Fear and Dust: A Hymal for the Wild Vol. 1

I have a new book of poetry coming out. The pdf is available to download now, from http://www.proost.co.uk/fear-and-dust-hymal-wild-vol-1 and the physical books should follow soon after.

A Letter To All Loved Ones

A Letter To All Loved Ones

Dearly Beloved,

Be-Loved and Beheld,

Broken-open and Born-anew

I long for you to heed this truth,

To hold it tightly to your delicate clay facade,

And to know it at the very centre of your being,

To grasp it in the very core of who you are;

The depths beyond which science shares no secrets,

I fitfully long for this word to bleed into your heart,

And plant a truth, a seed, bearing fruit in your understanding of yourself,

You are loved,

Beloved, you are loved,

Beloved,

You are loved, not for your achievements, though they are many,

And you are loved, not for your graciousness and compassion, though they are real also,

You are loved, beloved,

You are loved, not even because you simply, “are”,

The love with which you are loved is beyond quantifying,

And far beyond purport,

You are loved,

Whispered simply, you are loved,

Shouted from mountaintops, you are loved,

You are loved,

Let this truth soak deep into you,

Let it stain your self-respect,

Let it wash clean your notion of grace,

Let it cleanse the areas of your life that you’d rather forget,

You are loved,

Beloved,

I yearn for you to know a fraction of the artisan’s delight,

For you to grasp with unquenchable joy and enchantment, the love which formed you,

And the love which loves you,

For you are loved,

Time does not erode this love,

Disease can neither hinder nor diminish this love,

Guilt and fear and anger and grief and remorse are held by this love,

Not denied or ignored,

But embraced and understood by this love,

The grave shrieks and quakes insight of this love,

And the love knows the cost,

Dearly beloved,

Be-loved and Beheld,

Broken-open and Born-anew,

You are loved,

Beloved, you are loved.

A song of Plate and Cup

a song of plate and cup

there is noise

distractions and distortions

there is complexity

worries and concerns

there are conditions

expectations and stresses

there is fear

of what may be and what might never happen

there are temptations

trials and persistent damaging demands

there is worry

and there is peace

creator and sustainer

pioneer and saviour

give us your peace

held tightly in your love

bear us warmly

strengthen us when shadows lengthen

cultivate in us stability

rooted in your name

rooted in your word

rooted by your voice

give us deep roots

holding us together

keeping us firm

rooting us in our place

rooting us with you

rooted in our centre

help our roots build strong bonds

with the soil and fabric of our lives

strengthen our roots

with the nourishment we need

may our rootedness

interweave our lives together

and keep us ever onward

reaching towards your throne

keep us faithful and persistent

stable in fidelity

keep us creative and flexible

persistent in our searching

may our firm foundations

be yours and yours alone

that our deep entangled roots

would feed our hearts for life

help us to bear witness

to the journey that we take

and as we come to the plate and to the cup

as we have so many times before

feed us once again

with your flesh and with your blood

that plate and cup would root us in your story

rooted in earthly trouble and kingdom glory

build us up to tend your garden

shape our lives to grow for you

for your glory and in your name

to heaven’s son we pray, AMEN.

(c) Tim Watson, 2015

A song of Plate and Cup - a liturgy, used before the Eucharistic prayer, in a service thinking about "rootedness" - sly, unintentional nod to George R. R. Martin in the title!

incarnate

incarnate

In the moments that pass

 it’s easy to forget that each and every second that slips into history found its trajectory in the beginning,

formed and foreseen on a grand scale,

such complexity is beyond the imaginings of everyday moments,

so far beyond comprehension and more immaculately formed than history could ever reason,

stars scratching pockets of light into night’s grey shadow,

fresh rains filled with static scent,

bird song heard at every moment

and from every destination more music spills out of creation,

life blood from open wounds,

in such moments eternity calls out in perpetual clang and clamour,

life upon life upon life and there is no letting go,

too far beyond imagination,

too heady to comprehend,

and through these moments each hour meets with love

and hopes dashed,

grief and birth,

death’s song stalks the same hospital wards as birth’s angelic cry,

this story erupts into the ether,

punctuating the mundane with the extremes of every form,

and into this day

 screams beckon forth

bloodied life,

formed in eternity,

ageless truth enacted,

personified with purpose,

to this diet of life and death the son comes,

fully formed of human flesh,

to be cursed and to be beckoned into life’s every complexity,

this life born of the same blood and filth of life

into the hovel of the homeless

speaks without words and without actions,

very presence of the presence in the present happenings of that time,

immanence and transcendence tested to breaking,

beyond quick words and carefully formed phrase,

the creator

born,

created,

bearing hope and hurt and nursing at the breast,

limitless potential

formed of fragile clay

born of pain,

born into pain,

born of dust

and destined never to return to dust,

in the everyday hours of memories forgotten to history,

this form will find resolve in a different destiny,

light overcoming dark,

forgiveness framing fear,

solemn is humanity’s cry,

pitiful and plaintive,

burdened and beaten,

world wearied and worried

by rumours spoken on TV screens,

swiped from left to right on tablet touch screens,

telling tales of worry and truth’s terror,

this is the moment and this shall be the sign,

into this broken truth,

this brutal reality,

ageless,

less than static yet unchanging,

into this

a birth beckons forth a new dawning

and a new opportunity,

a new understanding and a glimmer of hope,

the baby born to tension and threat,

born to bring release,

freedom and sight,

born to bring the disinherited home

and they are home,

in his arms,

engulfed by his perpetual embrace,

for the son born as baby lives beyond limits

and dies beyond imagination,

flesh and bone,

words and spit,

nails and loss,

rust and cost,

to this future he submits himself,

born in a stable,

laid in a trough,

born with blood and gritted groans,

clenched teeth and no home

but in a mother’s young arms and a father’s fervent gaze,

every breath-filled moment,

building on the last,

the kingdom comes,

built on rooted rocks and whispered dreams,

cradled in a manger,

the cornerstone soon to be discarded,

eternity’s song,

intimate and infinite,

nothing more and nothing less.

FERGUSON KADDISH

FERGUSON KADDISH

Holy, worthy, utterly magnificent;

We want to see your name held aloft,

Praised on tall mountains,

Exalted in cathedrals and at coffee tables,

Called out to the sky above us,

For you created it all.

Every moment is within your grasp,

Each leaf carries your DNA, encoded - it is all yours,

By your hand creation came to pass.

Arranger of stars,

It is your kingdom we long to see formed in our midst.

Before our days are at an end,

We dream of seeing your kingdom taking shape ever more fully.

But we are sick tooooo.

We are sick of lies, lies.

And we are sick of hate.

And contempt.

Injustice.

We are sick of this,

Life shaped by the sated,

Contemptible abuses that stain our streets,

Causing us to wonder just how much of your image there actually is in us.

Build your kingdom and build it fast,

The tracks of this train are straining and snagged.

We are headed nowhere beautiful and it is you that we need.

We will still sing in wild and endless praise of your name,

But our words are jagged,

Just as we, ourselves, are jagged,

Frayed at the edges,

Distortions,

Shadows of our calling,

Torn apart by mourning and injustice.

Speak a word to us,

You who is there in the vigil candle’s flickering flame,

You who is indelibly written on our arms,

You who stand kettled against the blockade,

You, who is deserving of shouted anthems of praise.

You.

You are our voice.

Just as we are yours.

On Missouri streets you are an echo,

A startling sound ringing out across ages,

Calling your people home,

Your voice,

Honed in the clamour of exilic forays,

Knows the razed burn of lament.

We are merely yet more witnesses to yet another defamation of your image;

Pure,

Boundless,

Squandered in chaos,

Wrestled into death,

Leviathan names another victim.

Credence given to Babylon’s tales and version of truth,

But you,

Shaper of seasons,

You are to be praised forever,

You whose breath gives life to clay and scatters dust,

And yet.

Ferguson.

Not just another anything, but,

A person,

A name,

Inhale,

Exhale,

Inhale,

Exhale,

And suddenly stop,

And stay stopped.

Michael Brown,

Not just a name,

Not just anyone.

Not.

Not a face without a name,

For every face bears a name to you.

And this name was and is and ever shall be,

Michael Brown.

Giver of life, as we forage amidst the ashes of this collapse of love,

Help us to understand.

We find no peaceable resolve,

harmony is crushed and broken.

And yet we call out.

For justice.

For change.

We sing with your cadences.

We sing,

And you hear.

We cry,

And you hear.

But Babylon stays silent.

The meta-modern motif creaks,

Those straining train tracks.

There is lack.

There is decay and fear and persistence,

In wilful abandon they find their muse.

Yet you,

Instigator of all things,

You remain.

Unchanging.

Unshaking.

You.

Known as much in your presence as you are in your absence.

Help us to hear you on the breeze,

To know you in burning branches,

And to trust you in the terrors of darkest night.

We long to sing praises to you,

But all we have is our lament,

Yet even in this,

We will gaze into imperceptible murk darkly,

Longing for a glimmer,

Quickly and without delay.

For the shadows gather,

And trouble rides with them.

So to you beyond our horizons and cradled within our cracked clay frames,

To you we sing our songs.

You are beyond all our words,

Anything we might see fit to mutter.

You are beyond.

And beyond is what we long for.

Beyond and yet immanent.

To you we cry out,

For you know our names and we each weigh heavy on your heart.

Ferguson.

Ferguson know justice.

Ferguson know peace.

America see with wide open eyes.

Fill time and space with words,

Some spoken,

Some silent,

Words of prayer.

And may peace flow like a river through dry temple courts,

And may a faithful rhythm be found for all people,

For those who wander - lost.

Those who march and sing prophetic acclamations.

And those who whose eyes are closed and whose hearts are hardened,

THAT THE NAME WOULD BE BLESSED.

AMEN.

(Written: 23:15 on 29/11/2014 - 01:21 on 30/11/2014)

Lectionary poetry no more

This is a post I've been wanting to write for a month or so now, but I've not been wholly sure about it, yet at the weekend, at a Sunday gathering of the community I'm involved with, Restore (more on that later), while studying the Gospel of Mark we had a fantastic conversation about the timeliness of the leading of the Holy Spirit. The time to move on, to change the shape of ministry, to change the place of ministry and the time to lay some things down so that others might be picked up (or not...) At the same time I've been reading Fresh by Volland, Goodhew and Roberts and been reminded of the analogous situation contemporary culture and the church are in, with the early church context. Goodhew makes a great case for the role the Holy Spirit played in shaping the early church, and I feel that I need to heed that.

When I moved house I knew I wouldn't get a few weeks of my regular Lectionary poems written, but I'd always planned to catch up, then I checked, I had six poems to catch up with. This left me wondering, "why am I doing this?" I knew why I had been doing, I knew the reasons:

1. As a way to deal with being in a Lectionary based church, finding a way to grow, to be challenged and shaped by the cycle of readings my church community used.

2. To create something that i hoped would (at times) be a resource for those who engaged with project.

And while the second reason was still valid, the first had gone. And while I still want to resource my previous church community, that's not the appropriate thing to be focusing on. At Restore we are not currently based in the cycle of Lectionary readings, that may change, but it may not and I have no interest in pre-empting it.

One of the challenges with the Lectionary project was the amount of poetic energy, or creative focus it took each week. It was at times a burden, which quite heavily sapped my ability to write other pieces. Since giving up the Lectionary series I've written fifteen pieces for a long-standing collaborative project and that has been good. The pieces have reflected my thoughts about the journey this new community is taking, and the whole thing has been so helpful.

So, I am sorry, for those who have used the Lectionary poems, those who have found them helpful, they may well return, but I think its important to refocus and look afresh at what I'm doing. And if we don't allow the Holy Spirit to lead us in our personal creativity before God, will be be prepared to hold our churches and communities before God and seek the Holy Spirit's guidance for them either...

gaza

hate this disgrace

makes me feel irate

to stand against terror and

be afraid of labels of race hate

when no god is to blame

but the actions of humans

who know better

by the words of the book

mistook and misspoken

pronounced and refocused

turn from this death and look down from the skies

see the fear

the tears in eyes

the burning yearning gut wrenching cries

of children in a school

of families slaughtered

of mothers holding children

of death in the class room

the clock is past noon

and the christ is crucified

no one on earth can justify

why babies die

when the promised land is awash with pain

when tears and fears are forever the same

will the world wake up

will the world react

will the world dare to speak the words

so many have left unsaid

will the world dare to proclaim

that you can’t justify the dead

with statistics

and words and more words

when the only words that matter

are the cries that are never heard