Lost Generation (Two word poem)

Generation lost!

Fate failed

Societal cost

State mailed

Carelessly tossed

Youth jailed

************

Unloved most

Abused, derailed

Suffering host

Psyche frail

**************

 Scoured coast

Feelings stale

Future’s toast

Rudderless tale

Some time ago I visited the state adolescent Youth Services Center stationed at Watkins Mill, the state sponsored program for abused and problematic adolescents.  We folded bags for Harvester’s, a food pantry in my area, for an 8000 bag food drive.  I spent an amazing couple of hours with 6 girls, all of whom thrilled to have a visitor and to help with the project.  Afterwards, we shared teenager approved snacks and played Apples-to-Apples, and eye-opening experience to me.  Very few of them could read or understand the words, even though they loved the game.  My heart ached as the young quiet girl next to me tried to sound out words and whisper questions about what they could mean.  She seemed so lost and scared.  While I didn’t know her story, most of the kids placed there are for delinquency, truancy or protection from abuse.  But I was amazed by their sense of fun, politeness and camaraderie.  And touched by their immediate acceptance of me.

I highly recommend trying a service project for yourself.  My day had meaning for both myself and a half-dozen girls who otherwise would have spent the afternoon with no visitors and nothing to do.  Some of these young people don’t have a permanent home to go after their stay at the program ends, having been abandoned by their family.  They will either be placed in foster care, where they will be shifted from house to house until their 18th birthday.  There is no transitioning program.  When they are 18, they are released to go their own way.  No wonder so many go into drugs or prostitution or crime.  What else have they been prepared to do?  Having no home, no family support, no mentor, they are

 L-O-S-T    S-O-U-L-S

I thought the beautiful song “Dream With Me” was very appropriate for this post.  It was written by the soprano prodigy Jackie Evancho and her father and appears on her debut album “Dream With Me”.  Check her out if you don’t know her, she has a voice that will make your mouth drop with shock.  While I am just a shadow,  this is an honest and simple rendition with no equipment or embellishment.  I hope you will love this song as much as I do.

Dream With Me A Capella

Two word poem:  a very simple form with two words in each stanza

Purposeful Life (Senryu)

Our reason for life

God’s beloved creation

Worship gives purpose

≅

This is why we are here.  I hope that you will find this truth in your life someday.  For me, kicking myself out of the drivers’ seat and placing Jesus there has transformed my life.  Keep searching and ask the Holy Spirit to guide you to the truth of the gospel.

Senryu: same as Haiku in structure but theme is related to feelings and relationships

 

Viral Warfare

Surrounded, my war-painted spirit flinches

as your jagged temper serrades my bones.

Minutes morph into miles

in this marathon inside my mind,

as weeping walls will their way, ever closer,

and closed cubbords hoard threadbare wares

once fattened with short-order convenience.

YOUR hateful words pierce their way

through my hunger-worn bowels;

MY hangry mood feebly deflects

darts dipped in sweetly-poisoned jibes.

I claim my territory with warrior yells

as our marriage vows dissolve

into an acrid covenant of fear….

an uncounted tragedy of viral warfare.

∞

I have been deeply saddened that many couples in China have survived the horror of long quarantine only to succomb to the pain of divorce.  I woke up with some of these words in my head, only imagining the stressful events that led to this decision.  I pray for healing and hope to come to our lands soon.  But more import

 

 

Attraction Reaction (Etheree)

Fire

Passion

Hot ardor

Smoldering heat

Flaring emotions

Boiling, red-hot anger

Volatile declarations

Vacate with a bang and a flash

Tears carbonize ventricle edges

Curbed,  fire and ice create flowing water

Ice

Restraint

Arctic vibe

Chilling retreat

Glacial hardening

Stiffened, white-frost anger

Frigid repudiation

Abide as veins harden to ice

Tears glaciate ventricle edges

Curbed, fire and ice create calm synergy

∞

Perhaps some of you are in a relationship of opposites.

One full of passion and fire, who feels too deeply and the singed scars cause the heart to fail over time.

The other reticent and restrained where all feeling flows in a subterranean underground and rarely bubbles to the surface.  They feel, but ruthlessly regulate it.  Thickened ice causes the heart to fail over time.

Couples like this can be wonderful, a beautiful balancing act.  But this type of relationship requires constant re-zeroing of scales, or the balance turns into chaos.  To those of you who are happily balanced, you are blessed.

 

Note:

Etheree: Consists of 10 lines of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 syllables. Etheree can also be reversed and written 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Get creative and write an Etheree with more than one verse, but follow suit with an inverted syllable count.

Picture: aroostookreview.umfk.maine.edu

SonRise

As I gaze upon the sunrise,

God’s promise, renewed each morning!

These gorgeous,  multi-hued skies

lost to souls weary and scorning.

Each sunrise daily shows Your Glory!

This wonder renewed, viewed by all eyes,

unappreciated by the lost and forlorn.

Few thank You for this glorious prize.

But fewer men, your finest creation,

praise You daily; your gift of salvation

unknown to these unsaved nations

who daily rise, their unwelcome yoke

hot as flame, heavy with despair.

Unaware that Jesus, in agony, broke

Satan’s hold as Lord of the Air.

Few now seek you in prayer.

Hearts, black with hate, do not care,

rejecting gifts You renew and repair.

We trash your creation, living for cash,

hoping that riches will heal the ache.

Billions of lost, angry, unsaved souls

do not understand what can create

a renewed life, a spirit fully whole.

Belief in Your sacrifice will make

a Son Rise that all can appreciate.

∞

The Good News of the Gospel transcends time.  May you be renewed and rest in Jesus (Yeshua) finished work on the Cross.

Passion in Gethsemane

The poem below imagines Jesus’ prayer to His Heavenly Father asking God to take the upcoming suffering away from Him.  I can’t imagine the wrenching pain this separation caused to Our Heavenly Father and His Only Begotten Son but I know it was a singular event that became the bridge that is our only connection back to Jehovah.  I hope you have a blessed Good Friday and remember Jesus’ great sacrifice for us.

Jesus:
Oh Father, take this cup from me

Jehovah:
My dearest Son, you will set mankind free.

Jesus:
Father may Your Will be done….

Jehovah:
You will knit the breach, my Son

Jesus:
Father, My tears fall like bloody rain!

I cannot bear the spiritual pain

and I am afraid, this body so frail.

Jehovah:
My Son, you will not fail!

Your sacrifice is the final end

and a perfect, permanent mend.

Jesus:
Is there no other way?

Jehovah:
Keep the faith dear Son, do not stray.

Jesus:
I will do as you command.

Jehovah:
Soon, by My right hand you will stand.

Jesus:

The burdensome sin of man

almost breaks me. Please hold my hand.

Jehovah:
But at some point I must let you go.

Jesus:
Leaving me will tear my soul you know,

for we have never been apart.

Jehovah:
Turning my back will break my heart!

But have faith my Son, this will soon be done.

And I will hold you close when we have won.

Satan’s hold on earth will break;

hold on for our creation’s sake.

You will free them from their sin!

Your sacrifice the final, perfect win.

Tethered (Triquain)

Tethered Heart

Grounding my Paupered Soul

Forever Bound by Undeserved Grace

Spiritual Strength in this World of Insanity

Purposeful Life, Wanderless No More

My Hope and Redeemer

Creator

∞

Triquain: The Triquain, created by Shelley A. Cephas, is a poem with several creative variances and can be a rhyming or non-rhyming verse. The simpliest form is a poem made up of 7 lines with syllables of 3, 6, 9, 12, 9, 6, and 3 in this order.

REPENT (acrostic)

Rage….against this infectious storm

enveloping lands drunk with empty promise, as we

proudly stick up the middle fingers of our diverse gods toward

enemy number one, as Gods laws’ are spat out of minds.  And mouths

nepharious with artful deception, sequester away

time, which slides, with exponential speed, toward our ultimate doom.

∞

I think God’s hand is mighty in this pandemic.  He has timed the exponential explosion right when the salvation work of Jesus is celebrated.  As the worst of humanity rears its ugly head, society implodes when people have no hope.   And it is during this time of year when God’s hope is easy to read about.  I wholeheartedly believe that God is using  this virus as a way to lead people back to Him.  This may also be God’s judgment for our rampant and embedded evil and that the only answer lies in individual and world repentance.  Dont you feel the evil surrounding you?  Arent you tired of it’s hold on your soul?  It is time to repent, turn away from our sin, throw ourselves in front of the seat of our mighty Creator and accept His gift of salvation found only in Christ Jesus.  For some of you, time is of the essence and not on your side.  Now is the time to decide, now can be the day of your salvation.

God requires you to do the following to restore communion with Him:

Confess your sin to Him and ask for forgiveness

(Romans 3:23 All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God;  Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is Jesus Christ our Lord;  1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.)

Acknowledge that YOU can not save yourself and that you need God to save you through His plan of salvation.  Believe in God’s plan of salvation from eternal death through the sacrifice of His only son, Jesus Christ, who covered our sins and became our perfect and only sacrifice.  Confess that Jesus as Lord and Savior and call on Him for salvation.  

(John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. )

Living a life after salvation is an active process!  Turn away from your sin, follow God’s commands, grow in daily communion with Him by following Jesus daily. Confess new sin, read and obey the word of God, fellowship with other christians, look for opportunities to help others and spread the word of the gospel (“good news of God’s salvation plan”)

(James 1:21-22  Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.²² But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.)

Show evidence of your new life in Jesus and get baptized.  Baptism is a commandment that we are ordered to follow.

(1 Peter 3:21 Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.)

May God bless you and keep you in these trials.  The book of James  is an excellent place to start daily reading as the chapters are short and to the point and the advise is very practical.  Chapter one tells us how to live during trials and persecutions.

Acrostic: a poetry form where the first letter in the line spells out a word by the end of the poem that is related to the theme of the rhyme.

Drip Drop

Drip drip drop I have nasal showers;
 it’s really not embarrassing at all

◊

Drip drip drop this flow is powered
similar to the flow of Nigeria falls 🙂

◊
Drip drip drop and the allergic flowers
haven’t even made their first seasonal call

◊
Drip drip drop it flows hour by hour;
 I look like I’m having a really huge bawl

◊
Drip drip drop as I wipe and scour;
my skin is growing red-ripe and raw!

∞

I wrote this a long time ago (loosely to the childhood tune of “Drip, Drip, Drop”) when I was having some allergies in Springtime, but I thought that anyone right now with viral symptoms could appreciate a little lighthearted fun.  Be well, everyone.

For My Daughter [on her Eighteenth Birthday]

Can I count loving you 18 ways?

Can the moon measure its luminous glow

on newly captured fallen snow

or the sun count its glorious rays

as night fades to dawning day?

Can stars fall from awesome heights

to quench their luminescent light

or eagles soar on wings of time

 to prove our created paradigm?

Can all the waves on all the shores

be placed in drawers to be stored?

No, for these are marvels beyond compare

yet my heart does boldly swear

that my life will run out of days

before I stop loving you eighteen ways.