Contemplating-
When you ask God what His vision of Himself is, He will say-

You.

 

 

I am content

with the mystery-

    live   in me.

 

 

 

When I look at my body,

feel my bones,

the press of my flesh-

I am that close to God,

I am that close to Life,

I am that close to myself.

 

 

 

Don’t be afraid.

God will find you.

 

 

 

It is through our challenges and the pains of some of our darkest hours that we share most profoundly in the mystery of wholeness, compassion, and healing.

 

 

 

Every need reflects a joy

that is searching for expression.

Every fear

a love waiting to be shared.

 

 

 

Being One,

always One,

we are blessed

to be two

You and I.

 

 

 

Father

You clothe yourself in Creation.

You are

within the garment of the wind,

the closeness in every touch;

You are what is seen and what is heard

though the eye does not see and the ear does not hear.

You are the nearness

in the space between all things,

and a knowing so simple

that the mind cannot follow.

You are the Life in the living,

but the living do not see it.

You are nearer to me

than my own breath,

You are what makes me visible to myself

and the world known to my heart.

 

 

 

 

Beatitudes

Who speaks for me

                   when I speak not?

 

Who will hear my sorrow

                    gone lost  in the

                      crying of the world?

 

Who will drink of the cup

         that I drink-

Who will see my loss

                       when not one dream

               will remember its passing?

 

Who will plead my cause,

         pray my prayer,

            sing my song?

O’ who will lift me up

    Who will say my name?

 

And who speaks for me

           when I cannot?

 

 

 

 

 

Death

The dying man says

I will just stop and

rest here.

I will sleep a moment

then I will awake.

 

 

 

 

 

 

John 1: 5

I have a plastic Jesus.

One that stands on the dresser by my bed.

It glows in the dark.

I am so amazed that

someone knew what I needed.

 

 

 

 

Seeking

I am seeking

to be found-

seeking on the edges,

down the curved abyss,

in the violent deeps;

Seeking to be found

by the One Who seeks

the lost.

 

 

 

 

The Great Mystery

The great mystery that mystics speak of

is neither hidden nor distant.

It is the fullness of the hidden

made visible-

the breath embracing the body,

the unseen unfolding

as cell and limb, leaf and thought.

It weaves effortlessly

and affectionately through every way

and every path.

It is the destination of every movement,

the sacred becoming visible

the landscape of our longing-

endless revelation,

endlessly present.

 

 

Meeting God

When you meet God in the

Divine Liturgy,

meet Him as

The Almighty, Everlasting, Redeemer,

Eternal Word, Exalted and

Infinite-

when you meet Him in your room

meet him as friend.

 

 

 

 

As a Child

As a child

the world is always suddenly

waiting to happen.

And when it happens,

it is too big to hold on to

or run away from- like prayer.

 

 

 

 

Tabernacle

Build within me Lord

a house,

a great temple,

a house for all the glorious

and the poor,

the joyful

and the lost-

And let me be the small

and little place in this glory,

empty enough to hold you,

small enough to serve you,

holy enough to find you in all who come.

 

 

 

 

The Word

The Word is the lightness of breath,

the bringing forth,

the saying

and the seeing,

the knowing

and the holding.

It feeds life

with endless Grace,

its endless bounty,

its intimate landscape

and limitless horizon.

And each life makes this life

its own

and returns it ten fold

to be the life

that is shared by all.

 

 

 

 

 

Humility

As Man discovers

his humility

in the gentle

gaze of  God,

he knows himself as love,

and becomes the

greatest of all creatures.

God’s love has covered our nakedness

With Himself.

 

 

 

 

Experiencing God

Our experience of God is always sufficient.

But never enough.

 

Only

Only darkness can hold the Light,

Only sin can hold forgiveness.

Only pain can hold hope,

Only the broken can hold beauty.

Only loss can hold peace,

Only the Cross can hold Life.

Only love can hold it all.

 

 

 

 

 

What then is Mine?

What then is mine?

Who am I that I am

gone wandering

in the world.

Who am I

that you hide me so close

in Yourself that I can hear the world’s heart beat

and remember every word ever spoken,

and every sound the world has ever made-

even now.

 

 

 

Eucharist

God is revealed in all of our consolations,

and hidden in the tight fabric of our pain.

With Him, we are ground by the teeth of life

into hope for the lost

and comfort for the suffering.

And in him we resurrect

as hope, solace,

and consolation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

God’s Love

God’s love is a blinding Light,

a burning Fire cast upon the earth

that devours the promises

of the mighty and the selfish,

and brings down the walls that guard the proud

to reveal the lowly and the broken,

and turns all that is not of the heart to ash.

 

God’s love is a gentle Light,

that warms the limbs from the cold grip of fear,

dispels every darkness,

raises the seed to flower,

shows the way to the wayfarer and the lost,

and wakens all that is dead to life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

As Close as a Breath

God is the deep eternal becoming of all that is-

Inconceivable, unthinkable,

incomprehensible;

As far as infinity,

as light as a leaf,

as knowable as love,

as close as the breath.

 

 

 

 

You

O’ Lord,

You are the greening of the bough,

the silence that rises on every wave;

You wake the dreaming and love the blindest creature,

you move the bounds of eternity

for every wayward soul,

and call the star-deep heaven your own;

you are the fire hidden in every flame,

the silent words of every sigh;

You are the longing of the new born,

song among the grasses,

the teaser of our soul,

the sound of the earth turning,

the depth of the great waters,

the gentle hope of the sick,

and the bright joy of the dying.

 

 

 

 

Presence

God is always hidden

where there is no place left

for us to hide.

He follows our flights of terror,

waits in the silent moment

of our surrender,

and has already arrived

at our every destination.

 

 

 

 

John 1:5

Flame of God’s Presence,

light in the darkness,

Fire of God

the Light that no eye sees

gleaming in the night of every day.

Gift of darkness

promise made good,

gift of Life

in haunting pain and abandoned fields,

turning the many deaths of our days

into the way the earth breaths,

and the heart sings,

gift of life

in life's life Giver.

 

 

 

 

Bread

We make the bread together,

The Lord and I.

Mixing the flour and water,

kneading and folding,

waiting in the rising,

shaping and forming,

firing and baking-

Then breaking bread

with one another,

sharing this together,

You and I.