P o e t r y

unfinished

     Hear speak of me and it's not easy.  Shadowed memories lie hidden away, or waiting for the huckleberry's trap door snap.  Shadowed, hidden, spooks in the dusky distance.  Bright light, torn veil, scales lie piled at my feet near the place of skulls and separation. . .

I'm actually trying not to be so obscure with this one. . .

My Wedding Dress is White

my wedding dress is white.
it shimmers.
sequins and beads are designed as flowers and leaves
embedded in the lace.
it touches the ground and
hides the wear of my shoes.
the dress was made for my body;
it needs no alterations.

I’ve chosen the earrings I’ll wear with my dress.
sometimes
overcome with anticipation and eagerness
I let myself wear them… for a few minutes.
I like how it feels to have them in my ears.
they dangle.
there’s an oblong pearl suspended
from a burst of sparkling stones.
these are the earrings of an elegant, sophisticated woman.
I’m trying to live into her position.

I’m going to carry roses-
red, white, and yellow.
I’ll choose a couple out of the bouquet
to decorate my hair.

my groom will wear a crown of thorns-
a symbol of the suffering love
with which we were betrothed.
His pierced hands will reach for mine,
with them He’ll draw me close.
and the radiance (which is His glory)
will envelope us both.
He sees my soul as white as my gown
and will renew His covenantal love.

with all His strength I’ll pledge my vows
completing the surrender of my heart/will to His.
in service, in gratitude, I’ll confess my faith to (in) Him.

my fiancé king, who financed my ransom,
prepares a honeymoon suite for us
in the house of His Father,
who will celebrate our marriage
(this mystery, the melding of two souls to one)
with the most extravagant of feasts.

our supernatural union
will extend into eternity
for Death has been defeated
and there will be nothing left to part us.

my wedding dress is white.
I am (We are) the Bride of Christ.

Emily Harrison. 4.28.06

Some thoughts ...

God is our collective obsession. We cannot help but turn towards Him, and by nature it is impossible for us to not seek Him, for it is written on our souls. Individually we may desire Him, but He is not the obsession of every individual. That is a state more aptly applied to the whole human race, who is given to the instinctual tendency to return time after ceaseless time to the attempted apprehension of the Maker and Fashioner of our selves and our world. Out of the depth of our common psyche comes forth the repeated, though often inadequate, reach for the Great Beyond. Humanity yearns for the Heavenly Father like orphaned nomads in a desert land, sensing somehow that the horizon of water and refreshment in the hazy distance is more than just a mirage.

Thought Streams and Violent Screams

being empty being dry
upheaval of emotions, dry heaves when I cry
a primal scream tears from the caverns of my throat:
ripping the esophageal lining, shredding the thin skin
inside my cheeks.
I've been like this for weeks, an empty being, a dry thing. A silenced thing. Yet this has been churning in me, twisting and turning, ricocheting off of the invisible barriers, the undaunted expectations, the emasculated sensations drawn together in a whirlwind of thistles and thorns, falling in places like unwanted rainstorms - rain, rain go away come again another day - except when voice rains thorns and thistles, there is no desire for the return.
And so when the primal cry escapes, it is a hurricane force blast of anger, fear, wind, blood, tears, pieces of the invisible barriers and emasculated sensations mixed with pieces of esophagus and cheeks.
It is a violent, bloody thing. It is a nameless demon; the origins, thus the reasons, are unknown. Anger isn't strong enough nor fear descriptive; apathy cannot claim it nor volumes of definitions define it
it eludes me yet hides within me;
if only I could find it, I could let go of it;
yet I hve no golden string and I fear the Labyrinth
of experience will swallow me in walls of reasonable traditions that have become excuses for the manifestation of the demon.
Yet, what if it is no demon at all? Not to blaspheme but simply to mistake, what then would it take to admit that the creature in the Labyrinth is actually Creator? To be sure, this would not alleviate my anger nor the violence of my screams; only now there would be ears to hear, not a demon manifested but a Redeemer revealed, a Spirit who heals.

Spun

Spin whiskey to me in the cold, deep hills of Kentucky.  Smokey minds lie hidden and beyond my eyes.  I still can't see, can't hold, can't breathe, can't be.  Spin memories in this broken hull of life.  This hopeless hope and wonder of anything now called free.  It's too dim to dance, I'm too thread-bare to carry, but I'm free and so indeed.  Indeed, but too dumb to care it seems, or notice truth before me, some hope right beside my not yet healthy mind.  Forgotten in the deepness I am, weary from the travels and falls; from all hope, from any dream of me and my mind half-baked and drying in the sun.  Bring back this common interest, this quick blinding sun in moonlight.  Fast shadows fall double-quick in time.  I'm here, I'm out, I'm dreaming in the cold Kentucky hills, in the fast, still-born washes of the deepest back wood.  This is just the flow, the in-breaking rush of water-light, quick like a watershed memory in time.  A matchstick memory smooth and quick and flicked to burst forth light in all and less of me.