Cara Colleen

Shooting Star

I watch from afar
The bright shooting star
Streaming across the night,
Heart in my throat,
I’m watching it float
With brilliantly flaming light.

This time I know,
Although I’ve been slow,
That I have to let it fly free.
No catching its tail
(It really is frail),
But I trust Creator to see.

I see the star climb
Through distance and time
And prayerfully give it to Him.
He’ll catch every tear,
Keep drawing it near
As all shooting stars fade and dim.

He knows all star names,
Breathes new star flames
Setting them on the right course.
So I am content
To trust His intent
To draw all stars back to His Source.

Whose I Am

I have a lot of anger inside me—
Anger that my bible-quoting father could parade his religion to the world,
Then abuse his family behind closed doors,
Anger that an idyllic life could be shattered by a man
Who didn’t believe in committed, unconditional love or faithfulness,
Anger that my children have been torn from me
…Not once, but three times,
Anger that my character and motherhood have been libeled and
Battered continuously for more than twelve years.

The judgement is a heavy load, whether judging or being judged.
It is an unjust world that labels the victim as the perpetrator.
We all stand guilty.
It is only mercy—God’s mercy—that sustains.
So much anger remains.
The grief of life lost (my life!)
Enrages me by the injustice of it all.

…Yet I am but clay.
The broken shards, the crushing into dust,
The mud on the spinning wheel, the darkness of the hot kiln—
All wring the sorrows of brokenness, confusion, blind unknowing.
The tears flow like many-colored glazes.
I cannot see their effect, but the Potter knows.
He knew me while I was yet unformed in my mother’s womb.
Before a word is on my tongue… He knows.

Only He can take the burden of my anger,
The rage at the injustice of my life,
The grief that twists my soul in knots…
I do not even know how to give,
To let go of this lifetime long emotion.
Anger has been my companion in many forms
From stubborn stillness to screaming rage,
But I am tired.

When I am assassinated again by another criticism, another assumption,
When someone presumes my motives without knowing my heart,
My companion shakes me from weary slumber,
Tries to stir up the embers of fires long quenched and scattered,
And I AM angry for a while…

Till I remember mercy poured out,
Grace bestowed, forgiveness undeserved…
I am the bondslave of One who bought me with Eternal Love.
My right to hold onto anger is gone now;
My right to vindication is forsworn;
Because the Potter can do as He pleases
To form the image of Himself in His vessels.

Ode To A Winter Night

Cold winter night sky, you draw me
Up into the crystal clarity that seems
So far from where I am on the inside.
Even when the city lights obscure the stars
With their occasional brilliant glee peeping through,
The blackness between the bare branches
Offers an internal security blanket.
I could stare… all night…
Letting all the knots in my mind unravel
Were it not for the knots in my muscles
Fighting the piercingly chill wind.
I look down shivering,
Pulling my coat and scarf around me tightly,
Still standing still…
My unfocused eyes keep staring mentally upwards
Until I shake myself out of reverie and walk on.
Ah, winter in all its nighttime glory!
I like the bare trees standing nakedly real
Against the shallow unreality of
Man’s pomp and circumstance.
Black sky, you pull me out of the urban crunch
Into the uncluttered infinity of natural creation,
Even if just for a few moments.
I can trudge on smiling again because we touched,
You and I, dark knight sky, and shared
A peace beyond comprehension.

Humble Men

Society is saturated beyond a capacity to absorb
Another drop of Jesus—
Heard the message preached at them over and over
Until inoculation was complete.
Culture repels the efforts of a half-hearted church…
A church convinced of its own worthiness
Painted white panels against a background
Colored by the unrighteousness of the common populace
While blind to the deadness inside the beautiful buildings on
Perfectly manicured properties with trite sayings on signs.

Churches swipe chunks of neighborhood for
Bigger, better displays of perfection
While the hungry community curses the cliques,
Wonders why all the resources don’t
Feed them… emotionally… physically…
Or clothe their naked misery…
Or pay their hopelessly unpaid creditors…
As they wait for eviction on top
Of rejection by the oh-so-holier-than-thou
Who whisper, “Come be like us,”
While they turn up their smug noses and
Throw their guilty stones.

Such behavior makes the realist’s blood boil,
But the humble man isn’t in or out—
Doesn’t fit inside the immaculate,
Makes the unclean uncomfortable in a wistful sort of way.
He is reluctant to reject either “holy” or “profane,”
Finds truth in both realms, friends in both cultures…
Like Jesus who ate with
Simon the Pharisee and Zaccheus the tax-collector,
Who listened equally to
Nicodemus the council ruler and Bartimæus the blind beggar.

Structures, after all, are only artificial human constructs—
Some effort by humanity to box in the incomprehensible.
It’s true of buildings, communities, governments… even “cultures.”
Society may be over-absorbed, Church may be over-arrogant,
But humble men walk among us still…
Like the risen Christ passing through walls
To speak truth to doubting Thomas,
Like Christ speaking mercy to Peter through the “impossible”
As He filled his nets with fish again.

Humble men speak honestly without prejudice and
Society, inoculated against pompous judgments, listens
While the church marches blindly on…
Mostly…
A few wake up even inside the white-washed walls,
Try to take bricks out of barriers,
Learn humility so they, too, can walk through walls to those who need
Someone to relate to rather than someone pointing a finger.
Humble men change society gently from within instead of
Chiseling away from the outside.

untitled

Never quite know what to say these days,
Some wisp of a thought floats by and
I snatch it with desperation like a starving man
Grasping the crumbs under the long-cleared banquet table.
The wealth of easy creativity with words seems a distant dream,
The faint echo of the foghorn heard round the bend downstream.
Now I wrestle with language as Jacob did with the angel.
Sometimes I get what I ask for, but
The cost is almost more than I can bear…

Never quite know what to say these days,
The similes and metaphors with halfway rhymes and rhythms
Fit poorly together in my mind…
Like the pieces of different jigsaw puzzles
Where the colors look oh-so-close-but-not quite…
Whatever the result,
At least I feel better for having tried!