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Indelible
Wrinkles
| Poems by Ruth McLean |
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what
really hurts ....
what really hurts
is that
life is not as we think it should be
nor
as we would like it to be
but
simply ......
much of life and circumstance
is
as it is ......
and we merely have to adjust
and change
ourselves
to fit into the pattern
of what is,
to accept the reality
of what is.
contenting ourselves
in the little happinesses
of each day ......
moments when we reach
across the depths
and touch another's solitude ......
sharing occasionally
the short embraces ... fragile breaths
of brightness
warmth
or caringness.
moments when life
seems to fit,
our souls stand calm
at home in peace ......
and then the drum begins to beat
the ancient rhythm
carved in tears
and
hurting tiptoes blithely in
and takes its place
as if by right ......
and we remember
life,
our life
and how it is
as it is
not as we think it should be
nor
as we would like it to be
but
simply
as it is ...
and the hurting
really hurts
again.
Where Once ...
Where once you breathed your loving breath
upon my cheek, my neck, my ear ...
now, you are gone.
Where once you stroked my waiting palm
laid open to your flaming touch ...
now, you are gone.
an empty womb
the stillness hangs upon
within
around.
your absence aches
its shadow sears my mind
my heart
my soul.
Where once you filled my vacant stares,
my empty rooms ...
now darkness pounds.
Where once you tamed my rampant storms,
unleashed with fury in the night ...
now darkness pounds.
i am the babe
abandoned to the emptiness
the thick, dark black
the hollow arms.
i am the babe
set free amidst the tunnels of aridity
the spirals of unending
space
the waves of incongruity.
Where once you danced before my eyes
in raptured strains of liturgy ...
now, sorrow reigns.
Where once you dressed my soul in love
in orbs of fragile reverence ...
now, sorrow reigns.
Lost keys Lost doors Lost light
Lost me Lost You
Standing on the trail at sunset
i await your next caress.
paper
doll jesus
dear jesus,
wherever have i kept you all my life?
wherever did i hide your mouth and eyes?
concealed and silent
in a velvet case,
imprisoned and sleeping
in a tight, glass cage...
safe.
no humanity
no temptations or desires,
just
paper, lord,
my paper doll,
my paper doll jesus.
my God, how you could have loved
someone.
my God, how you could have loved
me.
crazy
let me be crazy with you, lord...
crazy, in love with you,
and spend some time
alone on the roads
that lead to the sun and the stars;
let me sing, let me dance,
let me rest in your arms,
let us be, let us share,
let us run with the wind.
let me be me
and be crazy with you,
totally crazy, in love with you, lord.
let me jump on your shadow
let me blow on your ear,
let us dream, let us touch,,
let us laugh through the tears.
let me be crazy with you , lord...
totally crazy and in love with you,
totally crazy, in love with you.
i thirst
i thirst for a drink
from your tarnished cup
but
teach me first
to sup life's water,
soothe
some tired, bleeding feet,
and bandage
broken, wounded souls.
then ...
let me stroke
the battered cup,
draw it to
my feeble lips,
and taste the liquid.
Light .....
kicking stones
eating dust
tearing vines
along the road
to find some answer.
thrust deep in sand
lost far in forest
bent low in dream .....
And then that Light,
that glorious light
breaks through
again.
grey
water
grey choppy water...
waves hit me in the face,
i can hardly breathe;
i keep swallowing water.
i am blinded;
water in my eyes,
my nose,
my mouth,
my throat.
i am breathing water
suffocating
drowning.
i can't see the markers,
no buoys to guide me,
nothing lighting my way.
i fight the waves,
they try to drag me under.
i tread water...
the
executioners
we are
the executioners...
people
in search of justice
morality
the way.
upholding laws that lie on paper,
enforcing laws that don't breathe life,
loving laws that cage our neighbours
words that stay in black and white.
we
the executioners...
people
in cozy homes, institutions, churches
with spouses, families, friends
defending protecting
believing
imprisoning the poor
as the rich escape,
oppressing the oppressed
recapturing the captured.
we are
the executioners...
pretending God is in our favour
pretending God
is an executioner.
awoken
i awoke, one morning,
from shades of sleep,
to find my world had changed ...
the ground on which i had always placed my feet,
had subtly shifted with the darkness.
the firm beliefs and solid suppositions
that ordered my daily decisions
had evaporated before my eyes ...
the images of God
which sketched my thoughts
and traced my days
now seemed anachronistic to my mind ...
comfortable pillows
that held my head
and spoke of warm security
in familiar ways
were slipping silently from my bed ...
the props i used
to keep me strong
now seemed obsolete
and strangely out of synchronization.
submerged in pools of doubt
lay the buoys i'd worn
to hold me up in times of trial.
caught and helpless,
uprooted and airborne,
i existed ...
dangling in space
between the old
and the new ...
one eye was fixed with longing to the past,
the other,
with an urgent expectancy,
to what might lay ahead ...
one hand was clutching
at what had been so easy and certain,
the other
grasped at what might fill
the freshly-opened void.
i had a new space within myself
which i had not discerned before ...
it begged designs to form its cast.
a voice emerged deep in my heart
which called me to an alien land.
it tugged and pulled
and bade me come
to risk and grow
in tune with it.
i felt the promise
of a more profound love
and communion with divinity ...
if i could only
shirk my fear
and put my trust
in what beckoned me ...
i
plod the land
i plod the land of ancient time
where faceless days and voiceless nights
rest anaesthetized
beneath the hand
of willed and bland oblivion.
descending burrowed abysses
where memory plays its instant frames,
i step into the tangled mesh
of mortal patterns etched in ice;
i crouch surrounded
by my self
and feel the web encircle me.
peering into mirrored pools
i see the past disrobe and speak
of crusted blood and careless tears
that filtered through my roaring streams;
i see my thoughts undress and hide
along the empty paths i ran.
i try to wash the pain away
and
slice the ropes that keep me bound,
but razor edges of my sin
slide deep into the fleshy part,
wedge firm within my fleshy part.....
i taste the cutting with my tongue
and bite the harshness as they sink.
i throw myself against the wall
and dash my head with jagged stones,
in efforts to escape this purge
of looking at my nakedness,
of sewing on my barren limbs,
accepting them as part of me.
i lie awake upon the floor
amidst the crumbs of who i am,
and dig the lava from my eyes
that blinded me to sacred light,
and tear the blanket from my heart
that let me sleep contentedly.
i plod the land of present time
with fearless days and voiceless nights
and raise my arms
in anguished call.....
i stand and bellow
to my God.
O
Touch That Thrills
o touch that thrills
and blazes beauty
with its flame ...
i cannot breathe.
i am beset
and occupied,
enraptured by a silent force
far greater, grander
than my own;
enraptured by a silent force
that causes me to
draw and hold
its burning face
against my own.
o touch that thrills
and causes me
to die ...
and in the dying
call for more.
and in the dying
call for consummation
of that power
that bids me faint
before its feet
in crumpled pools of ecstasy ...
that drenches me
in sweet perfume
and wraps itself
inside my soul.
o touch that thrills
and blazes beauty
with its flame ...
i cannot breathe.
O
Lord We Are Such Creatures
helpless
and dependent
amidst layers of superficiality
... we exist ...
every thought
so invisibly contingent
upon your grace.
moment by moment
caged within our own mortality
of flesh and blood;
like half-crazed
prisoners
clenching bars
in search of
freedom ...
--- O Lord, we are such creatures ---
the shroud hangs heavy
cloaking hearts
which yearn to speak
and trace
your brow.
burdened and afire,
our souls with groanings strain
to touch to share
to find to know
one single thread of sheer divinity
one silent kiss of holy breath.
--- O Lord, we are such creatures ---
helpless and dependent,
wholly here
in love with you
we reach to taste
your depthless centre.
receive us, O God,
transcend the trails of humanness,
hold us, stroke us
with your gaze ...
laid open in raw humility
we sigh ...
--- O Lord, we are such creatures ---
unveiling
the veil is rent
it's torn and tarnished
baring scars so old and glazed,
carved in flesh of innocence
carved in hearts from holy days.
wounds .....
still tender to the prober
once petrified with time and tears;
last vestiges of masked illusion
swirling with the soul's exhaling.
angel, pour sweet oil upon me
fill, anoint the fissured dream,
the veil is rent
and sinking slowly...
broken seams are oozing blood.
The
Lord's Prayer
O God,
You are mother and father to me
and so much more than I can imagine.
Your name is holy.
I spend time welcoming your influence
into my life and into my world.
I want your realm present to me.
May your desires be done now
as they are in the heavens.
Give me the bread I need for today;
I have confidence that you will look
after my necessities.
Forgive me for the ways I make you sad
As I try to forgive others
who have also disappointed
or hurt me.
Be with me as I depend on you
to lead me on the safe road,
struggling against false attractions,
protecting me from all forms of evil.
For you are everlasting,
My strength, my wisdom, my God.
addicted
raging inferno
that pursues my days
and obliterates my nights
chasing me tripping me
knocking me down ...
stomping my face kicking my head
draining my reason
consuming my soul.
raging inferno
that wars within me
i try to beat you
back.
deciding
i want to say ... i have decided.
i want to say ... I HAVE DECIDED.
i want to end this obsession that i have had.
i want to finally close the book,
draw the curtain,
say "finit".
i want to move on with my life ......
as if to say this has not been my life.
as if to say this has just been
a very poorly acted melodrama.
as if to say this has really not been living.
as if to say
i am really in charge here.
as if to say ...
life is so very, very, very tidy.
life proceeds a certain, acceptable, o.k. way.
life is living our moments in exactly
the manner we choose .
as if to say ...
life is the eternal fairy tale
we always hoped it would be.
humpty dumpty can be put back together again.
when all is said and done there will be a terrifically
happy ending here.
i want to say ... i have decided.
i want to say ... I HAVE DECIDED.
i am terrified of remaining in the empty desert
tortured by the hounds of
still deciding.
pieces
between
the stained glass cross
and the broken metal sailboat
lies my life ...
a window
a lookout
a me.
everything i am
everything i own
rests in state.
a tiny red flag
clings precariously
to the mast
i do not weep.
the shattered dream
is buried ... fractured splinters
tightly lodged
snugly wrapped
in layers of ache ...
too hurt to be held
too deep to be dug
too sad to be sung.
and then
the wind
a snap.
pieces of glass
begin to move and push
pieces of glass
begin to cut
and
slice
flesh.
pieces.
tangled
&nbs |
