Not Eden

Each night we dream of Eden
and drench our beds with tears
until dawn burgeons eastward
and morning rises clear.

Those dreams are fit for nighttime,
for we have never seen
a home but this, our exile,
where harps hang on the trees.

For this, too, is a garden,
each year by sweat renewed
until the day of harvest 
when God shall make it new.

No more the fruit of knowledge, 
but apples sweet and red
and wine and rushing water
and every bite of bread.

The harps hung on the aspens
no songs of Eden play
but notes that leave us gasping
when breeze-led branches sway.

And Christ, who walked the furrows,
shall gather in all these
and in his lasting morrow
shall make of this his feast.

Late summer dawn over the Mojave DesertCalifornia By Jessie Eastland – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=64756573

You Hide In Everything

You hide in everything,
delighting in your play—
you disappear in anything
each time I head your way.
The siskins' outstretched wings
reveal a golden ray
lain hidden as they perch and sing,
until they fly away.

You dance away from me
whenever I draw near.
I look and look but never see;
I hush but never hear.
The wrens may seem to flee—
they fly but do not fear,
and sing unseen in every tree
and ring upon my ear.

O God in every place
and with me, touch my eyes
to see the wonders of your grace
in their mundane disguise:
as fluttering through space,
or stillness split by cries,
a feather's brush against a face,
and every bird that flies.

By photochem_PA from State College, PA, USA – Bird in a tree, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=75359530