What do I have to give to the other
what to offer my sister, my brother?
my self, surely
my faith, purely
my ears to hear
my heart to learn;
my soul to discern
our being in Christ
our journeying in Christ
the Christ reflected
in one another.
Jesus Bread
Angel bread
Manna
Fiery coal
Consuming Love
Jesus Bread
The rainbow speaks
with refracted light,
a beauty passing sight
announcing itself without our bidding,
interrupting our journey where’re we’re heading.
May I never lose the Proustian gift of rainbow thought
following its own drift, metamorphosis in time.
Perfectly still, your beauty locked away within folded wings
I thought at first you were a black leaf blown in from the cold
but no, early March butterfly
maybe you crept from you chrysallis
in some ledge that caught a day’s sunlight.
Now you have been stranded in prayer
for days on our chancel step,
Maybe for you this is where
you make your journey from time to eternity.
your first and last resting place,
your glory hidden,
undisclosed.
.Hidden
We look for God
in the wrong place
so never see his face;
yet the kind heart
will play its part
with grace
and what is hidden to the mind
will yet be known to humankind.
Some birds don’t know how to jazz
like the cuckoo –
stuck they are with a note or two at intervals;
others are nature’s great improvisers,
at rest on branch or twig their spirit soars in song,
wheeling and turning with grace.
Strange it is, that those who trouble with the winds
are not the greatest jazz artists;
their skill is found in flight.
But songsters of the wood – there are many –
explore the art of variation,
while in our gardens blackbird and thrush
extrapolate their melodies.
Yet dear to me is the robin’s sweet song,
gracing winter’s dark days
and above all the lark,
spinning its burblings on high.
By these great jazzsters has my heart been taught
that truly, beauty springeth out of naught !
[ the last line is a quote from “All my hope on God is founded” by Robert Bridges ]
If I could pray for Syria
my tears would never cease
as it is, my cheeks are dry
because
I don’t know how to begin.
I wonder did the sad old gentleman
At the last,
Having despaired of faith for years
And entering the final gloom
Suddenly recall what he had written years before
Dropping gently into his failing mind
Like dews from heaven
his word to us
and God’s word to him,
Nimrod
Lover of God
And threader of melody
in parts,
pointing to heaven
and harmony of hearts;
you knew how beauty comes,
in art and craft is shown
cannot be captured yet
in music is most justly known.
Now that pollution’s mask has cleared away
partly for an instant
we see the work of thy fingers,
the multitude of stars;
O that within, these fingers might be working still,
Moulding, reshaping
With tenderness refiguring
What we are
And what we might be.
Little woodlouse
Crawling around
in quite the wrong place indoors;
how impatient you are to get on !
I must have transplanted you
to join the seeds I am sowing.
So now out you go,
onto the outside gravel
quite a shock to your system
landing with a bump.
But after all,
no living thing can
take a straightforward life
for granted.
( with apologies to Robert Burns )
