viewingcamelot

Father,

I’m Your child.
I came from You.
I see the ways I’m dissimilar;
Do I resemble You too?

There is no place for me here.
There is no place I belong.
Everywhere I go
I fit all wrong.

I always have to adjust my dials
Before everyone burns out.
The people who love me, stop loving me.
The ones who don’t, flout

Basic civility to expel me.
I’m easy to hate,
And I’m hard to love.
What will be my fate?

I don’t want to repeat
Painful cycles, I don’t want
To live a lie.
I am the runt;

I wasn’t supposed to survive the litter.
Yet here I stand.
I can’t be what they all are.
It’s exhausting to pretend

And there is no land
Where I am free to be me
Without being shot at.
I’m so tired of seeing

Myself
Through everyone else’s eyes.
I don’t want to hope.
I never again want to try.

Is this why You were a nomad?
Because You spoke plain
Their same language,
And they thought You were insane.

Where can I hide?
How may I escape?
It’s everyone everywhere always-
There is nothing safe.

There are no protectors.
No one speaks me.

In the back of my head
The thought insistently echoes:
“Stop now. Leave. You cannot do it.
You’ve gone as far as you can go.”

But then a smaller voice interrupts
Saying, “Probably, but you don’t have to run.
You’ve made it this far, you can take a single step more,
Let that be your last step, not this one,

You didn’t think you’d make it this far.
You don’t really know what you are,
Or what you are capable of doing.

Try one more round.
Get through today.
Fail and flee tomorrow.”

The seeds I’ve planted
Weren’t special to anyone,
But I believe they are to You.
I might be done.

Outside of You,
I have nothing but cut dirt.

But only You control
How a seed grows,
Or what it becomes.
No one else knows

The way the raindrop will run.

Relative Observation is Measurement.

It’s been my cumulative experience,
If I’m qualified to use the word
That no one is safe
Everyone is spurred
Into action along lines of self
That can not value others
Beyond basic posturing
Beyond reducing brothers
Into binary analysis
Based on gradations
Of derived, perceived benefit
And minimized complications-

A kind of comparative scaling
Over and against objective measures
Because no one gets off their island
And the value of their treasure

Diminishes in inverse ratio with distance and cost.

To explain the joke:
This is also hypocritical analysis.
Safe is a relational condition.

I was descended
From madness
And unto madness
I may yet descend

Whatever slope
My path may take
I purpose, I resolve
To do no harm
Along the way

As much as it depends on me.

I will try to add to, and not usurp,
People’s natural resources.

I may be a pariah,
But I will not be a parasite.

Bless them,
Not to make them cease
In a way that engorges their sin,
But weave for them true joy and peace.

Give them the best fruits You grow
Union with You,
Grace and love, patience, wisdom,
Help them live true

Whether I’m still around to see,
Bless them for me.

Give them my blessing.

Forgive me.

I have used my words
As torpedoes, to blow apart,
Because no one reads them
And I had murder in my heart,

But I am just as much to blame.
Forgive them, forgive me,
And sponge away the malice
I sowed as poisoned seeds.

Bring healing, bring hope,
Bring restoration.
Weave Your beauty with the threads
Of our failures and limitations

Like You always do.

Forgive us all.
We stand equally condemned
Of not being enough like You
To love in kind, in time, to defend,

Let Your sacrifice defend us all.

Forgive me. Over my plantings
Sow love, whose roots
Grow stronger through hate’s
And strangle its fruit.

Sow love,
Before my failures bear fruit.

You are the same God;
You are One.
What You promise in storm or stillness
Will be done.
Your signature is written in blood;
It does not run.

Forgive me for making my problems
Look bigger than Your promise.

All I wanted
Was to get away.
In my great fear and aversion
I didn’t want to stay;
I looked for any way to escape-

That wasn’t keeping my vow.

He doesn’t seem like a monster,
Unless he’s hiding it from me.
I know he has dark corners
I cannot see
But he showed some freely;

Those obscure memories feel out of context.

He tries so hard
To be a good man,
And I’m such a mess
He’s the only one who can
Keep in step with me

Who stays, who allows me to be
The great cacophony of me.

And before You, I promised everything
Always.

And I can’t do it alone.

And aside from him, I always end up alone.

I want to blame the ones
Who have disappointed me
Who could have extended a hand
To help pull me
From these choppy seas,

But it’s all on me.

I should have seen.
I should have known.
If I had only listened
To You alone,
If I’d relinquished my groaning,

I wouldn’t be here.

I am not listening right now,
In this dream sequence I live in.
I hear You’re still speaking,
But my sin taunts me to give in,
To forget the language of heaven

To embrace the darkness.

I know it will undo me
But I feel my numb fingers
Reaching for the clasp
On Pandora’s Box, I linger
I hear Your people sing

Your promises.

I have never been enough,
But You have never deserted me.
What comes next scares me,
But You have preserved me
Through all the lies that hurt me,

That have carved into my soul.

In my brokenness
When there was nothing left
I begged You to fix Your love on me.
I am now caught in a godless cleft,
I live bereft

Of Your tender virtues

But Your grace isn’t just for the broken,
It’s for the breakers, too.
I am not innocent before You
Unless Your blood slakes
My guilt, unless You take

Loving me as seriously as You promise

And Your promise never expires.

Fix Your love on the traitor in me.
Finish what You’ve started,

Even if I’m not building anymore.