What if the story
I’d been telling
Myself
All this time
Wasn’t true
What if I survived
By pretending
I wasn’t
Real
What if I buried
Truth
Like a dog
With a bone
Tag: ancestors
For Self Avowed Practicing Presbyterians
Trigger warning for stupid church politics.
I apologize for this small departure into the politics of church abuse to rant about shenanigans in a church I no longer claim, but apparently haven’t gotten free from. This lovely blog entry got to me this morning, when I should have been doing something else — which is maybe one of those signs it’s still an abusive relationship for me. This is a slightly expanded version of my comment there.
I’m a Calvinist by birthright, for better or worse. My copy of his Institutes has my mother’s maiden name in it. I was baptized Christian Reformed, for those of you who know what that is. Confirmed and ordained an elder in the Presbyterian Church (USA). I came out as queer and later trans while an active member of a PCUSA congregation.
Invocation
Starting over
Ashes warm
Smoke lingers in my hair
Begin again
Fresh breeze blowing
Clouds and trees in motion
Walk the land
Collect more tinder
Preparation must be made
Ready.
What a year 2013 has been
in the last hours of this year
I’ve been reflecting n talking
2 those close n dear 2 me
around ministry, family bio n extended
n my place in the world…1thing I know is that
thru everything
the good the bad n even the real real ugly
that transpired in my life
and on my journey in 2013
I never lost my Praise…
Continue reading “Ready.”
We Gather
by Louis Mitchell
We gather to remember
Your vibrant light & your soaring laughter
We gather to remember
The hands you held & lives you touched
We gather to remember
Your uncommon tenderness & your unwavering strength
We gather to remember
The sunrises that we greeted in revelry & the sunsets that we christened with our tears.
Breathing
We cannot be who we are,
we cannot become who we are intended to become,
without breathing properly.
Nothing here
to see me,
feel me.
Nothing here
to bear witness
to evolutions.
Nothing here
but breath
and spirit.
Emptiness.
Awareness of self.
Weariness and limitation.
Small and tired.
The Quiet
The statistics
take an accounting
but
without our spirits
remind us of possibilities
lost.
The stories
try to remember
but
without your touch
remind us of the distance
untranslated.
The silences
pretend to listen
but
without keeping company
remind us of the loneliness
gathering.
Continue reading “The Quiet”
In the Night
Who
comes
to you
in the night?
The living
or the dead?
Who holds you close?
These reports
can’t hold
the lives
of those we’ve lost.
Not like a broken heart.
Agape: For My Elders
Know What was Born(e) here.
Love.
Hold on to what you know.
Life.
Follow your dreams.
Speak of your visions.
Your children are alive
and fighting
to survive.
Blessed be the name of the Lorde
Audre Lorde passed over on my 21st birthday and I have long felt an affinity for her work. Her birthday, February 18, is always a great time to revisit her words and work to see what most resonates now.
There are many kinds of power, used and unused, acknowledged or OtherWise.(emphasis mine)
To Be OtherWise 