Tag / My Soul Feels Lean

by Michael

Poetry for the Day: Writing

Writing by Joyce Rupp

I wait out sluggish days,

empty evenings, mulish

attempts to capture words

hiding themselves

inside the undulating sea

of my mental thesaurus,

not even remotely available

for me to scoot them

onto my fingers and

into necessary revision.

So I wait, and wait,

and wait some more

while I fumble uselessly

with worthless concoctions

until

one early dawn

the tide comes in

and the first word peeks out.

then they all follow,

and like a flock of gulls

I swoop in to snatch

the sea’s latest prey.WIP

by Michael

Poetry For the Weekend

Joyce Rupp’s Greedy for Too Many Things

ravenous for too many things,

even spiritual growth,

greedy to grow without effort,

to have it all, to sit back and bask,

luxuriating in what was never mine

in the first place.

greedy for more time in the day

when I already have

all the time I need.

greedy for companionship

while I ignore the One Companion

always near.

greedy for, oh, so much,

while I miss the chipmunk

chewing on the sunflower seed,

the sound of soft July wind

rustling cottonwood leaves,

the color of azure sky as the sun

rinses morning out of it.

by Michael

Something of Worth

I find that intentionally easing the fast pace of my days is indispensable if a spirit of hope is to be sustained in tough times.  Being overly active and involved in the constant bombardment of social media or other stress-induced activities whittles away my ability to go to the deeper places of life.  Without daily attention to what lies beyond the outer world I can easily get mired in the non-essentials and miss the hidden movement leading to future maturity.

…There awaits something of worth even though I may feel emptied and forsaken, beaten or humbled by loss.

From Joyce Rupp’s My Soul Feels Lean (pg. 87).

by Michael

My Fear of Losing You

Beneath our enduring friendship

the unspoken, latent fear

I never mentioned to you,

that I would lose you

to work, to poor health,

to a faraway move

or something unforeseen.

And then one day I did lose you.

Death sliced you from me

with a condor’s swiftness,

ripped you out of

my fearful grasp without

a moment’s hesitation.

Always death wins

in who gets to keep.

You are gone now

and so is my old fear,

leaving plenty of room

for loneliness and sorrow

but also sufficient space

for the savoring of love,

the one thing Death

could not take from me.

From Joyce Rupp’s My Soul Feels Lean