Remembering Mother’s Day 2005
GRAFTED IN
Grafted in, the branches draw life from the tree.
Yet, still they bear fruit after their original design.
Adoption changes the child, changes the mother too.
But God does not change.
He adopts us all, calls us His own.
The Spirit counsels, convicts and comforts.
Jesus is our Brother. He calls us “friend.”
I am no mystery to Him as He is to me.
The elusive, mysterious masculinity of men, of God,
is even more so in these two sons, not of my womb.
Grafted in, these branches draw the sap
of trust, safety, and hope through the mother tree,
though she is buffeted by wind and battered by storm,
her branches weak, and many
barren by drought and difficult years,
She is grafted in too, into the Father.
The mother tree sends all she can
to these two branches, like and yet,
unlike the twisted, rooted tree.
Two branches beginning to bud, to leaf out, to promise fruit.
The tree ponders the mystery, surprised by the fruit,
its kind, its beauty and power,
strength and fragrance. I am grafted in Him,
rooted in the Spirit, His life in me
bears such fruit in these, branches my own.
May 2, 2012
Mercy
Mercy
Weary of beginning again
while continuing.
Change? Every day is not new.
His mercies are—new
every morning. But how
are mercies felt?
Does mercy cradle,
swaddle, bind us tight
to the Source of All Mercy?
Every prayer is ditto and amen—
familiar and broken, a muddy
pond stirred up.
Repentance, restitution,
rectifying righteousness—not enough
time left to re-create.
From dust-to-dust
and until then,
mercy.
.
March 5, 2012
i love him so much. i’ve decided he can have whatever he wants…even it’s not good for him…
February 6, 2012
Time
Most of the days fly away
while the minutes are so full
that the hour will not pass.
Yesterday, each hour, lasted four,
while the sun raced through the sky
and nothing got done.
January 24, 2012
Miracles
Miracles look like ripening apples,
an old Great Dane, princely named,
who loves me anyway, and always,
and without one condition.
Miracles sound like old pages turning,
and babies who cry, and children who giggle,
and sons with deep voices,
and daughters who listen.
Miracles feel like prayers that ache
before answers, the strong arm of a man,
the weight of a book and the hot greeting
breath of the horse in the barn.
Miracles taste like peaches still fuzzy
and tears that turn happy, hot spicy chile
with sweet fizzy cola, and the shock
of my lip bitten hard without warning.
Miracles smell like basil and onions,
fresh ink on clean pages, rain after wind,
boys’ hot, sweaty heads, the breath of a puppy,
and girls who love lotion.
Miracles are here, everyday, and never,
prayers turned into incense
and tears saved in bottles.
Miracles are.
January 24, 2012
