You got distracted cleaning the kitchen. I thought about telling you to hurry up. Realized it was already all too fast–you were already growing up too fast,
I should will time to slow down, distract it with something
To keep us here together
Just a little longer
I am haunted by a good thing.
We brought popsicles to the park. Melty hazards, right? So we are pushing the last of them on our kids when a small boy tugs my skirt and grins up at me–oh! His kingdom for a gooey fudge pop.
I felt terrible we had no more. I also felt terrible that I dripped on his adorable sister. Chocolate sugary baptism!
I rushed to the car and got some hugely inferior snacks. I wish I could have given my small friend a life-time supply of Popsicles. His openness and candor was a glimpse of heaven.
Because the kingdom of God was made for such as he…
I cry for a broken world and rough, broken people. I cry, and pray for the children.
The trajectory of flight
And the living animal in it
The color of the leaves
And the way they
Flutter to the earth
Gravity
And it’s seemingly integral role
In mating
Our divided selves
I understand my friend ignores
All these signs of his Creator
Blithely…
My little boy walks into
The room to talk to me
Small words in utter sincerity
And the perfect miracle of his face
Divine.
How can you not see?
The gift this child is?
The soft reflection
Of eternity in his eyes
What if I lost you?
What if you were not there?
What if one moment I saw you
And then blink
You
Were
Gone?
I ask myself these questions
With every beat of my heart
Knowing I have walked down these lonely roads before
Looking for the babygirlchild
Woman
I lost that day
no replacements found.
A friend asked me, do you put the kids to bed and at least get five minutes to yourself? No, I say, not really but I like them all…
Hours later I realize how strange that must sound, how incomplete. What I see in my head is thirteen years of eidetic episodes of unlikable events–bullying, tantrums, swearing, violent protracted rages, physical assaults, homicidal imaginary friends, routine larceny, and lies, cursing of the most egregious kind. Some stories so awful I do not want to write about the hurt. And all of this before the years of C’s sexual felonies were dragged to light.
Most sane and normal people would have known better, right? We believed if we did not give up on m and c they would be good, or at least better because of love. Because of Love.
Jesus said, greater love has no man than he lays down his life for his friend.
Somethings are easier than others to lay down, I say beneath the shadow of the Cross.
Those 13 years took things that did not belong to me from the most precious people I know. To say I like my children is an understatement.
They are my heroes.
Carrying Light 