These poems were written as a final project for a class called the Power of My Word. Power of My Word was the second to last pre-req before I can begin practioner studies through Amazing Grace, a church of Religious Science (not the same as scientology). I grew up in the Episcopal church, and it was an awesome place to grow up. I am not like my recovery Catholic friends. I don't wake up in a cold sweat freaking out about all the things I am doing to write my one way ticket to hell. But I did hit a point with the Episcopal church, where service didn't feel the same. I began to become numb. The words that held so much value to me as a kid lost some of their magic and all those question that I never really felt got answered...well they were still there for me.
Fast forward several years. I found myself at the Center for Spiritual Living. This was my first introduction to Religious Science and after that one service it took me 6 months before I was ready to go back. I like it. It was powerful, but it was also kind of overwhelming. So over the last few years I have been easing my way into the church and into a deeped understanding of the teachings of Ernest Holmes. One thing I love, is that I am encouraged to question, to find my own answers, to wrestle with what I believe. These poems are expressions of what thoughts I've been working through lately.
When I told my mother I was going to be a practitioner
When I told my mother I was going to be a practitioner
she said of what?
and I answered Religious Science
and there was a silence
that filled the spaces between us like a canyon,
a breath that rattled days, whole seasons
of inhale and exhale
a stillness etched in rock and color
river water and wind,
with a sky on time lapse,
night and day of slow dancing clouds
gathering and releasing rain
for the simple gentle beauty
of completing another cycle
before she asked:
But what does that mean?
I’m going to be a professional prayer
I told her.
And there was again the loving silence
of a parent whose child
has just expressed an improbable dream
like being the first Black American Queen of England
or a democratic president of the NRA.
No one wants to say
No Sweetheart, you can’t fly with paper wings,
on the off chance that just this once
they will lift and bend beyond law
to the higher nature of children’s dreams
but no one wants
to be the parent that didn’t explain gravity well enough
to keep their child from leaping from the roof.
I had seen this look before,
the measured belief tempered with a healthy skepticism,
a mommy pragmatism
that is always followed up with gentle reminders
about mortgages to pay and how health insurance
is really a great thing to have.
I felt the weight of doubt then,
What is this thing I have been called to do?
Do I even understand it enough to achieve it?
The intersection of mind and spirit,
law, word, and speaking truth into experience.
I imagine myself like Oprah
praying forth new cars and dream vacations,
the squeal of elation,
the jumping up and down
of my own captive audience,
or a Houdini
disappearing need
with flashy hand claps and tambourines.
I might need a theme song
and a roving band of musicians,
at minimum a chorus of Hallelujah girls
to punctuate the miracle
of every shimmering, gold star treatment.
But what happens is very quiet.
Within the canyons of gentle space surrounding
the field of my dream,
the No is carefully withheld
a deep swirling measure of glitter swells
with the in breath
before my mother tells me:
Well that’s cool.
If you blinked
you might have missed it,
but I didn’t.
Another answered prayer to check off the list.
On Praying
There is a part of me that is afraid of getting what I really want. Call it superstition. Knit evil eye covers and toss salt over left shoulder. Genies are never to be trusted. And wishes, carefully meted. No one wants the Midas touch, or to pray for rain from drought only to call in floods. And yet there is a want in me, a river I shade with palm fronds to muffle the rapids, to make it look smaller than it really is. But this water is deep within me and never still, a rushing of please and yes. I don’t want to want too much, don’t want my need to run naked through the streets flashing all my insecurities. To pray is to admit to longing. I would rather these unpleasantries be handled discreetly in back alley way deals with devils and demigods, with contractual agreements that mitigate things like miracles, place reasonable limits to what you can expect so that no one can say you didn’t know what you were getting. I’m not sure anymore if I am more afraid to be surprised by my good or by my bad, it is the never knowing that haunts me. The best surprise is no surprise, but that is the one that never shows up. Do I wade now? Baptize myself in the truth of what is missing then call on sun to dry me on the shores when I am made new and ready to receive? Or do I stay in the forest of my discontent another season? Place my bets on just enough to get by.
Some thoughts on God
How I wish you were a vending machine
filled with Tahitian vacations and diamond chokers,
a huggable life-sized Snuggle bear
that would pull me into your embrace on bad days
or better yet, a magical remote control to stop and pause
rewind and recreate my life until it is just right,
movie perfect and Hollywood happy ending worthy.
But you are God with a capital G
and I neither understand you
nor feel your hand in mine.
I might have seen you before,
from the corner of my eye,
the flint of you,
felt the warmth of your breath
at the nape of my neck.
You have made the hair there raise up in surprise,
But every time I turn to see you
You are not where I think you will be.
I am tired of hide and seek.
You win.
Ollie Ollie Oxen free,
Come out and explain to me
What this all means,
This messy hodge podge of miracles and disease,
Of free will and destiny
Can you just tell me
PLEASE
I promise I won’t be pissed
At the spoiler.
The Release
Letting go is the hardest part,
I think I am,
but hands and mind and heart are sticky with want
gooey with greed for things un-promised.
I can name and claim
with the best of them,
stand in knowing and gratitude abundant,
but I don’t want my prayers to disappear.
Once they’re out of eye sight
I get nervous,
like a babysitter with roving toddlers.
There are sockets to stick fingers in,
fragile plants to knock over.
Every time I close my eyes
I know my prayers are
falling down stairs or wandering into traffic,
swallowing bleach and playing with matches.
I need to gather them back to me
to make sure they’re okay
then I might venture to send them out again
when they are a little older
a bit more developed.
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