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Commentary
ON THE PATH This early morning poetography is too personal, too idiosyncratic to be GOOD. But, like the dream from which I just awoke, it is TRUE.
The elements don’t go together for anyone outside my head. But for me, they all belong. I know when and where I took the background photo: December 22, 2019, west shore of White Rock Lake. I know what I was thinking then: I was beginning to recognize my judgmentalism, how unreliable I am in whether people are attractive or repulsive to me.
I’m still learning my place on the trail. What I think of—or feel toward—people I encounter on our respective paths is not what’s ultimately important.
THUS, THE TITLE: Wherever we go, See ourselves as sent: Not for our pleasure, but His.
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Commentary
TODAY’S LUNCHTIME THOUGHTS I have been camping out in John 18 for about a week now. This is the chapter where Jesus is arrested and Peter denies him. John switches back and forth between Jesus and Peter. One is protecting others, the other is protecting himself. As I reflect on what Jesus would have me learn from this section, I naturally think about the spheres in which I can and should look out for others: in my family, church, at work, on boards…. Am I being a good shepherd?
HOW ABOUT GOD? The poem pushes on John’s claim that Jesus loved his disciples to the end, and that he did not fail in protecting them. I’m convinced that God does not mind us asking hard questions about his goodness. To do anything less is to not take him seriously. So, is God good?
What I have written in the poem is not a full answer to that question. Hah! But it’s part of the answer. His loving purpose for us is not accomplished in 70 years, or even 100.
(if you are viewing this via email, the website has a recording of this poem and commentary; click the title above)
Commentary
It’s lunchtime as I write this, and I’ve reached chapter five of Fleming Rutledge’s “The Crucifixion.” She is pointing out the active nature of remembering. It’s more than simply recalling. Some of us live only in the space between our eyebrows and the tops of our heads. Our thoughts and actions are estranged. We think, but do not do. Fortunately for us, God isn’t like that. We may not appreciate or understand what He’s doing, but HE IS DOING.
By the way, of poems that I have written, this has come to be one of my favorites. The mindless mumbling of the poor man in the poem is much like my prayers, even the poems of prayer that I write. What I am coming to understand is that God takes my requests more seriously than I do. I expect to be reminded of this often in eternity.
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Commentary
LUNCHTIME POETRY A coworker asked me how I spend my spare time. My answer felt weird and lonely.
Thinking about this some more…. Actually, I DO have friends who enjoy things I enjoy (e.g., hiking, making music, photography), but I have failed to schedule doing these things WITH friends most of my adult life (especially after my 20s). I understand this is a common weakness of men. A counselor told me that men my age generally have very few close friends (he was surprised at the number I DO have). Plenty of acquaintances, sure, but they might as well be strangers. I had that in mind in the second stanza: we are sometimes strangers with those who could be friends, or are friends… close friends.
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Commentary
My progress through John gets slower and slower. I’m to chapter twelve. I may be too hard on the crowd in this poem, but I still wonder how Jesus was feeling as he entered Jerusalem in “triumph,” all the while knowing what awaited him, and what awaited the people he loved….
The next day the large crowd that had come to the feast heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem. So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!” And Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it, just as it is written, “Fear not, daughter of Zion; behold, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey’s colt!” His disciples did not understand these things at first, but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written about him and had been done to him.
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Commentary
I was a wealthy little boy when we were a penniless missionary family in Mexico. Nobody, anywhere had it better than me: food, music, literature, travel, freedom, and love were all mine in abundance.
I haven’t always enjoyed this wealth. It took a few years of rest to recover my perspective.
Tomorrow (December 12, 2022), I start back into a full time job, after almost six years of leisurely freelance work. I think I’m ready for this!
December 27, 2022 Addition: It has been over two weeks now since I began working at the library. It has been slow, as I’m told it always is this time of year. But we have had enough traffic, and I have had enough interactions with library patrons to know that my compassion and empathy will be stretched in this setting. By God’s grace, they’ll grow.
(background image by Emilian Robert Vicol on Pixabay)
(if you are viewing this via email, the website has a recording of this poem and commentary; click the title above
Commentary
These days, whenever there’s a mass shooting, one of the more poignant things afterwards is hearing what the shooter’s parents or siblings have to say. Imagine being Judas Iscariot’s father. John gives us his name. It was Simon Iscariot. Why do we know that name? Did Simon end up following Jesus? I hope so!
Here’s the passage that prompted my flight of imagination (the poem), with a little of its context:
Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” Jesus answered them, “Did I not choose you, the twelve? And yet one of you is a devil.” He spoke of Judas the son of Simon Iscariot, for he, one of the twelve, was going to betray him.
John 6:68-71 ESV
A friend of mine wrote this:
In Mark 3, when Jesus chooses the 12, it casually mentions that Judas would betray him. I always thought that was just a throw-in, some foreboding music to alert us about coming plot twists. But then it hit me: What if Jesus chose Judas BECAUSE he was going to betray Him? And what if he put Judas in charge of the money bag in order to keep him around, since he planned to use him as an important part of orchestrating His own death?
Bruce Beaty
“We’re on the same page,” I said, “Jesus was orchestrating events, not just responding to them. It’s amazing.”
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Commentary
This kind of poem should probably be written by an experienced counselor, or pastor… someone who really knows the condition of hearts. As a poet, I sometimes just throw words against the wall to see if they stick. It’s like verbal spaghetti. How did Photine perceive herself? Why had she gone from man to man? I have an intuition that men and women long for beauty, especially beauty that is tied to the goodness of a person, ultimately THE Person: God.
I am working my way very slowly through the Gospel of John, and typically spend a few days translating and contemplating each chapter. I wrote the above poem the morning that I started into chapter 4. It was an attempt to imagine what the Samaritan woman might have been thinking as she trekked to the well for water. As I think about her situation in the days after I wrote the poem, I begin to second-guess myself. And that’s okay. It’s helpful to use one’s imagination, not for coming to conclusions, but for generating more questions.
A Grammatical Riddle Should the last two lines be “competitors FOR peace of mind,” or “competitors WITH peace of mind”? Even thinking through a question like this one raises other questions: 1) would Photine have said that she already had peace of mind? 2) were there false claimants to her peace of mind? 3) was peace of mind really one of Photine’s felt needs in any case? I don’t think any of us knows the answers. But maybe some day we will.
(background image adapted from a photograph by Fr. Lawrence, OP. He comments, “This painting of Christ and the Samaritan Woman is in the museum at the Dominican priory of Santa Sabina in Rome.”)
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Commentary
I don’t think I’ve ever written a poem that stirred up as much emotion as this one stirs up in me. Today, I began reading a book* about a theologian who wrote extensively about beauty. This is a subject whose extreme importance I sense but cannot intellectually grasp. I thought maybe an introduction to Hans Urs Von Balthasar would help. So far, this book only serves to remind me once again how far my reach exceeds my grasp. I want to understand something essential in God, but the mind he has given me is insufficient for the task.
On the flip side of that frustration, there is this: Our beautiful Savior imprisoned himself in our limitations for a time in order to remove the worst of those limitations forever.
*The Cambridge Companion to Hans Urs Von Balthasar. It looks like I may have better luck with another book once I get my hands on a copy: A Key to Balthasar: Hans Urs von Balthasar on Beauty, Goodness, and Truth by Aidan OP Nichols
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Commentary
My commentary here is in two parts.
My Original Confusion (what I was thinking when I wrote the poem) In Luke 12, the tone of Jesus’ parables switches from reassuring to threatening. Just as the tone changes, Luke throws in a question from Peter:
Peter said, “Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for all?”
Luke 12:41
This is one of those seeming non-sequiturs that makes me sit up and ask, “What’s going on here!?” Luke doesn’t give us Jesus’ answer. Or does he? I don’t know yet. But I know that the passage makes me uncomfortable. Perhaps that’s exactly as it should be.
On Further Reflection (what I wrote on a subsequent day) You know, as I read through Luke 12 again this morning, I am getting a really different picture. How does Jesus describe the master (Himself) who returns at an unexpected hour and finds his servants being good to one another?
Blessed are those servants whom the master finds awake when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will dress himself for service and have them recline at table, and he will come and serve them.
Luke 12:37 ESV
The picture is grim not for those good, Christ-like servants but for those who selfishly look out only for themselves.
Jesus doesn’t ask us to do anything more than He has done… or anything less.
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Commentary
FROM SASSY BOY TO CAKE DECORATOR
In my crawl through Luke, I’m to chapter fifteen. There are several celebrations in this section—and some people who don’t care to celebrate.
This morning, I’m reminded of family devotions at the Hepp house in Puebla. Before heading off to the seminary to teach, Dad would lead us in considering a portion of the Bible. We took turns reading. Then Dad would often say, “Now tell us what you just read in your own words.” If it was my turn, I’d just as often sass, “Why should I do that, given that it’s already in the best possible words?!”
Now, I’m grown up. I’m forever trying to put things in my own words, often in the form of poetry. Much of what I hear, read, or experience gets compressed and squeezed through the piping cone of my poetic mind. I’m like a cake decorator in training, looking for celebrations, looking for something to squeeze decoratively into my own words.
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Commentary
LET LAMENT BE
When we suffer loss, people often reach for metaphor, supposing it will comfort: windows being opened, gold refined of dross. But the view out a window is sometimes bleak, and gold in finished form not always something we would seek.
In plain terms, one of the themes I keep returning to in my poetry is a sense of loss, and how to deal with it. I think of Paul’s claim
12 I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. 13 I can do all this through him who gives me strength.
Philippians 4:12,13
Paul isn’t self-sufficient. Jesus’ provision of strength comes at least partly through fellow believers. The immediate context of Paul’s claim seems to be his thankfulness for financial support from the church at Philippi. But in the rest of the letter to the Philippians, Paul mentions other kinds of support. Notice the words and phrases in chapter 2: encouragement, compassion, comfort, looking to the interests of others, concern, having mercy, sparing from sorrow.
How do we participate in this mutual encouragement? What I’m suggesting in the poem above is that it starts with acknowledging difficulties. In order for any of us to support others in their grieving or loss, we need to first acknowledge grief or loss in ourselves, and let others do the same.
(if you are viewing this via email, the website has a recording of this poem and commentary)(background image by “Semevent” on Pixabay)
Commentary
I treasure friends who can remember what they read and study. They serve well. But how about the rest of us? What’s the silver lining on a forgetful mind? This poem only poses the question, not an answer.
Teaching and Forgetfulness You’d think that by my age, I’d have come to terms with my limitations. But I haven’t, at least not fully. There are three things I ask God for on a regular basis: growth in 1) kindness, 2) discipline, and 3) ability to teach. How can I teach in any traditional sense, when I forget–or have trouble accessing–most of what I learn?! And If I DO remember, I discount my understanding so severely, that it’s practically useless. Nothing has convinced me that sure access to confidently-held facts is anything but a diminishing proposition. In other words, the more I learn, the more I recognize my ignorance!
Salvation and Forgetfulness I often think about what people mean by “salvation.” One element that stands out for me is being rescued from a descent into uselessness, meaninglessness. In the poem above, I allude to my hope that I will ultimately be rescued from this descent, that my Rescuer will restore meaning, explain the utility of current limitations, and set me on an eternally satisfying course. Then, salvation will be complete.
Despite the silly sound effects in my recording of this poem (and on the video version), it’s a serious poem. I promise you, it is!
I get very frustrated with narrow-mindedness, and with people who don’t develop intellectually over their lifetimes. Hopefully it’s obvious that the speaker in this poem has spent his (or her) entire lifetime defending a narrow, and tired point of view.
Looming Open Door This is the sad conclusion of the poem. Opportunity has existed at every point since the speaker’s feet touched the floor to go out and explore. Instead, he considers the world “out there” a threat.
I wrote this poem in anticipation of talking with a fellow poet. One topic I wanted to discuss with him is the vulnerability of baring your breast through revealing words. Is it insanity or inspiration?
We didn’t get to the “inspiration” part, but the “insanity” part was almost funny…. My fellow poet read me one of several poems he has written while struggling with depression. He said that people have phoned him after reading such a poem to say, “I read your poem. Are you okay?” He answers, “Thanks. I’m doing better because I wrote that poem.”
I don’t enjoy listening to people complain. I’ve noticed that other people don’t enjoy listening to me complain. Sometimes, my public complaint is answered by a public rebuke, often with an underlying, “If you were as spiritual as I am, you wouldn’t have such thoughts.”
I don’t know a good workaround. One of my jobs as a poet is to express what’s hard to express. That can include negative thoughts, and problems whose solution hasn’t appeared.
I think most people have at one time or another experienced pain that feels strangely pleasant. For instance, when you find a way — perhaps with a friend’s help — to apply pressure to that knot in your back. For some, there is pleasure in the pain of a red-hot pepper. Well, recently, I have noticed that I am strangely drawn to sadness, and feel a certain pleasure in its presence.
In one of my recent poems, I depicted sadness as a lady who has me sabbath in her house. She feeds me and urges me to “rest and weep.” In the commentary for that poem, I suggested that the process I am in is one of becoming more compassionate. I’m pretty sure that’s fundamentally true.
But in the poem above, I ask if the reason for this phase (I guess it’s a phase) is that I need to fully recognize and steel myself against Satan’s lies. The emotion of sadness helps me better comprehend what I’m looking at in a fallen world. Things are not the way they’re supposed to be, no matter what anyone might say.
When I contemplate oppression, poverty, and death, it’s hard to imagine a future world where these are eradicated. It seems that everywhere I look in this current world, wealth is amassed at someone else’s expense. In a generally prosperous culture, that’s not always easy to see, but I’m learning to connect the dots.
How could it work any other way? I believe it will some day, but how? That’s what the last stanza of my poem addresses. When the all-powerful Creator has restored the world to its original design, then my questions will be answered.
February 26, 2023 Additional Comments:
[This part I barely understand, so bear with me. If it’s too dense, skip to the last paragraph]
In “The Crucifixion,” Fleming Rutledge writes about a “PARADOX: THE KNOWLEDGE OF SIN AS JOYFUL GOOD NEWS.” It’s a startling claim, but Rutledge makes a good case for it. Later in that chapter, she writes the following: “The action of God’s grace precedes our consciousness of sin, so that we perceive the depth of our own participation in sin’s bondage, simultaneously with the recognition of the unconditional love of Christ, which is perfect freedom. We recognize that love, moreover, not from the depths of the hell we were bent on creating for ourselves, but from the perspective of the heaven that God is preparing for us.”
Over the last few years, I have increasingly felt this strange pleasure at recognizing what a wretch I am, not only on the basis of my own sinfulness, but also on the basis of my being PART of a sinful humanity. This strange sensation is something I tried to explain with the attached poem, which I wrote exactly one year ago. The reason that I offered then was surely right in part. But it didn’t fully account for the pleasant sadness.
So, Rutledge—and other wise souls—are helping me understand the pleasant sadness.
[This part may be easier to understand, as it relies on imagination more than on theology.]
I picture myself on a long hike with Jesus. Naturally, the trail we’re on is along the sides of some mountain in the Rockies. We can see forever. Conversation turns to why Jesus had to die for me. It was my sin. He goes into detail. But we keep walking. He’s with me on the trail because he loves me. It’s obvious. He’s telling me these things because he loves me. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be here. He wants me to know that he knows fully well what kind of rotten friend I am. Amazingly, it doesn’t feel like scolding. Through talking with me about my sin, Jesus produces in me a pleasant sadness. He reassures me I need not fear his rejection some day when the truth comes out. He took care of everything. Everything.
Recently, one of my ongoing projects has been peeling back layers of personal, church, and world history in order to better comprehend this world’s fallenness. I felt a certain compulsion about it. I needed to feel sadness about the many insults to God’s purpose and His image in man. I needed to feel sorrow about ways that I participate in those insults.
On a recent Sunday evening, I hit pause on the project. I thought, “Enough of this for now. I’m not feeling the compulsion.”
Was I done with exploring sadness? I don’t think so. It was just a rest. My heart still has chambers of ungodly anger that must be flooded instead with compassion. Like the Pharisees who despised the Lord of the Sabbath, I look for fault with His followers. I treasure offense at His disciples’ trespasses. Like the Pharisees, I need to understand what this means: “I desire mercy, and not sacrifice” (see Matthew 12). Then, perhaps, I will not be so quick to condemn.
SO, WEEP SOME MORE I had just finished writing this poem (and was pretty broken up by the process of writing it) when Susan came in and told me that an old friend — a GOOD and brilliant man — now has Alzheimer’s. My sadness turned to sobbing.
“Now rest, and weep, And rest, and weep, And rest, and weep Some more.”
I can’t help but think that this season in the house of Sadness is what I should expect as a follower of Jesus. It’s on the path to becoming compassionate, like He is compassionate.
He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
Recently, I have written some light and playful poems. So where does this one come from?!
It seems that I have come to the end of a hopeful period. What I have been investigating–in personal, church, and world history–has been dark. It has left me sad, but sad in a hopeful way. I thought that by identifying the source and nature of various evils, I could somehow propose reformation.
I thought that I, through poetic thought and expression, could be a channel of God’s reforming beauty. Maybe I’ll regain that perspective tomorrow. But today, it feels like beauty has been put on hold; it has been tabled for now.
Is this depression talking? I doubt it. It’s probably just reality setting in. Beauty will have its time. But now–at least today–belongs to lament.
ADDENDUM: On my long walk today, I finished listening to a book my counselor assigned: Henri Nouwen’s The Return of the Prodigal Son. The final chapter of that book encourages the reader to consider how he or she might become more like the Father in Jesus’ parable. Well…. In considering that, one thing stands out to me tonight: God the Father takes joy in isolated victories. If He can, is there any reason I cannot as well?
The Title Okay, okay…. I know that “may” should probably be “can.” But that wouldn’t rhyme with “say,” would it?! The title is a reminder that we should make the most of the relationships God gives us in this lifetime.
“Dispatch” Dad was a theologian, writer, and editor. During much of his life, he wrote Bible study courses that were used by people for whom English is a second language. So, he was keenly aware that he needed to practice what he preached as an editor: “Don’t use big words when little words will do.”
This morning, for some reason, this random memory popped in my head. When speaking of killing insects, Dad always used the big word “dispatch” when he could have used the little word “kill.” Why did he do that? I assumed it was a bit of humor. But I never asked him. In itself, this is not an important question. But my failure to ask him points to something that is important….
Uncharted Memories Lately, I have been working through painful memories throughout my life, but especially from the formative childhood years. I’m realizing that my parents tended to not discuss the emotional impact of tragic events. I’m told that wasn’t unusual for people of their generation. But it bled over to me in the way that I interact with loved ones to this very day. Often, I’m not curious — or don’t act on what curiosity I do have — about others’ emotional state. There’s much that I miss of all I could love, lament, or celebrate.
I wrote this partly in response to Mary’s wise and beautiful poem in Luke 1:46-55.
The subject of POWER has been much on my mind, in part because I have been reading Robert Greene’s entertaining but amoral “The 48 Laws of Power.”
I have been thinking about how God-fearers should relate to power. Of all God’s attributes that we can and should reflect, since He made us in His image, this seems to be one of the most dangerous.
[NOTE: I was very intentional with my punctuation, even in introducing ambiguity to the title]
Last night, instead of sleeping, my mind was aswirl with thoughts of trees, vines, fruitfulness, and the relationship of these to imago dei. Too often, I have stopped at noting the object (e.g., the persistent tree) without noting its purpose: fruitfulness, provision, generosity like that of the Creator.
“Be fruitful.” “He is like a tree… that yields its fruit.” “Also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.”
I jotted this down yesterday morning after a sleepless night, one where an admittedly minor ailment was reminding me of what took the lives of my parents. I’d have posted it yesterday, but ran out of time. Now, as I post this, it is Easter.
If you see ambivalence, mixed with annoyance, mixed with underlying hope, you see well. Hopefully, my reading of the poem (above) will reveal the negative side of my feelings.
The background photo is one I took up in the mountains last year on a similar morning, after a similar night.
Here is an exchange I had with a concerned friend, when he asked about the ailment. After describing the ailment, I wrote:
So, the poem was written out of fear and mild exhaustion, but with the realization that I was not acting in the full hope that often moves me. It’s full of double meaning.
Darol responded:
Yes, the middle of the night amplifies our fears and disappointments. I tell myself that the daylight will scatter them, and that they will end forever in that eternal morning.
This scene, and the words I attached to it, is extremely moving to me. I guess that by my age, there is a lifetime of grief that will not go away in the short term. As a friend wrote, there are “So many missing springs.” Indeed. I can never see the daffodils, wild violets, and other spring flowers without thinking of my Mom. Ever since 2006, they have bloomed without her.
The scene is what I saw when I crossed the bridge where Rush Creek enters White Rock Lake. A few weeks before, I had taken the following photo, which I then captioned “Grow Old Along With Me” (an allusion to Dad’s favorite poem, Rabbi Ben Ezra by Robert Browning:
I’ll be hard-pressed to fully explain this one, but let me try by recounting the occasion:
I had been praying for a friend’s father for about a year. He was a brilliant man whose mind and health were failing. My repeated prayer was that God would give him enough clarity of mind and grace to respond in faith to the Savior — if he had not already done so (my friend wasn’t sure). He was on my list of “People I Want to See in Heaven!” God knew all about it.
On Saturday morning, after months in hospice, the father passed away a little before noon. My wife and I heard the sad news shortly after.
A couple of hours later, I was taking my afternoon nap. To help me sleep, I placed a piece of dark, heavy clothing over my face. As I lay there in that artificial darkness, it was as though the sun had gone down. I thought of my friend, and I began to sob. Some of this was fresh grief for my friend. Some was the mounting grief of a lifetime of deaths. I’ve been here before — three years ago, when my own father died.
I thought of how convenient it was that I could press the artificial darkness to my face and express my feelings without alarming my family. How I’d like to stay there, not remove the darkening cloth — now wet — from my face. But this day had many more hours to go.
Yet to Explore
How does the sun relate to the father? How does that sun both create and respond to the reality of “newborn day”? I have been thinking lately about Romans 8, where creation is depicted as groaning as it awaits freedom from corruption at the “the revealing of the sons of God.” That figures in to my inchoate thoughts. Here’s one of those embarrassing things about poetry: I don’t yet know the meaning of my own words, but firmly believe there IS meaning.
This Advent mindset doesn’t come easy for me, but I’m trying…. When I say “Let’s not pretend,” it’s myself I’m talking to. Being a “glass one-fifth full” guy, I frequently gloss over my own disappointments. And I ignore the suffering of others all too easily. But I’m convinced that God will correct this, that God IS correcting this.
It was dark in the living room. My wife and boys had already gone to bed, and I was left alone in the papa chair. By faint light coming from the kitchen, I could see Princess on a blanket we had set for her on the floor. She sat there, as peaceful and dignified as ever, probably purring. Two days before, she had stopped eating altogether, even when Joshua stroked her bony back and tried feeding her from his hand. The tumor in her stomach had won, and now she could barely walk, let alone jump or climb onto the couch.
In the morning, Joshua and Susan would take her to the vet. They’d ask the vet for some locks of her beautiful hair to remember her by. It seemed more appropriate than ashes.
Sitting there in the dark, I thought of how Princess’ well-being had been my responsibility for most of her seventeen years. Under my protection, neither hawks in the trees above nor the bitter cold of winter nights had ever touched her beautiful form. But now…. Now, tears began to stream. “I’m sorry, Princess. There’s nothing I can do for you this time.”
Up to this point in my life, I had never really understood corporate guilt. “Yes,” I could admit — only because good theology demands it — “I somehow share in the sin of Adam and Eve. But slavery and other atrocities? If neither I nor any of my relatives ever committed this or that sin, how can I — why should I — feel any guilt in the matter!”
That’s not what I was thinking about in the darkness of the night.
Looking at Princess across the room, I was sad. That much was clear, especially in the darkness. But then a little window opened. Through my tears, new light came streaming. It was sorrow, an emotion I barely recognize. “Princess,” I wept, “Not only am I unable to help you now, but in a very real — painfully real — sense, I am responsible for all that brought us to this dark night. I am truly sorry!” In that moment, for the first time ever, I was Adam. Once upon a time, God set me over His creation as its protector and provider. But I failed. And now, my Princess, like everything else under my charge, was dying.
A small window opened for me that night. Wisdom whispers, “Don’t let it close!”
Perhaps, in the light of that account, this poem I wrote the following day will make sense:
This is a sad time for many I love. The pain is shared and felt deeply, but need not be without purpose.
The poem was a response to what I observed in myself as I contemplated the tragic drowning of a friend’s 4-year-old son. For over a week, I — along with thousands across the globe — was praying for this child to recover. When God did not grant our prayer, I didn’t know quite what to do with my own response. To act as if I didn’t have disappointment was surely not healthy. Elephants in the rooms I share with ever-present God are silly creatures. Some response — if merely a poem of lament — was necessary.
