Tag: poetry

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The Lingering God

I wonder if you’ve met this God St. Francis knows. A God who isn’t tapping his fingers, asking you to hurry it up. A God who lingers, who kneels, who adores. A God who is prejudiced in your favor.

I think God might be a little prejudiced.
For once He asked me to join Him on a walk 
through this world,

and we gazed into every heart on this earth,
and I noticed He lingered a bit longer
before any face that was
weeping,

and before any eyes that were
laughing.

And sometimes when we passed 
a soul in worship

God too would kneel
down.

I have come to learn: God
adores His
creation.
                                                                             {St. Francis of Assisi}
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Wendell Berry, Sabbaths 2007

I’ve been pondering how, contrary to our persistent beliefs, nothing is wasted or forever ruined. There’s always hope. There’s always redemption. This really does seem to be at the core of what it means to live under God – rather than attempting to live as God.

A year or so ago, two friends gave me a limited, hand-printed edition of one of Wendell Berry’s poems. It sits immediately in front of me as I type. It watches over me as a I write. It watches over me as I prepare sermons. Berry’s words remind me of something important for my life as a pastor and a writer, a father and a friend.

I go by a field where once
I cultivated a few poor crops.
It is now covered with young trees, 
for the forest that belongs here
has come back and reclaimed its own.
And I think of all the effort 
I have wasted and all the time,
and of how much joy I took 
in that failed work and how much
it taught me. For in so failing
I learned something of my place,
something of myself, and now
I welcome back the trees.

Wendell Berry
Sabbaths 2007, no. 9

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The Saturday Between

On this day of stone-silence,
We sit fixed in the Saturday between.
Between tears and joy.
Between poverty and plenty.
Between ruin and triumph.
Between despair and delight.
Between forgotten and welcomed.
Between fearful and joyful.
Between war and war no more.
Between dark and light.
Between gloom and glory.
Between tears and laughter.
Between death. And life.
We sit fixed, riveted, in this Saturday between.

And this moment
Casts a pale, hallow light
Over the Long Saturday,
The many days
Where the world waits. Between.

But between is not the end, never is.
It is only between.

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Shalom

sirens wail
mother sobs
iron clinks
Shalom

stomach gnawing
nightmare haunting
refugee slumping
Shalom

tires squeal
dad disappears
again, again
Shalom

moonless night
sunless soul
forever alone
Shalom

violence
poverty
anarchy
here

goodness
well-being
feasting
everywhere

Shalom.

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