The Namesake Dilemma

Posted on October 23, 2020 by Elea Lee

I have been waging a Sisyphean campaign to draw scrutiny to a large business deal.

One of the companies involved has clearly secular goals which are in frank opposition to the stated identity of the other.

The other bears the name of a good friend of mine. My best friend–

It troubles me that in recent years this second company seems to be more concerned with monetary transactions than honoring the name applied to its legal entity.

It is a good reminder for me–if I want to mark my life, my identity, my business, my things, with the name of my Beloved, well

I better make sure

They all really belong to Him

And we both know

He is my best friend, my boss, my king

Savior, Redeemer, Lord

God’s strong right arm.

Revelation 12:17 NIV

[17] Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring—those who keep God’s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus.

Killer Dogs/Beautiful Clouds

Posted on September 17, 2020 by Elea Lee

As you well know, I have been trying to focus on the presence of signifiers–the feral blender noises the dogs make when they are behind the dark door–the way the clouds pool and furl in beautiful splendor–let us say our daily prayers

Swap the signifiers

Killer clouds for beautiful dogs

This savage world/all ripped to pieces

While the light of one ordinary star is enough to

Remind me

Just how good you are

At holding on to me

All the same.

H. Turcicus

Posted on September 14, 2020 by Elea Lee

Oh howl, my intemperate soul–

Until it was too late

I did not realize who it was

Singing on the porch each night.

Thought it was a frog or a night bird

Not this perfect little cup-sized creature

I have no place to go to speak my grief

Only the knowledge that it is me and my kind who have

Ritualized the extraction

out, out

of each small, indelible singer

Leaving us to mother

Regret instead.

Silverfish

Posted on September 14, 2020 by Elea Lee

What happened to me, that in a moment of gargantuan hubris, I smudged it out? So what if it lived in the books or the play things? So what if it preferred the damp and closeted nocturne?

The moment before it was a glinty, wriggling alive

Then it was just an undoable regret

A life I should not have taken

We all have them–

Our ghosts, the ones we wish we could

Bring back whole

A parade of The Returned–

Uriah, John the Baptist, Stephen, Joan of Arc

Leaping and unfettered procession

Amidst the boundless sea of

The Redeemed

these trees of life

Splendor through the fence

Posted on September 12, 2020 by Elea Lee

I could be a quark or an hurtling star,

A duck or a chicken

Living on one side of a beat-up plank fence

With knots in it, and scooped out holes

Signifying they all used to be trees

and the fence and the yard and the girl are just

Another kind of spaceship

Prone to sunset

Nothing can stop the Splendor from breaking through

Every hole in the fence.

The Remarkable, “Yes!”

Posted on September 12, 2020 by Elea Lee

John 4:12 KJV

[12] Art thou greater than our father Jacob, which gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his children, and his cattle?

I have sat in the noonday sun with these two people for hours here and there over the course of my own friendship with the Man in the story.

He could have just answered her–

Yes!

You betcha!

Absolutely!

But he knows I will be listening, that others will be listening so..

John 4:13-14 KJV

[13] Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: [14] But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.

A person cannot go wrong with living water.

But it is worth noticing the question she asks–

Is Jesus more powerful than Jacob?

Strange to think of all the days when

The hope of Mankind hinge on the Jacobs of history.

When Jesus was coming

The Breaker

The strong right arm of God

The one who makes all other heroes look

Like chumps and losers

Jesus–

Living Water

A Drafty Letter

Posted on September 3, 2020 by Elea Lee

Bottomless

Posted on August 22, 2020 by Elea Lee

I pretend the river is bottomless because I cannot see it to the end

Because, so blue

when I come up for air she asks–does it get all of its color from the sky?

Hold this

river in your cupped hands

Until night falls on us all

Woman Up!

Posted on August 18, 2020 by Elea Lee

I have never been a roller coaster girl. Too queasy, but these days the ride is all mental grit and actuarial tables–I stop in the credit union parking lot just as the preacher on the radio quotes Jesus–ask anything in my name and I will give it to you!

Ok, God, I tell Him, make those doctors brave

Could substitute kind, generous, humble, compassionate

Feels impossible, I tell Him then

He reminds me

Impossible

Is His specialty.

Who protects the wary?

Posted on August 11, 2020 by Elea Lee

John 5:3-4 KJV

[3] In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water. [4] For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had.

My first question for you is–do you believe there was an angel who came down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the waters?

So one person each time could be healed?

Crazy, right?

But no crazier than believing that Jesus healed the man who had been at the pool so long, who does not turn out to be the most grateful healed man.

I have skirted the issue of the angel at the pool for years, choosing instead to focus on Jesus and the man and the religious oligarchs who made it hard for Jesus.

I understand that angel complicates everything–messenger of God who brings some healing, brings some hope only

In a certain season.

Carrying Light

Words for light

Category Archives: God