For creation awaits with eager expectation the revelation of the children of God; for creation was made subject to futility, not of its own accord but because of the one who subjected it, in hope that creation itself would be set free from slavery to corruption and share in the glorious freedom of the children of God. —Romans 8:18-23
Creation groans for this, that cannot speak: a seed that rises without dying first, the dove come back, a green twig in its beak, from springs that never flood but quench our thirst with raindrops that return again on high and draw us with them through the further sky
to where no petal droops, no sparrow falls, no lambs are ever lost from grazing flocks, no weeping mothers keen unceasing calls for fledglings snared by huntsmen or by hawks; where broken bread is yet forever whole and still the crushed grapes overflow the bowl;
where harrowed earth, its fertile furrows red with iron, like our torn and tattered flesh, rejoices that its scars have never bled and life springs up not ever knowing death; where birth is not accompanied by tears and shadows in the valley hold no fears.
A seed falls there as gently as the rain and unharmed in the furrow sprouts and lives to see its offspring in the golden grain rise up as swiftly as the good earth gives to be both merrymakers and the bread there at the feast where every hope is fed.
Beneath the shadow of almighty wings the hawk and hen are resting with one brood, and every creature lifts its voice and sings— oh, we have waited for this since the Flood! The day will come when joy will fill the nest: Creation groans until we find this rest.
When the wine ran short, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.” Jesus said to her, “Woman, how does your concern affect me? My hour has not yet come.” His mother said to the servers, “Do whatever he tells you.” —John 2:3-5
Your hour had not yet come, when heart’s blood shedding you should make all things reconciled in you, nor yet the further hour, the Bridegroom’s wedding to make your work in Eden live anew, and yet this hour was yours, its feasting, too. You made the hour; you made all things that are and every drop of water in the jar.
Your hour has not yet come, but see our thirsting, you who see everything and every hour and who fill all of them, fill them to bursting but hold them still together by your power so mercy blossoms in us as a flower: You made us, and you make us ever new, new wineskins for the new wine that is you.
Your hour has not yet come, but you are in it, O logos with the Father ever one, the hour of timeless victory: You win it and let the eternal will be ever done, but our brief hours run swiftly as the sun. The joy your hour imparts is yours alone unless you bring it here from heaven’s throne.
Then let your hour be come, the hour of blessing, not just when bells in celebration chime, but in each moment’s pleading and confessing, the ticking-by of ordinary time. The water that we pour turn into wine decanted from your someday wedding feast, and pour your great love into all our least.
Descent of the Holy Ghost, Pedro Machuca, ca. 1520-1530. Museo de Arte de Ponce. The Luis A. Ferré Foundation, Inc. Gift of Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York. Photo taken by author.
They crowd the spaces of the colonnade, drawn to the sound of wind, the strange new light that casts the outer court in deeper shade, to see the plain men’s faces burning bright but not consumed, the woman robed in night.
Spectators gape or lost in wonder stand and grifters shift to conjurate new ploys. Amid the babble, tongues from every land, one sits in silence, deafened to their joys— the rushing wind, the languages, just noise.
Where some see miracles, some merely charms, his eyes see only night and deep despair. Where are the homeward road, the father’s arms? Where is the welcome for the son and heir? A thousand miles away, and he not there.
Now all the faces near him shine too hot. Too long out in the cold, a warm hand burns like tinder when the falling sparks have caught, too bright for his dark eyes, and so he turns. Too many roads will suffer no returns.
Some nights are endless, only borne alone, unless a line of light shines out, extends beyond the faces, past the strength of stone: A true line has no start and never ends but from the heights to hell itself extends.
At that time Jesus exclaimed: “I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to little ones…. Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.” —Matthew 11:25-30
And am I learnèd, then? And am I wise that you have hidden these things from my eyes? Not childlike, I, so you have not revealed the mysteries from ages long concealed; not trusting simply all the work of grace, so never fully looking on your face.
Happy the child who comes to you to rest, an infant curled upon his mother’s breast. Happy the ones who comes with empty hands: Beneath the shadow of your wing he stands and asks for all he needs. He shall receive. Happy the ones who hear this and believe.
But I have carried laws like bars of gold— a treasure and a heavy weight to hold. And if I set them down, O Lord, what then but that I’ll have to pick them up again? For wise and learnèd ones must bear them so who cannot bear, O savior, not to know.
But I am weary, Lord, of being wise and can be but an infant in your eyes. Give me that hope—let fearful heart relent! Give me that trust that makes me innocent. Let me drink peace from wellsprings dark and deep that I may lay this burden down and sleep.
Nel mezzo del cammin I-35 as it parallels the Mississippi River, I find myself midway through being alive, though no one knows our years except their giver.
The days we’ve lost forever fall behind; ahead the mornings yet to come enkindle and flare and fade as quickly into mind. If I have numbered mine aright, they dwindle.
Where prophets read the stars and lightning bolts to shape and steer the lives of men and cultures, I read the fields beside me: Mares and colts are grazing underneath the gaze of vultures.
Yet for all that, still something calls me forth; the road runs on along through death or birthing. From delta mud we rise up and head north. The journey’s end will find me still unworthy,
but I will drive ‘til I run out of gas and pray the miles hold some sanctification, for swallows dive beneath the overpass and rise again alive with jubilation.
Though I fly as the swallows, swoop and dive, though vultures eye me all the days I’m given, let there be mercy, Lord. Let me arrive and every wasted mile be yet forgiven. Amen.
Interstate 35 at milemarker 102 (just north of the Ladd Road exit) in Goldsby, Oklahoma. Image taken by user Scott5114 and uploaded 15 September 2005. Public Domain. Wikimedia Commons.
Jesus said to his apostles: “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” —Matthew 10:37-42
Lord, we’re baptized now into you, baptized into your dying, too. This valley you will lead us through, of shadows deep, will take us to our Golgothas, and yet you say, Take up your cross; take up the weight of pain and loss: The way is steep.
We leave behind what we have loved, our parents, children, in the dust. We leave them to the one we trust above all else. In truth, they were not ever ours but yours—O, hold them to your heart and keep them, though we dwell apart, yet with yourself.
And all we’ve gained is ours to lose, yet all we’ve lost is yours in truth. When mercy every life renews and deserts bloom, we’ll hear at last your great Amen: You’ll give us what we’ve lost, and then you’ll bring us back to life again out of the tomb.
So day by day and breath by breath befriending our eventual death we follow in our shepherd’s steps, remembering that we are mortal, doomed to die, yet even that shall pass us by when you have raised us to the sky, O savior king.
You fill my life with irises and callas, daylilies and my own chrysanthemums that flourish in the brutal heat of Dallas because you love—the greenest of all thumbs.
And I have taken root within our garden far deeper than I guessed such things could grow. New rootthreads sprout and in the dark earth harden; now they withstand your well-loved winter snow.
You grow here, too, beside me through the summer. We drop our leaves and wither in the heat until September brings the sound of thunder, and let the wind and rain and hailstones beat.
When January comes, how will it find us? Asleep and waiting for the end of gloom, our roots entangled so they join and bind us. When summer comes again, love, we will bloom.
I can’t find a good photo online, but if you’re in north Texas, you’ve seen along empty stretches of highway whole trees enveloped in wild grapevines. These are mustang grapes.
As leafy vines are swallowing live oaks, devouring miles along the interstate, and mustang grape swarms up the tree and chokes the branches, bears a bitter weight: inedible wild grape that cannot sate but only mocks the hunger it provokes,
so I am overtaken by this vine of thought, and bound within the twisting shoot that sprang up out of nothing just to twine about my being, crown to trunk to root, ‘til I am glutted on its sourest fruit and starving for the taste of bread and wine.
These grapes are bitter as the oak tree gall, dark as the shadows hiding them from view, but even so are harvested in fall and sugar’s added—buckets full—to brew sweet wine from sorrow. Thus we follow you: O sweet-as-honey Lord, redeem it all.
Kate Bluett 