Category: Poetry

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Mrs Fergusson (A response to a letter)

Mary and John

(She folds his head into her bosom,
His blood drips down onto her dress,
Her eyes like an arm reach out onto mine
And this is what they say,)

“Come, Sit, Wait with me while he dies
Wait with me while I die and yet still live
Wait with me while I live the dying
And still wait with me as I suffer surviving
Come, sit, wait with me.

Place your knees beside his unfolded feet
Stretch out your hand and feel as the heat escapes,
As the fading breath ferries my sweet;
The Son of woman away.

Don’t leave, don’t fall to sleep,
Don’t slumber while I attempt to slay
The rising sorrow with feeble words heaven bound.
Pray on my behalf, for I cannot say the sounds
My tongue is in shock for the wounds perfectly here portrayed;
This body; this one that in my arms now lays
Carries the stains that will wash away
But not the stains that remain
Asking you to stay… with me
Asking you to wait… with me
To wake… and die yet still live,
And live the dying…
And suffer the surviving…
And sit… and wait… and pray… with me.”

(Then with his eyes open as her eyes close, we meet… he speaks…)

“Here is your mother”

(And breathes his first).

© Denis Adide 2014

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The Walker

john the baptist

“Where are you going?”
Said the boy to the walker.

“I go to the horizon
to find the place where the sun emerges,
Rising when it’s darkest
So with the first rays I can harvest
the hope of things to come.
It sinks into the dew
and evaporates when the light is brightest”.

“But you have neither bag not basket,
How do you keep what you harness?”

“Peace demands I take no bag,
Courage that I take only the shirt on my back,
I shake the dust off where there are mountains
And drink where there are streams.
As for the quarry I seek, these feet,
soaked in the mornings joy,
feed the heart I follow
to the visions that keep my soul warm.

Besides,
I placed my bright mourning flower on the widow’s window,
Put my loaf of bread at the door of the new parents,
Gave my bag to the beggar for his first belongings,
And my water jar to the unpaid servant.

So all I have is me.”

He then watched the thoughts
shoot through the young boys mind,
Watched as those fresh eyes
noticed the closed doors
and flickering candle lights
just about piercing through the gaps
of the boarded up windows.
He watched as the perked up ears
noticed soft whimpers
in between the quietening bird song.
He watched as the the blood
drained from the unguarded face,
the beating softening
as the realisation grew
that though all was not gloom,
it had left little room for much else.

Then knelt the walker,
Gently taking off his shoes.

“One day,
When these fit you,
You will chase the horizon too.
Perhaps towards the setting sun
To mine the hums of the cooling breeze
For the gifts of the seasons:
Reasons to keep going
in the face of encroaching darkness.
Between us maybe
we can feed the trees to fruit again.”

With that he handed them over,
Smiled,
And carried on his way.

© Denis Adide 2018

With special thanks to Peter Duckworth.

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Catch up: Part 5 (a)… First March of the Penguins

Though I had Ironed it on the first night of the retreat, I ran the steamer over it once more on the eve of the ceremony. My black suit was spotless and crease free – apart from the intentional one on the trouser legs (my ex-military dad had taught me how to iron and my residual nerves had ensured absolute precision: even samurais are not that sharp). The clerical shirt was immaculate and I could see my face in the spit-shined shoes. If God was going to reject me, it wasn’t going to be for my garments. Maybe for the shoes… maybe.

When I bought the shoes, I thought it funny that they were made by a company called ‘hell leather’. Yes, I knew they were what I would wear to my ordination; Yes, I hoped the people who would be directly behind me would see them; and Yes, on the day of the ordination I knelt with ears sharpened, ready for the ghasp from a holy person about the unholy thing they had noticed about the soon to be deacon. The length of my cassoc, however, scuppered my plans: dresses can be quite annoying.

It’s a weird thing, waking up on days like these. Light, not the clock, woke me up. Gently it trickled in through a small gap in the curtain. It was just enough to give the room a glow: or maybe a child was excited about Christmas. I didn’t yawn or stretch. My eyes went from sleep to wide awake in the space of seconds. My mind brought the rest of me up to speed. Fresh in memory the conversations I had had with my fellow ordinands over a 12-year-old Ardbeg the nights before we went into silence. Fresh in memory the brief interview I had had with the Bishop the day before: brief and encouraging. Fresh in memory the gentle thump of my heart as I tried to fall asleep the night before – dreaming of what was to come while simultaneously being thrust back into the dark room I was to try and rest in. It had felt like a kind of baptism, a kind of tomb. Perhaps part of me was dying. I don’t know. Truly something was going to be slightly different tomorrow, that I knew.

My heart wasn’t game for a wrestle against the tide, against the time, against what felt like destiny. My bones were aligning and that was good, and I knew that. I knew it well. I knew it in the place one visits when they honestly shut their eyes and look in. There was no trembling here. Just the gentle thump of a peaceful excitement. Today was a big day, there were things to do. Within minutes my bed was made and everything I didn’t need was packed and ready to for check out.

A drink of water can refresh the outside of a person. This morning the cascade of droplets pelleting my face and skin felt like little drums chiming in the horizon. With their pitter-patter, they soothed me and prepared me for what was ahead. What they said, the cocoa butter sealed in. Awash with peace I dressed up.

There is a thing about uniforms that make them ridiculous. When you wear one part of you is hidden and part of you comes to the fore. No uniform ever captures the totality of the individual (like the extra bits of the fajita that won’t fit into the overfilled wrap). looking in the mirror I had to laugh.

“Clerical shirts are not good for anything else”, I thought to myself. “Can’t use a normal tie with them”. With a brief smile, recognising the somewhat hilarious confluence of my uniform and branded shoes, I slipped my collar in. After debating whether to wear the jacket with one button or two done I left my room, cassock bag folded over my left arm; ‘normal stuff’ bag slung over my right shoulder; no button done.

We looked like a bunch of penguins sipping tea. Whoever thought of giving a group of clergy white teacups and saucers was a genius. In the sea of black, all you could notice were the moving cups and collars. But one couldn’t laugh could one? No! oh no! One was one of the penguins. One could smile though. Partly because it was the appropriate Christian face for the day (everyone apart from the retreat guides wasn’t in a place to be pastoral so panic face or sad face might have been ignored by the potential church leaders in the building: ceremony first, service later).

At this juncture, I’d like to point out for legal reasons that the description put forth in the preceding parentheses are the author’s own and may not be representative of the wider troop.

After tea begun the march of the penguins onto the coach: some kind person had brought chocolates to share. Then the drive to the cathedral for a final rehearsal and the Bishop’s charge. Then lunch at the Bishop’s digs. Then Family time (which I valued greatly) before returning for the final robing and ceremony.

…

It’s funny how nothing changed… and yet…

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Catch up: Part 4… Yes Retreat, Yes Surrender. 

Even though I’ve grown to love silence, it is sometimes very difficult to work out how to make it a resource when reflection is actually necessary rather than practise. It can be like those odd moments where someone tells you not to think of an elephant and you try to obey. Once the gavel rained down telling us to be quiet all I could do was notice the noise in my head and heart.

I hadn’t been a regular retreater so this was a somewhat unusual thing to be part of. most of the times I had taken to do some reflection involved very long walks/ hikes/ bike rides. I always had something physically exhausting to do which allowed me to think. Being in one place, and worse being still, didn’t really work for me. Neither did the surrounding city streets. So this ordination retreat was going to be awkward, even more so with that blasted elephant I had to try and barge out of my head (a thing not helped by the elephant’s penchant for trumpeting and hip hop based interpretive dance).

Once the train ride was done and we had found our way, bags and all, through to the east of the city, we alighted and carried our wares to St Katherine’s retreat centre. I was nervous. The bag that my cassock was in was white, noisy-plastic and quite cumbersome. It kept knocking against my knees. I had hooked the hanger on the strap of my football kitbag which was looped over my shoulder: my kitbag had my other clothes. The more we walked, the more foolish I felt. The more foolish I felt, the more nervous I got. The more nervous I got, the more the feeling that this role to which I was supposed to step into after this retreat was one which I was neither capable nor qualified for. It would only be a matter of time before they (whoever they are) would see through the facade and expose me as the fraud I felt I was. To compound the whole thing I didn’t offer to help one of our party with her bags coming down the steps from the train station (insert poop emoji here).


[Just to say… Our faith is one that is chuck full of hypocrites. Not because we profess to be something we are not, but because we are something we have no right to be. Righteousness is a gift given to those who cannot attain it. Accepting the gift is quite a hard task, especially because ever unction from within us rejects the gift: simultaneously also stating our need for it. This whole priest thing isn’t exempt from the struggle of self acceptance – acceptance of the self as God declares it to be. If you are facing a similar predicament, looking at the privilege and wondering whether you fit the bill then hear me say this… You are fit for it because you are not fit for it. You are fit for it because God makes you fit. It is fit for you as gift, like that blasted technicolor dream coat which repulses part of you because of the unfiltered and unexplainable hope. You wont be comfortable with this until the right time, and those parts of you that are impoverished, and trying to escape the drought rediscover this aspect of you seated in prime position in Pharaohs courts. Be patient. Trust God. Trust him more than you trust yourself. Oh… I digress. Let’s return to the regular programming.]

The tranquility of the retreat centre was as welcome as an oasis would’ve been to Lawrence of Arabia (hyperbole). Finally having a room to enter and a place to put my bags down meant, at the very least, space to breath. I took off my shoes. I was tired of hiding my nerves by joining in the niceness of the troop. I hate smart shoes. There was still dinner to endure followed by the silence for which I had downloaded episodes of Rev onto my iPad (apparently the final part of my theological education). The retreat schedule lay open on the small table, one for each room I assumed. I read over it as I unpacked my bag onto the bed, freeing my cassock from its confines. My Darth Vader costume was well pressed (Vader of Cheam) but my new and unused clerical shirt still had the new-shirt creases in it. It would need ironing before Saturday (when the force would be at full strength).

After a few seconds staring at it I tucked the collar into the inside jacket pocket and then by the hangers lifted everything off the bed and placed them in the wardrobe by the door. It had doors which, thankfully, meant I could compartmentalise that part of my future for now. The full size mirror hanging on the outside of those blasted doors weren’t helpful. There I was. In full ‘colour’; the dreamer in technicolor (HD). I couldn’t look myself in the eye for too long. Priesthood… lol (insert tear drop emoji here). The story behind me was a full and enfleshed one, my heart wouldn’t let me turn back even though my stomach desperately willed it. It was too late now.

I cannot capture in words the depth of gratitude I have for our retreat guides. The balance between the seriousness of the task before us ordinands and the truth of a joy filled life on display not only filled me with courage, it inspired me past the cobwebs of my shaken self concept and into a place of deep trust in the God who was gently beckoning me forward. The pre-dinner introduction was fantastic. it gently teased me into laughter by making the experience I was about to have a corporate one: the nerves were shared equally between the 30 odd ordinands on this retreat. The stories that our guides shared made what seemed like a dark thicket at first turn into a well trodden path whose pitfalls were well documented, avoidable, and survivable.
Permit me to straddle two times here.

This post should’ve been sent shortly after Catch Up 3. The reason for the delay is the great disruption that was Brexit and its equally devastating aftershock TRUMP. I put my silence down to a broken heart. All of a sudden the world I thought I lived in took its mask off and once more revealed itself to be negatively complex. Worse still it didn’t understand itself as it was appearing. There were friends, close friends who I felt were contributing to the this negative complexity and as such I didn’t know how to respond. I couldn’t understand their positions. Neither could I understand my own hearts. I couldn’t write about what I hadn’t understood, mainly because I didn’t have a clear ethic to apply. The lessons captured in the book of Barabas needed to seep in. The bitterness to which those lessons spoke into needed to be digested so as not to pepper every expression with the same blotches of red (or whatever colour grief takes).

At this juncture I must apologise to those who listened to me preach ‘in those days’. #Gosh.

…

“That morning” one of the retreat guides said to me in a moment of prayer. He was referring to the end of the ordination ceremony. “Look out the great west doors to the cathedral. Look out into the world to which you are called”.
At the time these words lifted some of the weight I had felt thrust upon me by the little black boy. They refocused my mind away from questions surrounding my capacity and aptitude towards the clear image of a God who went before those whom he called. The shepherd was good and all I had to do was follow him. Simply true, and traceable through the life I had thus far lived. I was where I was due to a stupid bumbling into obedience. God had made use of my errors to make me who I was and was now about to do the same in leading me to life, and with that others also. #SolaGratia

Then came brexit… and trump.
To the ordinands out there slowly marching towards their ordination I share this. The world is messy. That makes the calling both complex and life giving. Complex because people generally do not realise their rejection of Jesus and each other (it is one of those things the bible attests to).

Complex because the effect of it all is heart ache (and I suggest that a lack of heart ache indicates an unknown resistance to Christ: because having compassion and being confronted by its subjects will always break hearts). Complex because the nature of the compassion and the nature of the people who need it most make embodying compassion extremely difficult.
Life giving because the banner we bear is the only one with a realisable hope at its core. There is nowhere else other than in Christ that the world finds resolution (both existentially in the present but also in eschatological terms). Life giving because the same place of deep frustration at the seeming ineffectiveness of compassion is the same place of understanding God’s gracious unconditional compassion towards you. Life giving because for a brief moment at different frequencies, there will come a moment when the banner and uniform will grant access to the privileged place of helping others see that compassion from God as centred upon them – and that is magical.

In the face of these things, it is definitely worth recognising early that the rank your joining is one you’ve already been apart of. You are being set apart to be who you are and no more. There may be other responsibilities but the tip of the spear remains the same: proclaiming Christ the crucified and resurrected forever servant-king of kings. It remains being his witness to a world that doesn’t know him or even understand the impact of its blindness to him. Our proclaimation will work against a vast and seemingly endless tide but, in the words of a very wise group of people, “we are on the winning side”.

Embarking on my retreat, all I had was the petty nervousness that was born of a small world. A world that encompassed only my own perception of myself. Now, about to embark on another retreat (priesting), I am assured of a bigger world into which I’m being sent. If this was as clear to me last year as it is now, I might have dealt with the heartbreak a lot better than I did.

When the time to be silent came, I plugged in the iron and brought out the shoe polish. With each crease I took out of my clericals, I recognised the flawed nature of the institution I was soon going to represent; I recognised the flaws in me that these well pressed garments would either cover or highlight; but most importantly I recognised the reality that God had chosen to not reject either. In his mercy and wisdom he had chosen earthen ware to carry his Holy Spirit. I wasn’t with Simeon, who after patiently waiting to see the Messiah now sought peace. No! I was with simon peter, who through error and betrayal and blasted cockerels (or elephants in my case) was now being asked to feed lambs and sheep; who was being asked to fish men into an eternal net; who was being granted the privilege of watching them draw their first breath once out of the waters of baptism.

I didn’t watch Rev in the end.

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The book of Barabbas

Chapter 1. (New Revised Standard Edition Anglicised.) 

Lamentation’s answer. 

1While an encampment that human beings had erected in order to survive their journey away from death was being torn down (because of external decisions), another – longer standing – encampment of human beings who journeyed in search of a better life was deciding its direction. 2The world that could choose was choosing, the world that could not choose was watching and waiting to learn if its future had hope or darkness. 3Beneath the discourse a slight whisper from the hearts of those who themselves couldn’t hear. 4Words, very clear and chilling to the ears of those who were attentive: “am I my brother’s keeper?”.

5Those who heard it, the same who hold the memory of blood from the shepherd’s head-wound dripping on the rock now dropped by his brother, wept. 6They wept alongside the tent pegs that had been left behind when the bulldozers came; 7they wept beside the old men, sifting through the rubble of the old city for signs of the lives they were in denial of loosing; 8they wept with the mothers of sons who were criminalised, lived under the threat of death and its worse sibling twins – incarceration and slavery, sons who were shot before tasting grey. 9They wept as their tears were projected onto the endless feeds as pictures that mocked justice by pointing to guilt that would go unpunished and unchallenged 10(for those with the power to act, didn’t react – the threat never close enough to warrant lifted hands). 11They wept bitterly, tears bursting the underdeveloped levies and washing away their home: 12how were they to call home the place that their stronger brother had claimed for his own – even without birthright?

13These were the days when judges were scarce; when prophets were silent and pharisees were loud; when the widows were hungry – portions served to false kings; 14and the fatherless uncovered – squatting in the shadows of hillside mansions. 15These were the days when no one noticed the wind – no vanes were erected nor sails raised 16and none with oars left the harbour and nets were swapped for fig leaves. 17These were the days when the third crow was unheard, heart unhurt, and stomachs stretched as far as the blood-soaked heaps of coins would allow. 18No one ventured into the wilderness, by the river where the death that saved awaited: opting rather to skirt the edge of the greens on the journeys from fortresses to fortresses. 19Those who bore the truth had arisen and headed to Tarshish by land leaving the outcry of the infants – whose blood also stained the sacrificial rocks – to rise. 

20Then spoke the Lord to the old soldier’s son,

“Gather your garments,

take off the sackcloth;

rinse your head and be clean.

21Cease from your weeping and rejoice,

for now you know my deeds –

my thoughts in the silence

22when with feeble knees I stood,

half alive from the lashes

wearing my crown of thorns

and my blood-soaked robes of glory,

23watching as they chose

to make Barabas their king.

24Come, stand with me in love,

and love from this place beside the tree

till darkness fails and every knee

bows”.

Let him who has ears…

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Catch up: part 2…#Pilgrim

About a month had passed since the valedictory service. Some of the faces and memories are referred to in my last post was still fresh my head. I hadn’t quite began to miss things because it all sort of felt like an extended break. Somewhere within, I was convinced that things would resume at a certain point and the rhythm that I had grown accustomed to would return. This illusion was kept in place by the fact that we hadn’t moved from the house we had lived in while in Bristol. The place we were to take up during my curacy was due to be worked on – maintenance and repairs. What this meant was I would have to take my stuff for the ordination retreat with me all the way from Bristol and after the ceremony return to Bristol. This wasn’t particularly ideal: but that’s life. To be honest I was more daunted by the prospect of ordination than I was with the discomfort of travelling.

I suppose there is something about the pilgrims journey being the pilgrims journey. If one does not own the destination as their own, where does one draw determination and the hope to persevere – or even the courage to attempt the journey in the first place.

Close to 3 years prior, I set off from quiet house in West Sussex to make the three-hour trip across to Bristol to begin my theological education. I stress that ‘quiet house’ because it was empty. There was no one to share my anxiety and excitement; no one to encourage me; no one to pray for me – I had needed it badly. Then, and in this moment I am here reflecting on, it felt as though God clearly wanted me to understand my sense of calling as my own. In as much as there are so many people he had placed around me to nurture me and encourage me through the journey, it seemed important to him that I knew that it was my journey first. That it will be me that would be shaped, tested, carried, refilled, thirsty, bruised, strengthened, and approved. So when with the retreat beckoning I placed my bags in the boot of my Little VW, that sense of solitude – positive solitude – was one that I recognised. This journey was for me.

There is something about the M4 that’s both charming and frustrating. Over the time spent in Bristol I have had to make numerous trips to and from London. Both the night time and the daytime journeys always gave me time to reflect, time to dream – obviously not while asleep at the wheel, and time to ‘defragment the hard drive’. The morning  drive was east into the sunrise, the evening drive west into the sunset; and the night’s peppered by a cascade of headlights. One grows accustomed to the red of the rear lamps. (If you are doing the London to Bristol trip, the Membury services have a drive through Starbucks #BroTip). On some days you might be lucky and there are no roadworks slow you down. But on other days, most days are really, at some point you have to slow down to a creep because hundred or so drivers decided they wanted to have a look at what was going on the other side of the motorway. For the many trips I had taken, I had grown to know the different curves and distances between the junctions; and how many songs would get me to which point.

This journey was different. For some reason  It had a feeling of finality to it. Almost like the beginning of an end. This was more than just a ‘you will no longer live in Bristol’ kind of end. Or a ‘you will no longer be a student at Trinity’ kind of end. This was a ‘your life is about to change’ kind of end. A ‘brace yourself’ kind of excitement washed over me as I buckled in. I started the ignition as that kind of smile you smile when you see the lion in the zoo and recognise how small you are, washed across my face. Needless to say I was parked up and a few steps away from the train station in Chiswick when I realised that I didn’t even put the Radio on for the two hour road trip.

The headphones were in and the music soundtracks for the cascading scenes and faces as the train took me deeper into the big smoke. The same Waterloo station that I had frequented in my freelance days now took on a different sense of wonder. Light interrupted by rows of steel ushered me forward. I slowly walked past the National Theatre and the BFI keeping away from the river because I knew what awaited me. But with a sense of inevitability the buildings peeled away. I could see it across the water, that great survivor who had welcome me into her arms once before and now towered above all so she could do it again.

When Wordsworth talks about spots of time, I think it’s things like these that he refers to. The memory is etched, maybe seared in. I can almost count the contours on the stems of the trees that line the embankment, their broad leaves slowly swaying in the gentle breeze. In front of me the tourists with their big cameras trying to catch little scenes, little glimpses to take home with them. And then there are other joggers, pilgrims themselves; and those on benches unpacking their sandwiches. I must have fitted right in with my travel bag and cassock carrier.

Slowly, as I approached Millennium bridge, all other buildings began to shrink. The cathedral grew bigger with each step, and so did the tremor from within. I was hungry but knew I couldn’t eat. It was all made worse by the fact that I knew I was afraid, wanted to turn back but couldn’t: I just couldn’t. I should have bought the sugar coated peanuts from the vendor on the bridge. There were steps to ascend gradually as the paved path from the river to the courtyard opened up. I wished I had memorised a song of ascent: there was a song playing through the headphones that I can’t recall – in truth I wasn’t listening.

With one last look up the steps at those daunting West doors I turned left as had been instructed. By the entrance to the crypt a sentry stood.

“I’m here for the ordination retreat”. I almost whispered.

“Right this way Sir!“, the reply, with an arm extended toward the well lit hollow.

…

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Left onto Stoke Lane

The sun shone brightly,
it’s warmth tempered by a deep cooling breeze.
The days weren’t as long as they had been,
the grasses were browning from summer’s green,
And I could see, as I drove in,
that the leaves were desperately clinging to the trees,
Soon all would fall and a new thing would begin.

It had been a quiet drive,
Serene and subtle deep,
The slower speed now meant I could perceive
the acorns and conker seeds
knocking in the wheel arches.

Left onto Saville Road from Parry’s Lane,
then right onto Stoke Road down the hill,
I’m sure its here I should turn in.

There are indeed some scenes that stick
like the big rocks at the bottom of clear streams,
or words vividly spoken mid-winter dreams,
that lay claim to a past and form the present’s meaning
while conquering future schemes,

She was one of these,
The tree’s – like her veil – did peel,
her brick work sealed by the gardens (Big up Dave Snell).

Intimidating, her beauty was to me,
Shyly I walked into her open arms
and within her embrace I blinked.

Then with a blade, dipped in love she touched me
Hurting to heal, healing to teach,
teaching to give me more than I had dreamed

There are indeed some scenes that stick,
like the big rocks at the bottom of clear streams,
or words vividly spoken mid-winter dreams
that lay claim to a past and form the presents meaning
while conquering the future’s schemes.

How indeed, will I now with eyes open
Full of hope release the grip of her embrace?
Even though the grasses are green,
and the flowers pristine,
And the trees themselves in bloom,
And my real calling is to serve her groom,
How will I, without tears, this very long journey resume?

Well, I must bid these faces adieu,
Treasure the spaces and rooms,
The calories burnt and consumed,
The songs sung in and out of tune,
The comedians, The d.j’s,
and the tears shed in the old swimming pool.
As they go from present meaning to past anchor,
securing my future schemes
as I turn left one last time onto Stoke Road,
and up the hill.

The light brightly shines through the clouds,
the sun they slightly shroud in drizzles will win,
His warmth, seeping in through the slight chill
will bless the new leaves and fill the trees,
And lay claim to a past, form the present’s meaning,
and conquer the future – once a dream.

© Denis Adide 2016

PS: All mistakes are on purpose, they frustrate those who notice. Those who notice… know!!

 

https://www.trinitycollegebristol.ac.uk/blog/kingdom-living/left-onto-stoke-lane-a-poem-from-one-of-our-leavers/

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Notes from the death star

 הָֽאָדָם בְּצַלְמוֹ

And so the curse prevailed un-curtailed.
I, for my own desires, continued in failing
maintaining that blasted work
of stitching leaves into garments
Even when dried skin sufficed to unify.
Where hands failed, I made new ones to fit,
and covered the blood that soaked them;
Where feet had come unstuck,
cracked from the toil and sweat,
I fashioned boots to hide the bones
fleshed by scars upon scars;
Where my eyes resisted my heart’s covenants
dark glasses over the spaces in the mask,
the same that covered the mind
whos banner self had turned
from usurpations of benevolence
to tyranny’s reign.

“Words I chained in Hymns
and winds to whom once in song I’d yield
rose I and tamed.”

But I hear it,
resounding like the distant echo
of a thousand drums;
a thousand shakers attached to dancer’s heels,
peering over the hills that form the surrounding horizon –
my prison of deeds.
Like the sweetness I once recalled
from the days before the banishing,
before the knowing that couldn’t be unknown;
before the seeing that couldn’t be unseen;
the blaming that couldn’t be undone;
the hiding that couldn’t by my hand be uncovered;
the betrayal to which i’m here unstuck –
like the sweetness of before it rests,
tethered to the memory deep behind
what I’ve hidden;
from the spaces that dream of beyond
bonding to the things the blasted hills deny.
Ahh it is a crying only I can hear, I think,
teased into being by the thoughts that this wind whispers

“there is still good left in him”

I hope for it’s truth
but live out the lie.
walking in the undoable denying of the third crow;
living at the end of the sixth hour,
and the death that is now known as end.

For words I failed to attend,
and actions i’d never commend,
its neither me nor pretence.

“I call out to you, again and again,
Yet you linger.”

From whence cometh my help?

© Denis Adide 2015

 

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The Railing

Genesis

1. Will you only hover over the emptiness? Will you kiss the mess and speak? Or will you hold it together in its darkness.

2. When will the night cease? The word was heard and the divide created but this darkness won’t relent. Shine brighter still in the darkness for this plain won’t break from its failure to comprehend.

3. This is not order. This is not good. This is not fruitful. This is not living with the blessed. This is neither sleep, nor rest, nor sabbath. This is the forbidden curse uncurtailed. This is the untrodden serpent but the bruised heel. This is the body you put here in the unweeded garden. This is the toil beyond the fences, the rebellion of the soil – with breath in it, the scorch, and even worse… the unending waiting.

4. Yes. I lifted the rock and struck his temple. You lifted the smoke and struck me beneath the skin. (I lifted the first fruit – the choicest of the flock and yet was still struck. Were you not my keeper also?)

5. Voice from the deep, where will you lead me? Where will you have me place my feet? Where will you have me pitch my tent? Where shall I call home? Why, when you call in the night, won’t you show me the place to which you’re headed? To which we are headed?

6. For those I have forsaken, and for those I have brought with me, show me more than just stars. My flesh is old, as old as the promise whispered in the darkness. Follow, you said. But lifetimes later… I’m still lifting my tent pegs.

7. Will you destroy the city when 1% is righteous? Will you destroy my name or leave me a remnant? If you will then why the following? Why the calling?

8. Bless what I have dismissed.

9 – 16: neither of us have had the opportunity to laugh.

… here my scriptures end…

#Adide2016

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Faith: Dancing with Donald Grump

A River Runs Through It and Other Stories (1976)

I climbed to the top of the peak. When I looked, I knew I might never again see so much of the earth so beautiful, the beautiful being something you know added to something you see, in a whole that is different from the sum of its parts. What I saw might have been just another winter scene, although an impressive one. But what I knew was that the earth underneath was alive and that by tomorrow, certainly by the day after, it would all be green again. So what I saw because of what I knew was a kind of death with the marvellous promise of less than a three-day resurrection.

 

Might be a question that primarily reflects my own experience but, did Christmas catch you at a bad time? I know with all the lights and resurgence of that Michael Bubble album on the radios; and the many Christmas jumpers, it may seem as though happiness was thrust upon everyone indiscriminately. I don’t know if, like me, there was a grump who got pummelled into dust by the relentless call to think in a celebratory way; a grump who couldn’t escape the responsibility to respond from the recesses of what he/she knew instead of how they felt.

I won’t lie, for me, the time spent putting together the lego Millenium Falcon, and the 1000 piece star wars puzzle I received for Christmas helped the grump have some space to find perspective. I am not a Christian (lol init!). I know how important this whole birth of a King stuff is, and not just in terms of when I eventually get to heaven but more importantly for the life I lead now. Yet neither of those two facts sheltered me from the true and valid emotion presented by Donald Grump, who had casually found his way to the throne room in my heart and was wiggling his bottom on the comfy this-is-how-I-feel-right-now throne.

The presence however, of Donald Grump, didn’t negate or even diminish the truths to which my life was to be ordered. Maybe it was the reading through and around the scriptures for the two Advent and Christmas eve sermons; maybe it was the look on the people I loved in whom the hype had fully set; maybe it was the reality of the temporary reign of Donald Grump. Either way, alongside the lull, there slowly grew a warmth that eventually danced in the throne room in spite of, but not to spite good old Donald.

Here was the lesson I had forgotten, was reminded of by the experience, and have found expressed in the quote from Norman Maclean.

“Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (NRSV Heb 11:1).

OR

“The fundamental fact of existence is that this trust in God, this faith, is the firm foundation under everything that makes life worth living. It’s our handle on what we can’t see.” (MSG Heb 11:1)

OR

“faith comprehends as fact what cannot be experienced by the physical senses” (AMP Heb 11:1)

 

Because I believe that this child whose birthday the whole hype is about, I find myself placed among those for whom a future season of joy and happiness, and more importantly peace is guaranteed. I can rest on the truth that this guarantee is not just for what is to come, but that because of this same child what is to come is a possibility in the Now. Forgiveness means that Donald Grump is disregarded but rather embraced and renewed; loved with a patient passion; cherished into shining with happiness.

In other words, the sorrow that stood in the way of my joining the hype was as temporary as the seasons which Norman Maclean observed. It was subject to change. And the only permanent thing was the ‘ALIVE’ and ‘MAGNIFICENT’ promise of a resurrection from which there will be no death.

The warmth that danced in the throne room was always there dancing: He is the King who doesn’t need to sit on a throne to reign; whose dancing was permanent and infectiously changing all who sat on the throne into movers and shakers and spreaders of joy, and the peace that undergirds it.

The Norman Maclean book.

 

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