Friday, August 14, 2015

Rivers of Living Water

Rivers of Living Water

We have lost magic and the holy wells.
I cry in an ordinary room.

Hope, which swims in Holy waters, slips out of my hands like a slick fish,
Even as I struggle to keep it from landing in the dry gritty sand of the rational life.
I will never be content here.

Here, the worst reality is the knowledge that you are limited.
A vining legalism twines around your potential. Here, the worst trial is the triumph of fear.
Anchored in doubt you sink to darker waters.
The end.

At least I am still shouting and cursing the day I was born,
 like Job.
Even with no magic; no Holy wells no hope, no wonder..
Job stopped short of cursing God.
Me, also.  I will not curse God.  
My life may be lost but I Am That I Am remains, 
And that is the ground of consolation.

But, blind faith is a cursing affair
Especially when one walks alone.

I look into night skies and see milky roads
Stars, pin pricks in dark paper
Letting light through by specks that would overwhelm us
Unveiled.

Satellites creep in every direction, 
Evidence of man’s ascension to realms of power
That turns magic to mere equations and wattage
Distracting the eye from the magnitude
And the mystery of profound wonder.
I am starving.

We are a conquered people, colonized and governed by machinery
Having traded art, music, ceremony, love, family, tribe,
Custom,, provision and enlightenment
For some mandated entitlement and big screen media flash.

We surrendered both community vision and solitary revelation
Our talents and gifts, turned aside
Because we are both too diasporic, and too local.

But, we are free, you say.  What is our slavery?
Loss of language, heritage, elders, ancestors
Our children,  who cannot stay here 
All swallowed by cities
All this limited to overreaching paperwork, 
Substituting economy for relationship.
I thirst.

My gritty little fish is gasping for Holy wells.
I stand upon dry sand.

On impulse, I open my mouth and the fish leaps in
Diving for my belly
And the rivers of living water.

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