23 September 2011

slow and marching letters

How is it that it's always new?
Is it always speaking?
Alive?
Am I so forgetful?
              unobservant?
              small & finite?
Is it new?
Am I new and so
I hear it different?
Does his tone change upon my next opening?
Did he grow the words while I slept?

This book, this book
the word
a word
Christ, the word
Messiah, Emmanuel
God with us, word with us,
among us, piercing us, dividing us,
healing us, washing us.
O, sword, Spirit's sword,
O, water
O, bread
           O, Christ.

Now I sit, I stop, I open, I pray, I train my eyes and ears to run back and forth across these thin & stoic pages. I force myself to sit & wait. For anything?
For nothing?
Hello?

Sit & wait impatient, unbelieving (but I've seen it before)
Drop the seed & cover with dirt:
And miracle of miracles, by the time I'm mad
just as I've forgotten & called them dead
a leaf unbends itself, 
pushing up the dirt.

And sword
And water
And bread
O seed of life.
Seed of Christ
in my tilled up heart
I wait
I wait on you.

From shriveled marching letters
in worn and distant heart
Life springs new
New and new

How is it that it's always new?