Such is Grace

You love me so much that You give me everything
Yet still I complain

And You, loving me as You do,
Let me complain
With Your hands held out
Full of offerings

In the certain knowledge
That eventually, the complaining will stop
And I will simply surrender to Your love

Such is Grace

These Books and I

The books on these shelves here, to my left

Once laden with promise, heavy with the hope of salvation

Are no longer groaning under the weight of such responsibility

I supped greedily on those words

Desperately praying that the nectar of freedom

Might be magically conveyed via those pages

To transmute my undoubted suffering

Surely, I reasoned, the answer must reside somewhere in those sentences?

It's been a while since I last glanced across at them

Tonight, I notice some familiar words on the spines

(Mystery, spirit, vastness, heart, extraordinary)

And I see colours – dark blue, black, deep crimson, green –

Against the white of the bookcase

Otherwise, they seem strangely empty, offering nothing

No longer required to hold out hope

Relieved of the burden of redeeming me

These books and I now all free

To simply be what we always have been

The Axis

I thought I was important
I thought I was the centre of the universe

Believing I was the axis on which the Earth spun
I was, Atlas-like, carrying the world on my shoulders
And it was really very heavy

A momentary shift in perception
Reassures me that the world will not stop spinning
If I lie down and rest for a while

Selling Yourself Short

My guess is

That you’re trying to not be what you are

So wonderfully, hysterically futile

My guess is

That you’re selling yourself woefully short

I know I did

I kept my sights in check

Punched well below my weight

Procrastinated, dissembled

And came up with a hundred excuses

Believing that if I hid beneath the parapet

I might escape the inescapable

Trying not to be this

Made me mad

Not all-out-bonkers insane

But contained, constrained, numb

Then the lying came to an abrupt halt

There I was, totally exposed

Deeply insecure, stumbling uncertainly

Rendered utterly incapable

Of being anything other than this, here, now

And inexplicably, incomprehensibly happy

Falling

Always scared of falling, I clung on

Holding fast to anything that seemed secure

Eventually, it all gave way

And I dangled, desperately bracing

Against the inevitable screaming descent

Of my solid body to the ground

Finally, I jump
(Having exhausted every other option)

But instead of the expected terrifying hurtle

I’m caught by a gentle upward draught

Stunned, I discover my weightlessness

And the total absence of places to land

All further struggle rendered unnecessary

This Is An All-Inclusive Ticket

Believing yourself unworthy, deeply flawed, or incomplete

You deny your total acceptability

However, if you read the small print

You’ll see that this is an all-inclusive ticket

With no caveats, exclusions, or conditions

There’s nothing to dispose of, box up or pack away

The price of admission covers everything

And no further payments are required

Strangely Silent

Lately, this room has fallen strangely silent

The white table there, the books on the shelf,

And the two mismatched rugs, all suddenly quiet

The recently-gathered dust balls have ceased their taunting

No more recriminations from the dirt on the floor

No further complaints from the unopened paint cans

Not one extra dose of shame from the unpacked box

The yet-to-be-fixed coat hooks or even the peeling wallpaper

Now that there is no one here to listen

To take delivery of fault or blame

None of it has a word to say

How still this room has become

How strangely silent