A snow map helped me find my way
Into this tiny town
That has grown in value to eclipse
Every prior abode, hands-down.
Now the desired snow falls
Filling this space to the brim
But it’s colder in the exposure
Without the illusion of him
Memory like the snow
Sometimes conceals, sometimes reveals
Time is a wet-toothed shape-shifter
It hides instead of heals

I wish I had some solid ground
To hold and support my feet
What I have wrought, what has become,
Subdues me, leaves me incomplete

Always working for what stays out of reach.

Tiny crystals in the light
Shimmer, flake, and fall
Collecting in a gathered dance
Covering all
The look of fresh and pure
Painting over yesterday’s road
But somewhere underneath
Frozen, amnesic loads
The same ruts are carved
If you step out, too bold,
You may trip beneath the drift
Slip asleep beneath the cold
The earth is old, but the newness of snow
Beckons appeal in pale patina
With whitewashed skin over rotting bones
What hides below the icy arena
Isn’t clean.

Forgive me
If my love wasn’t deep enough.
We’re all still here;
Was it really that tough
Or was I too sensitive?
He’s a man
Not a monster,
And he still stands
While I fall and flounder
What did I think I deserved?
What could I have possibly sustained?
At least he’s had the constant nerve
To remain no matter what
No matter who
I turned out to be.
I wish he loved You.
I feel like I’ve judged him harshly.
What has he actually done?
Have I forgotten something important?
Why was I desperate to run?
Have I burned him out now?

Please don’t let me make him worse
Because I exaggerate what is.
Please don’t let me conflagrate
The years here for my kids.
I’m tired, and all my decisions
Are bad, I know.
I yield to the rising tide-
Direct its flow

Around me.

I don’t really remember
What I was doing here
In the first place, in last place,
You said Do Not Fear,

So I wait where I got lost
For You to find me,
Reclaim me, restore me,
Remind me

How I got here-
Where I am,

Where I am supposed to be going.

Deliver me there.

You met me on the dirt roads
Alone under Your expanse
You sang comfort to my aching soul
With a harmony of circumstance
You found me before, in the crowd
While in the congested cities
Lost in the flow, the current,
The hum and buzz of anonymity
Pulsing in density and activity.
You held me in all, Tender Shepherd.
You begird my wounds
With hope conferred.

You are that Hope
Cradling the little chicks
Under Your mighty wing.
Keeper of the wicks
When the darkness creeps
When shadows run long,
Your timing is timeless,
Your tender song
Causes the cold and proud
To stamp and stumble
Falling low, but You lift the low;
You exalt the humbled.

You spin the world
And flip these features
So we must face and respond:
We are the creatures
And You are the Creator.
How good it is to praise
Our Father Eternal
Weaver of Days
King of Synchronicities
The tapestry You weave
An opus in hidden image
A secret delight to those who believe

And in the eye of faith
Those who can see, see
The higher calling and final becoming
Of True Beauty.
You give the best sight to the poorest,
All the wealth of man
Leads to blindness;
You shorten their span.

Lead me, True Shepherd, to the end.

I have always been
A misplaced girl.
I struggle to know
My place in this world.
I spend so much of me
On other people’s kingdoms.
If I have unique contributions,
I don’t see that I bring them.
I stack tasks and days,
Toiling for my daily bread,
I long for some way to be
Free and freely Spirit-led.
I ache for the quiet, simpler days
Nurturing my little foals,
The time in absence erodes me,
Leaving behind a brittle soul.
I now hide the truest parts of me
After the gauntlet and the ice.
I yearn to return to who I was
Before brutality and lies.
Instead I march onward
Waiting for the change to bloom,
Waiting for the end of waiting,
Waiting for life to resume.

Working at the Waiting.

I feel like I’m in the wrong stride
And it hurts Your precious being.
Forgive me my ungrateful pride
I have eyes; I fail in seeing
I’m caught in the riptide now

I can’t see a shoreline worth the swim
And I’m tired of beating the waves.

I thought they had respect for You,
And it would be safety for me.

They did not.

I’m not asking for razed earth.

I came to this place with six kids,
Two feet, and a bindle.
I’m leaving with the same
My hope has dwindled,
And my faith in men.
I hope my faith in You hasn’t balked.
Travel with me down the next new roads,
Like the ones We’ve already walked.
I suppose I’m one who needs distance
I need to leave to let go,
To forget what I cannot bear,
To erase what breaks me to know.
I’m really just leaving to put distance
Between me and the company
I don’t understand why I care
They immediately started forgetting me

Stripped from walls and hearts.
The least I can do
Is follow suit.

It’ll be better when I’m all gone.

Do with them whatever You please,
But remember, to me, they were graceless.
You remember the coldness of their souls,
And I’ll forget their names and faces.

You tested them
In the pride of their days
Not with strength, but weakness,
And they were wicked in their ways.

I came to them in meekness
In humility, in need:
A widow in my distress
With orphans to feed

I needed, like Ruth,
To glean in safety
But they were cruel.
They have afflicted me.

I was an alien, a sojourner,
A foreigner in a foreign land,
They defrauded me,
They crippled my stand.

You take up my case.
I wash my hands and depart-
They are not my people-
I leave their cold, arrogant hearts

In Your Just Hands.

You promise justice to widows, orphans, the sojourner, and the poor.

I ask You for it.

*Addendum

I have asked for justice
Instead of vindication
Because I only changed it
In the first by way of prevarication
Justice is merely
An eye for an eye,
But they have both
And at the time, I
Only had one
When they put it out.
If they lose an eye
They go about
Barely impeded,
But my world is forever
Alone in the dark
Gripping what’s severed
Unless You take into account
Power, and the responsibility of sight,
Measuring my experience
By the widow’s mite

Justice by percentage
Instead of volume.

And to remind You again,
I already have a petition in
For vindication.

Forgive me for my faithlessness.
I have trouble seeing
While grieving the changes
But I know in my being

You keep Your promises.

No one can thwart Your design.
What You have said, You will do.
You have loved me exceedingly well;
Love me through.

Before this began,
While I was still asleep,
You took me through the book of Jude-
Your promise to Call, to Love, to Keep.

Fix Your love on me
Beyond what I understand
In Your unchangeable nature
Like only You can

And if there’s a miracle,
Give me faith to believe its possible
Because, with You,

All things are possible.

P.S.

I found a breadcrumb forgotten.
Even then, I must have sensed in part,
And I asked You for this surgery
So in the agony of the unguarded,
I ask You again:

Finish what You’ve started.

I trust You.

Identity