SLAVE

Lord, break me of self-realization

‘Til I know of naught but you

And in that hour of crucifixion

Help me all else to forget

For I am worn from holding onto

Hows and whys and wanting yets.



I can’t support this heavy knowledge,

Care no more to figure out

The nuance of the fraud I saw as

Independence safe and proud,

For all I’ve ever been in charge of

Left me losing solid ground.



All the things that passed before now

Add up to the empty sum

Of what it took for me to give up

Willfulness to be my own

And I’m ashamed at how I fought

For years to hold the rights you won.



So go ahead and take away

My claim to who I am,

And I will be your grateful slave,

Submitting to your hand,

Owned and set free at your word,

Nevermore to take my stand.



The only thing I must remember

For all of eternity

Is this day when I surrendered

To the right authority

Ever living or to come,

For all of lost humanity.

HABITATION

If His life inhabits mine,
Then does He not sustain me?
If I claim His Spirit to reside,
On what more can I rely?
What else do I think to need
Than God Himself?
Preposterous, this supposition
That takes for granted
The very nature of the reborn
Soul, having at its disposal
All-surpassing resource!
Power, love, and mercy complete
Abiding within this vessel!
A constant companion,
He conquers all loneliness,
Providing cover beneath His wings
And ever-present help,
Setting me free from despair!
Why do I yet forget it,
The explosive and vast potential
Within the very heart of me?
Is this not a gift to treasure,
Worth giving up every scrap of myself?
How can any earthly pleasure compare?
Momentary, fleeting, and minor
Are the joys of this world
Compared with the very essence,
The just and creative force
Of the God of the universe
Bound to us, its tiny seed!

TO LOVE ME SO

You speak to me
In truths profound
And make my ears to hear,
As other senses
Fade beyond attention…
And your voice,
Now paramount,
Plants your Words
Inside a mind paused
In broken thought,
Whispered terms
That occupy
Consciousness’ space
For brief revelation,
Unbearably true!
Then disappear,
Regardless of efforts
To hold them fast -
Yet they linger
In realization deep,
Serving purpose
With miraculous impact,
This divine transaction,
Spirit’s contact,
Solely for reaching
Into a life’s timeline,
Purely because…
It pleases you
To love me so.

I do not know what's best for me
But that's not what I think,
As thoughts betray
My wicked heart
That lusts for my own way
Through the muddied water
Of recurring illusion
I stray once more,
Unconvinced of my own folly
Except in Spirit mild,
Its power contained in Words
I must seek for correction,
Repenting again and again
Of this consuming idolatry.

PERCEPTION

Excruciating,
The penetrating gaze
Under which I falter,
Dropping clutched hope
From guilty hands
While straining to see
The mark that I miss
And constantly the light,
Mocking my efforts
To perceive clearly,
Shines down its holy white
Intimidation
To expose my failing features.

Unexpected,
The sudden tenderness
Under which I fall,
Receiving love’s warmth
In empty hands
Extended for redemption,
And constantly the light,
Focusing, holding
My attention fast,
Streams down its pure
Compassion
To enlighten me of His
Wholly benign nature.

WHAT COMES NATURAL

That which comes
Naturally to me
Is the very thing
I should avoid,
Masquerading as God-given
It grabs me wholly,
Insisting on its validity,
Persuading me rationally,
Invading my thoughts
With seeming synchronicity.

That which comes
Naturally to me
Is the very thing
I learned to do
While coping with life,
Learning as a child does
To take control, avoid pain,
Escape disappointment,
Take care of myself,
Disregard the loneliness.

That which comes
Naturally to me
Is a resulting thing
And not at heart,
For underneath its fierce emotion
Lies divine intention
Waiting to be discovered,
Patiently knocking
On the door of my conscience,
Ready to unveil the unreal me.

That which comes
Naturally to me
Commands the flesh
To WAR against
The Spirit of the living Christ
And His quiet truth
I am called to walk in
And draw from, yielding to
The absence of demanding rationale…
In hopes of attaining the prefix super-.

GHOST

I'm chasing a ghost
That I can not take hold of
And often can not even see
Elusive, intangible,
Slips through my hands
Like the notion that
She's the real me.

She flickers and motions,
Still now inconsistent
And made up of vapors and wisps,
This creature I long to
Become and embody
Does not utter words
From her lips.

I know her by instinct
And never by logic,
She haunts to the
Core of my soul,
Believing and calling,
Always with Spirit,
But she would not seek to control.

It's fear that reminds me
Why I won't become her,
Still trapped in the
Shell of this skin,
And strangely enough
It's surrender I run from
While holding the best of me in.

In Christ Alone

I have no defense
But Christ alone,
The reason for all that I do,
Who raises me up
To more than I am
And sees that my heart remains true.

I have no footing
But Christ alone,
The rock upon which I must stand,
Who carries the weight
Of my burdens with ease
And holds me within His right hand.

I have no intention
But Christ’s alone,
His Kingdom is all that I see,
‘Til bringing Him glory
Becomes my obsession,
My trust in His goodness complete.


6/10

BETRAYAL

This I do not understand,
How good intention, reaching out,
Is stricken down by accusation,
That which seeks but to uphold
Is torn apart in daft delusion,
That professed as friendship
Now mistaken for derision –
And it feels like broken promise
As betrayal cold and dark
Comes to do its bitter calling,
Sure to miss the trusted mark.

Something Like This...

This Emotion is a Demon
Struggling to be set free
From the prison I have formed
By trapping it inside of me
For fear its power, ever loosed,
Might take control unstoppably
And turn the thinking I depend on
Into liability
In effort to fulfill the flesh
That cries out of its awful need
For give and take between another
Bonding us entirely
‘Til I no more exist as one
Alone with this insanity.




KDC 5/2010

I AM NOT

I am not to be God
But to show Him,
I am just to speak
The truth in love,
I am not to force you
To believe me
But to point you to
The One to trust.
I am not to save you
From your folly
But to pick you up
When you might fall,
I am not to change you,
Though I want to!
I am needful of
A change of mind,
For I am not to think
But let go of me,
When falling for lies
Of such vanity -
And I am not too proud
To need you to show,
But not to force,
Speaking in love
Thus to point me
Into submitting unto
The One we trust.

PRESENCE

When your presence
Finds existence
I am swallowed,
Taken up
In overwhelming
Understanding
Of the smallness
Of my love
Compared with
You who speak
Creation
And surround
All that we see
With power endless
In compassion
Never ceasing
But to BE.

IT

I looked for it,
But found it gone -
Funny how it took so long
To faith avow
And make response
Without anticipation.

I felt it there
In younger times,
Adopted it as ever mine
Until without
Was awkward more
Than being in its presence.

I miss it some,
For hinged on such
Was in myself a measured trust
But nonetheless
The safety there
Was never to fulfill.

I do not know
Quite how to feel
Without the constant need to heal
The sordid wounds
That taught me fear
I think I’ll live without.



KDC 4/2010

The Wisdom of Oswald

"You cannot have a moral vacation and remain moral, nor can you have a spiritual holiday and remain spiritual."

Allowance

The good Lord, He gives
And allows to be taken
The things we believe to have earned –
For nothing in this life
Can wake up and shake us
More than a tide that has turned
To reveal that the gift
Became more than the giver
When viewed within light of our need,
Presuming that we know
What He could do better
To quench our inherited greed.

LINES

THE LINES ARE BLURRED
AND IN BETWEEN
THE SMEARED REMAINS
OF WHAT HAS BEEN
AS TIME ALLOWS TO HEAL
OPEN WOUNDS,
THAT WE MIGHT FEEL.

THE LINES WERE DRAWN
SO LONG AGO
BEFORE WE WERE
SUPPOSED TO KNOW
THAT HURT IS NOT THE END
WHEN WE'RE
WRAPPED INSIDE DEFENSE.

THE LINES OF FACES
DEEPER GROW
AS WE TAKE HOLD
OF LETTING GO
TO FIND THE LIGHT OF HOPE
SHOWING HOW
TO LIVE BEYOND TO COPE.

MORE, AGAIN

More, again,
Persistent mess,
Human walls
Put up against…
My way, yours,
In between -
Resolution’s
Rarely clean.

More, again,
Left behind,
Dirty remnants
Over time…
My scars, yours,
Unforgotten –
Conflict all
Along begotten.

More, again,
Much undesired,
Peace remains
Though uninspired…
My soul, yours,
The one escape -
A world away
For which we wait.

MATTERS

It no longer matters,
The how or the why,
The fault of whom,
The wasted time,
Nor does it seem
To matter now
The sum of damage
Too profound…
The only thing
That I can see
That makes a difference
Is that we
Don’t allow it to matter,
The how or the why,
The fault of whom,
The wasted time,
The fear we hide.

ILLUSION

ALL CONTROL IS ILLUSION

YOU HAVE NO CONTROL

THERE IS NO CONTROLLING THE OUTCOMES

CONTROL IS LOGICALLY IMPOSSIBLE

YOU ONLY THINK YOU CONTROL

BUT YOU DON'T, IT IS A LIE

YOU HAVE BELIEVED A LIE

IF YOU THINK YOU ARE IN CONTROL

OF
A N Y T H I N G
A T
A L L

Half-Hearted

Here's the thing that keeps striking me solidly,
Over and over again as I grow and observe,
Striving to be the spiritual me,
The one that knows and honors truth,
And not the her that constantly lusts
For things to feed her self,
Just to feed her desires,
To fill the gaping hole that He left
On purpose so that He and only He
Could come and fill it with His Spirit.

Here's the thing I mention because of its nature,
Subtle and insidious, begging common practice
While posing as benign status quo,
Affecting our every decision and motive,
Governing our conscientious lifestyle,
And that is the amount of our heart
That is invested in God's will for us,
And the resulting amount of LIFE that we
Devote to His calling and give to Him
Sacrificially with no expectation save His pleasure.

Are you whole-heartedly His, with every fiber
Of your being guided by His hand and
Seeking His truth for us who He created
With purpose, not to please our selfs
But to please Him and thus each other,
Bathed in truth and light and love to
Shine on the world altruistic intent,
Seeking better for us all with no regard
For satisfying lusts that leave hungry the
Gaping soul that can only be filled as
We learn not to be HALF-HEARTED.

FORSAKEN IDENTITY

In the case of forsaken identity,
We are not who we once believed,
Nor do we have the right to know
The future of outcomes once controlled;
Instead, there lies a troubling void
In place of refuge mind-employed
To cope with what we might incur
As in the past when being hurt
And finding no room left to run,
Looked for reason where there’s none,
Concluding that we couldn’t trust
A soul to love forever, thus
We learned to keep another plan
In store in case we had the chance
To try and find solution to
The loneliness we always knew
While in the form of self assumed.

Inside Out

So much damage from life before,
Leaves me searching for ever more,
Creating patterns of response,
That leave me in a pool of want,
Until I find the source of life
And all that ever there is,
To dwell on what He means to us
And what He suffered to give,
‘Til when I come beside His power
I know there is no doubt
That He is all I need to see
The rest is INSIDE OUT.

KDC 1/10