importance, something in my heart. 

but it's been eighteen years 

and the dam that was there when i was born

 is still there now. 

i approached it as Jericho, but seven days did nothing. 

seven years have passed, and still nothing. 

i have a journal with small poems

that just make my heart sick (perhaps an overstatement) when i read them

because i could never say it / quite right.

no, wait --

s t o p.

could you stop protesting and just LISTEN for a moment?

i am tired of words right now,

tired of sound.

tired of people telling me how / when / possibilities.

just listen.

i drove in the desert heat to a picnic table in

the middle of nowhere,

and sweat on a bench eating blackberries and

watched the clouds dance and sway quietly along

their bright blue stage.

i had meant to pray.

to abide in the presence of my Savior, pouring out my heart.

maybe to listen and hear a word from Him / (trying not to be a hypocrite).

but the sun just covered everything it could,

and i was hot, and the wind was hot,

and there is no good word to describe it all except hot hot hot.

i've forgotten how to write, after all.

but a man walked with his daughter,

laughing and calling after Maddie. both of them

bore weapons against the heat (just squirt guns and hope).

i grinned at the trees away from them, trying

not to spill the secret that i was listening.

i think he knew.

i don't think he cared.

i guess you don't need to know how to write

to be spoken to.

/x

hey babes. graduated high school. sending my school laptop back to the school so i'm not going to be able to post again until i buy a new one. but that's not new news. i mean, it takes me a couple of months to post these days anyway.

thanks for always coming back, even when i am a poop and don't reply to the comments. i see 'em and love 'em. 

faithfulness

it is suddenly a thursday, a daring blue sky sending kisses in clouds. the grass in our yard is too long, not asking to be cut because we both know that sometimes you need to let things grow while you rest. it has been a long season, full of full, long days. but look, the tide is changing. today i slept in without worry for the first time in months. my mom planted flowers in the pots on our porch. i didn't have to take a jacket with me when i left the house yesterday evening.

faithfulness. i roll that word around in my mouth, learning what it means. i asked her what God was teaching her on sunday. she laughed and gave me an answer, but i wasn't expecting her to turn the question back on me so quick. i didn't really have an answer - "He is teaching me a bit of everything." she was gracious enough to accept those words, commenting a bit upon them.

but here i am, only a few days later, and i have found a word to describe the gentle work He has been working in me, through me, and all around me.

faithfulness. 

in all things. man. if i could just pick out those moments in my life, and place them in your hand for you to see and to know and to feel, i would.

it has been this past school year, staying up late late to finish homework by the end of the day. it has been waking up at 5:30 and wearily getting out of bed to get ready to go to work. it has been squeezing in loads of laundry into the washer, finally picking it off the floor because your room has been a mess for a week. it has been playing guitar on wednesday nights and praying in the car in the morning.

but not all of it has been physical - it has been choosing to love when i don't feel like it, it has been checking up on friends, it has been replying to emails or texts or emails or letters (even if they are latteeee), it has been learning to surrender, it has been sticking it out through the hard things, it has been being honest, it has been asking the hard questions, it has been choosing forgiveness and asking for forgiveness, it has been humility written into my core.

it has been laying myself down for the sake of the Cross, for the sake of others.

you must understand that faithfulness was never about what you could get. what you could gain from being faithful to another person or to another thing or to God. faithfulness is about love and it is about lifting others above yourself and it is a continuous choice. it isn't a one time thing. it is a battle to stand firm, proclaiming Christ into the face of things that call you off of the solid Rock.

it is my King Himself, beaming grace. beaming humility. beaming love. all of these things are woven in to each other. you can't be truly faithful without any of them.

and don't get me wrong. faithfulness is full of sweet fruit.

because of it, cords have been tightened, hearts have been strengthened, trees have budded, finish lines have been crossed, rest has been earned, glory has been given, joy has grown deeper, cinnamon rolls have been made.

faithfulness. it is written into everything. i laugh when i look at the sky, a golden sun has been revolving for thousands of years. my God has fulfilled each of His promises. the flowers are peeking out at me, shy but bright. there are callouses on my fingers from the guitar. faithfulness is good, good, good.

hard, yeah.

stinking hard.

but those types of things are always worth it. He has proven it, and i will not doubt it.

/x