To be clear, God,
When I say “I am yours”
What I really mean is this:

“I am as much yours as I am able to be.
And there’s something, yes, something in me
That wants to be wholly yours.”

For these three words spring up in me unbidden
As aspiration, as expression of a longing
Too deep and too complex to understand or deny.

***

Yet I am holding back.
I say the words beneath my breath,
Awkward, tentative (“I am… yours?”)

What do they even mean?
Do I tell the truth with them?
Where are they leading?

I used to think their meaning was clear
And their destination unquestionably desirable
(By nature yours, I choose to be yours)

***

But there was darkness hidden in their light
Subtle self-loathing in their love
And in the appearance of choice there was no choice at all.

For if your only dream for me was to be “yours”
Because to want to be myself was both selfish and dangerous
Then my life as an empty vessel was all destiny no decision.

But that was many years and many tears ago
And I was wrong, so wrong
About me and about you.

***

You gave me my freedom
When I didn’t know it was mine to have or desire
And when I begged to be shown your will, you asked me

“What is it that you want?”
So that step by slow and painful step
I came into my own.

And now I find that in seeking to be like you
I have turned out to be myself
And that this was your dream all along.

***

Now I find (irony of ironies)
That opening to my uncertainty about your existence
Also opens inside me a fresh wellspring of desire to surrender

Because – though it makes no rational sense –
A God who is so wholly unfazed by my doubt and by my reticence
(Since you desire my freedom and flourishing more than I)

This is a God to whom I want to say yes:
You who say yes and yes and yes over me and all my noes,
You who willingly wait till I am happy that my yes is whole.

***

So I know you will lean close to catch these whispered words
As they catch in my throat:
“I am yours.”

I know you hear and treasure the hidden truth
Resonating through them as an unfolding story:
“It is because I am becoming mine that I can freely choose to be yours.”

And I imagine I hear an echo of your whispered response:
“Beloved, if you choose to be freely and fully mine
Let it be because I delight to be freely and fully yours.”

And so gratitude grows up like a rose among the thorns.

This is all there is.
This one rose.

This one sunlit window seat.
This one painted mug filled with steaming coffee.
This one warm moment to savour.

Look around and all is barbed and spiny.
The light does not reach, the heat does not penetrate.
The coffee grows cold.
The pottery is brittle and will one day break.
This one rose, this one moment, is not enough.

But turn back, and this is all there is.
This one precious moment is all
there
is.

This one fragrant rose still grows up,
Beautiful among thorns.

[February 2012, first posted here]

Gather me, Spirit.
Gather me into this moment
an hour of quiet and solitude
an hour to set aside my phone
and the addictive scrolling search for
connection or meaning or distraction.
Here I am.

Gather me, Spirit.
Gather me from my worries,
from the lists and loose ends
that are waiting for me when I wake
and from my need for them
to make me feel important and worthwhile.
What good is it
if a woman gains the whole world
but loses her soul?
Here I am.

Gather me, Spirit,
as I choose to be gathered
and to gather myself –
from the far-flung corners
where I am wandering, lost,
having given myself away
too much, too soon,
to busy battles
that are not mine to fight.
Here I am.

Kind Spirit,
gather me kindly.
Speak softly to my fear
that nothing holds together;
disaster waits darkly in the wings
and if I stop spinning for one moment
everything will finally fall apart.
Speak softly to my fear
that if for once I stop wandering
and quietly come home
I will find nothing
but a hollow, empty shell.

Wise Spirit,
gather me wisely,
you who know me
better than I know myself.

I do what I can:
I come, I sit, I turn off the screens.
I give my time, my attention,
as much of my heart, mind, soul
as I know, as I can.
I dare to believe in my substance and yours.
I dare to be found.

Please do what I cannot:
Gather me into the shape
that has always been mine
and the shape I can become.
Gather me to you,
the centre that holds.
I am here.
I am yours.

Hear this.
I don’t care
whether or not
you believe in me.

I believe in you.

I don’t need you to protect
my fragile sense of self
by defending me,
by ensuring I am the answer
to every question,
by twisting and distorting your precious soul
to accommodate this little image of me
that you’ve created but outgrown.

I am not small
and I don’t need you
to play small
or play safe for me.

Can’t you sense
that I am always
beyond,
outside,
and calling you
to join me there?

Can’t you feel
this unstoppable force
carrying you towards
a love so powerful
that it is breaking your brittle heart
and remaking it
as a river?

Can’t you see
that I don’t exist
for me,
but always for you,
always for the other,
and that you are just like me?

So please.
Let go.
Stop fighting
and give in to the mighty flow of reality
which is love.

Let whatever is
be.
Let your own beloved self
be.
Whether or not you believe I am
Let me be
for
you.

Let me be
in you.

Let me
believe
in you.

 

[Find the first poem, Confessions, here.]

Never underestimate the power of a question.
Don’t dismiss it as mere herald to the all-powerful answer,
Or despise its uncertainty as feeble or unsafe.

A good question is full of life.
It bursts with the curiosity and promise of undiscovered worlds.
Its key turns the lock of never-opened doors.

So don’t let your own question spill heedlessly from your mouth.
Instead, turn it,
Like a hard toffee between tongue and teeth.
Savour, smooth and hone it.

Hold and admire it, a wild bird balanced on your faltering hand,
And when you release it to another’s charge,
Be ready for it to return to you unfamiliar,
Changed beyond recognition,
And pulling in directions you did not predict or desire.

Learn to listen,
Just listen,
And to let answers be extended questions.

Likewise, when another’s question comes to you,
Don’t push it away if an answer does not spring instantly, comfortingly, to mind;
For this question’s gift was fashioned in the ferment of someone else’s strange soul.

A question should be given space
To roam through forgotten rooms.
Perhaps at first it will seem to bounce like a discarded rubber ball,
Its lonely thud echoing against the emptiness of abandoned space,
Bareness of untrodden floorboards.

But refrain from picking it up to thrust again into a cosy pocket,
And its ricochet will knock open closets,
spill chests,
split windows,
Drawing invisible arcs to connect random points,
Until the tangle of lines
Suddenly
Reveals a picture.

This picture you may pick up
And wonderingly exhibit,
Or carefully fold to store in your heart’s chest.

But the question?
Let the question bound on…

 

(Saturday 29^th December 2012)

I’ve decided I want to unearth some of my older poems [from the archives] and share them with you now and then here – either from the archives of my previous blog Learning to Savour or from even deeper archives in my computer or journals. This is the first installment.

Colourful stairs to…? (Cuba 2018)