Tag: Jeremiah 2

Broken Cisterns 2

A re-write of this:

We set out for our Edens;

we thought we knew the way,

but shimmers in the distance

have tempted us to stray.

Still, Lord, we were insistent

that you would bless our days:

We dug these broken cisterns,

then knelt and prayed for rain.



You opened up the heavens,

poured water through our hands,

but all that we collected

ran off into the sands.

We thought that you would bless us

and sanctify our plans,

but, God, our wells are empty,

and thirsty still we stand.



But you know well the desert--

through forty days and nights

you let yourself be tempted.

You know our tears and sighs.

And you have felt our yearnings,

our hungers and our drives--

then may we feel your mercy.

O Mercy, hear our cry!



Take all our broken cisterns

and make them sound and whole.

Our locust-eaten vistas

in you can be restored.

Our empty wells transfigure;

redeem our hungry souls

to hold the good you've given:
Pour out your grace once more!

Broken Cisterns

Two evils my people have done:
they have forsaken me, the source of living waters;
They have dug themselves cisterns,
broken cisterns that cannot hold water.

Jeremiah 2:13
We walked the desert distance

in search of welcome lands,

but dug these broken cisterns,

like graves, with our own hands.

We chased our own insistence

that shimmered on the sands:

Now we are trapped and twisted

in thirst that never ends.



Make haste, O loving Father,

to seek us ere we die,

your wayward sons and daughters

who flee your gentle eye.

We turned from what you offered,

yet, Mercy, hear our cry:

Pour out your living water,

for, oh! our hearts are dry!



Though what we dug was broken,

yet you can make it whole;

the years lost to the locust

in you can be restored.

Redeem our slipshod workings;

our wasted days transform:

Let them, too, hold your goodness:

Pour out your grace, O Lord!

Remains of a Nabataean cistern north of Makhtesh Ramon, southern IsraelBy Wilson44691 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18792763