Tag: offering

Thistles

Cast out from our parents' garden,
poured our sweat into the soil:
Thorns and thistles for a harvest,
little for so great a toil.
Yet, O Lord, will you accept it
when we bring our sacrifice?
Will you, can you, take and bless it
if we have no greater tithe?

What you spoke at our beginning
when you took the formless world,
molded, shaped it, set it spinning,
called its dusks and dawnings good,
does that word still echo for us
though our shaping comes to naught?
Does that goodness still enfold us
if our harvest goes to rot?

Messy, naked, hungry, empty
we come from our mothers' wombs;
we will go forth in the same way
to the silence of our tombs.
Only you can fill these hands, Lord,
with the gifts you'd have us bring.
Take our nakedness and failure:
Let it be our offering.

Planta de cardo en flor, en una vereda de Montevideo By Fadesga – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=144819271

I Don’t Have Flocks

I don't have flocks to offer you,
just these two turtledoves;
if they could be enough for you,
you have them with my love.

I lay no treasures at your feet,
no more than two small coins.
All that you first have given me,
I give to you again.

Little enough, the gift I bring;
I pray, let it suffice.
Though but a meagre offering,
it is my sacrifice.

If I had cities in my hold
or talents in my grasp,
or harvests ripening to gold,
you would have but to ask,

but if I have no more to give,
do not be angry, Lord.
Still let it stand for all I'd have 
if you had given more.

And let me be content with this,
with giving you my mite.
If you have made me only this,
it's good, then, in your sight.
Frescos in Ferapontov Monstery – Lesson of the widow’s mite and Healing of two blind men, Ferapontovo, Vologda Oblast, Russia By Dionisius – http://www.dionisy.com/rus/museum/120/200/index.shtml, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=97153736

Turtledoves

I have no kingdom to my name,
no crown upon my head,
nor can I offer pow'r or fame—
but I can give you bread.

I hold no sway in mighty lands;
no influence is mine.
Take just the labor of my hands
to work your will divine.

I have no wisdom in my soul
nor supernatural light;
no fortunes bend to my control,
but just a widow's mite.

I have no gold or frankincense,
if you would seek them here,
but take my life and take my death;
anoint them both with myrrh.

Come, take me as the offering
each moment pouring out,
for I have nothing else to bring
but all my heres and nows.

And though I have no fatted calfs,
I give you turtledoves.
I give you all I've ever have.
I give you all my loves.
Dove with an olive branch, Catacombs of Domitilla, Rome By Dnalor 01 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=32603350Minolta DSC