Pruning Burning Bushes - in Relief: A Quarterly Christian Expression

Issue 2.4 of Relief: A Quarterly Christian Expression came today in the mail, and in it, my first published poem. Look at me, I'm a poet. Ah ah ah.

Pruning Burning Bushes


I am over-pruning burning bushes
that border my front porch on Morgan,
cutting back two-thirds of growth
to trigger recovery from the trunk up.
Horticulturalists wince as I saw
through oldest limbs and keep going –
the shrubs are old, nothing new is budding.

Someone buzzed them back before we bought
the house, topped and tipped instead of using
crown reduction. There are a dozen leaves left,
tiny offshoots triggered - bursts of green
from long dead, empty stems. My trimming

is traumatic. The branches bend, sustained
so long by suckers sprouted in haste. Here I am,
sighing, sweating, fists on hips, the pruners
lost in the grass. The landscape breathes.
There is no exchange, no return in trauma –
either slowly hollow, heartwood rotting outward,
or grow from green into a fiery blaze in autumn.

I pick the pruners off the earth, dust
my aching hands and look for where
the calluses will form.

Hymn of Skin

Hymn of Skin

*POOF!*

The Merciful Gardener

The Merciful Gardener
“Come, see a man who told me
everything I ever did.” – John 4:29

It feels as if I’ve been buried here
forever, dehydrated, covered in dirt,

a crocus stagnant and frozen with scales
wrapped tight and tunic pointing skyward

waiting for signs of spring. And now
water trickles down, sunbeams warm the soil,

I can feel myself changing, breaking!
All I’ve ever done was wait and rot.

And then he – And then he showed me –
I am compelled to tell, can’t help but bloom –

Do you see how he knew just what I needed?
Do you see how he knew what I could do?

Snow in Auburn

Snow in Auburn


More than once I have heard
your frosty winter promise whispered,

the fire crackle of your laughter,
felt your sorrow falling with the snap

of heavy branches in the woods.
Eternity, you roar so loud

it wakes me from my sleep; I stand
by the slamming screen door and stare,

wind sudden, deliberate, constant,
each gust stirring the empty field.

Though annuals stiffen, roses brown,
and hostas wilt, dawn will sigh

over blackness. I will ascertain answers
from each snowflake in six feet of snow.

Hope

It has been a crazy week around A-town. The returning theme, however, has been hope. Put your hope in the Lord - nothing else can save, nothing else can be counted on, nothing else is permanent or solid or steadfast or true. God insists in his word that we have a hope and a future in Him. This is the hope that I have, the joy that carries me through darkness, the faith that lifts me out of anxiety and worry.

My prayers go out to the family who grieves the loss of a young woman, to the young ladies who called her friend, to the campus community silenced by tragedy, to the country choking on anxiety and fear over what the future holds. Give us peace, Lord. Comfort our trembling hearts. Ease the lines of worry and restore hope. Restore hope.

Defenseless

Defenseless
Put on the full armor of God…


You loosened your belt,
let truth slide to the floor.
You slipped off your sweater,
threw it in the corner.
Your feet were bare and prone to slip,
legs uneasy, head dizzy...
What if you’d been wearing a helmet?
What if you had had a sword
to wave at that demon who lured
you toward the window,
who promised it would be best
this way, to kick out the screen,
to feel the cold air from seven floors up,
your blonde hair streaming in the wind?
What if you had known your opponent
wanted it this way, to beat you
in the battle? You had no armor,
no defense against the quiet, sudden
decision to leap. Tank top, underwear,
bare arms and legs sailing
among all of the other small,
unique, beautiful, irreplaceable
snowflakes in the dark winter night.


“Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against the authorities, but against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore, put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.”

Consider the Sparrows

Consider the Sparrows


So many come, Dad hides behind a blind
with birdshot and a rifle in the grain field.
They scatter, land, scatter, land. I hear them
chirping through the boom, watch their flight
ripple like cotton sheets lifted in the wind.

A sparrow’s egg on concrete - the yolk
seeping through the fracture - makes me stop
to look from broken shell to fretting maple
branches above for the mother who chirrups
in her nest, twitching, head tilted, eyes blinking.

This too shall pass, small sparrow. Tomorrow
I will walk beneath your bed just like today,
the ruined egg in smaller fragments, or vanished
and you will scavenge the earth, fly overhead,
the sky heavy with you and your flock,

who will not know me from any other beast
below. I will regard you as just another
house sparrow, aggressive attacker
who captures bluebirds in their nestboxes,
descends on golden fields of grain.