viewingcamelot

Through my years
I have sustained
Many acts of violence
The intense strain
By taking a knee
Absorbing the pain
Standing, taking step by step,
Until momentum changed
Memory and ache.

But this won’t stop hurting.
My children feel the weight
I watch them move differently
Unaware they now compensate
For the thing that changed all things.
The grief infiltrates
And I can’t mend what’s torn
I can’t take
Many more of these days

And nothing can make it better
If You don’t redeem it.

Shadows and Echoes.
People come and go.
Some see me; no one knows
I am my own ghost.

I wait for the kaleidoscope to spin
Pulling me from the place I’m in
Into the chaotic twirl of change again
But who I am already descends

Laid to rest in the most foreign land
My bones interred bear the brand
Will that mark, by some mysterious hand,
Tie me ever to this place I planned,

But could never understand?

I don’t want to leave;
I don’t want to stay.
I want to stop haunting,
To dissolve away

By some gentle breeze,
Into nothing.
Instead

I scream with coyotes
Barefoot I run with them.
I howl like the wind.
My soul is tethered;
I fear I’ll be trapped here when
The kaleidoscope spins

Roaming and wailing with no end.

I’m so grateful
For the incremental victories
That are concrete reminders
That You are with me,
But on the equal and opposite
Of each success
I stare into the void
Of grief and emptiness.

I’m done with calculations,
And I’m not blaming my husband again.
He gets life done
When I am crippled by my sin.
I can’t see a resolution
That doesn’t end in perpetual grief.
I can’t see a higher outcome
Than temporary relief.

Be the God of my wilderness.
Find a vantage point.

My children are all sick.
The house is a mess.
My marriage is comfortably empty.
My boss seemed upset.
I don’t speak the same language
As the ones who wear Your name.
I’ve been alone so long,
It’s all I know, how I must remain:

We sing songs of You
As the Rescuer, the Restorer,
And I am grateful You do.
I’m ashamed to ask, is there more, or…

Or do I take small bites of today’s
Daily Bread
And remember the real Bread of Life
Is best enjoyed after I’m dead?

It’s all grace either way
And I am grateful for today,

But I’ve fallen on hard times.

It used to be so loud.
I wanted terribly to believe
I could be truly loved
It’s a silent grieve

Now the dirt is laid
Over the casket.

I’ve never been clasped
Inside safe arms, where
I could press against a heart
That beat for my welfare.

No more arms, no surprises,
Just tending my brood
And saying goodbye.

You are a judge and advocate
For those who can’t find justice.
A provider for the widow,
A father to the fatherless-

Filling the gap
Men leave behind.

Is that why You have loved me
Intimately all my days?
Because You knew
It would be the only way

I could believe love exists.
Thank You
For not being broken.

It’s a different kind of fear.
When that which snarls and salivates
For your life, takes you gently in hand,
Speaks tenderly- Imitates
A safer species.

When in disarming tones,
Commending what may not be true,
Guile croons to damage,
Or even end you,
All inside a charming smile.

It’s a different fear, when underneath
Is the thing that screeches against the light.
He is just as trapped as I,
And that’s when biting creatures bite.

She apologized for a noise
I didn’t even hear.

My life has required certain skills,
Segments pieced like a patchwork quilt.
How long have I appeased those
Who require blood for spilt milk?

Have I accepted as necessary conditions
Excessive exactions?
Am I allowing gouging
In daily transactions?

I asked what damage her noise caused;
Was it sharp? Was it hard?
Did she swing it like an axe?
What harm did it cause?

She giggled like butterflies.

No harm No foul No apologies
For a noise.

The Viking growls
From under his cowl
His restless impatience to shatter
Knits his eyebrows in scowl
Inside and under his trained civility
Wafts the odor of something foul.

He walks with cudgel raised
Looking for any inch of loss to defend
Holding hostages in hostility
Bring him his mead, he grins
But the blood may flow
The moment boredom sets in.

No one invades, no one contends,
No one will ever take a stand
Against the drunken Viking
Weilding his weapon in hand.

Is there a noble warrior
Left alive in the land?

Or were they all consumed by cudgel or mead?

In undeserved regalia
You have honored me,
You have washed my dirty wounds
And draped me in the finery
Of Your favor and affection.

I have been through death
The only thing that still lives in me
Is the breath You shared
But dying loosed my chain and freed
Me of my cares, my burden to strive.

I am only alive where You love.
If You withdrew it from my days
I would collapse back into my grave
Your love lifts me, carries me into the rays
Of warmth and blooming and song.

I can see the world by lovelight again
While the grave still sits in my chest
I see tragedy is the passing stranger
He will never be at rest
In a place You call home.

I have never lost a breath
That didn’t warm Your face.
You have been nearer to me
Even in the days of disgrace
Than I could hope or see

But I see You now.
I have never spent a moment alone.

Believing I was alone
In my blindness,
Was only listening to the stranger’s lie.

In and out of sleep
Gripped by fear
As a brand new predator
Draws near

To me and my brood.

I try making myself
Look bigger than I am.
I scream and roar
But I can’t scare him

And he returns to destroy

He changes color
And his fur changes design
His teeth are wet
He is after me and mine

And he keeps breaking the line
I can neither defend nor retreat

All night stuck between threat and defeat.