This is a poem I wrote on the advice of my Spiritual Director. I read it to my friend Mark (you should check him out here) and he said it would be worth publishing. So here we are.
“Taste and see that the Lord is Good,
Forget not His gifts” they tell me.
Let His wings form your blanket and shade.
Let His oil drip, honeylike, into the cracks of your broken heart.
Let His joy be your strength
And His strength be your comfort.
He can put strength in your bones
And a path at your feet.
This whole maelstrom of meaninglessness
Can be inhabited with graceful purpose -
A paternal breeze to tempt you home.
The pillars of the earth to become the pillars of your esteem.
A staff to drag your sheep head out of the mud
And a rod to keep you on the path.
Fire to lick your lips and eyes.
A cloister of love to retreat to.
And identity as a beloved.
And a loadstar to become.
And then I read Your book.
With all its blood and darkness.
Your right to be obeyed
And willingness to kill if crossed.
Bizarre laws and rapes I have defended.
Delusions that invasions help the poor.
Warlords and petty tyrants as saints.
A God all spines and smiting
Who has to be constantly begged not to kill us
(To the tune of ‘Do not destroy’).
More about control than care.
Typical tribalism on a cosmic screen
With all the virtues needed for the mafia.
Baffling letters written by no one
Gospels full of stories that hurt.
An entire stupid waste of time
That made Western civilisation
And regularly guts me.
What a great Christian I’d be
If that Bible didn’t take God away from me.
And do you think I don’t know the answer?
I know all about faithful despair,
Symbolic readings and Christ centred hermeneutics.
But when I open that book it’s like I haven’t learned anything at all
Everything is swept away in one rush of unbridled terror
And I’m back to cringing like an insect before an angry God
Who had to kill His Son to be able to look at me.
But sometimes it doesn’t matter that I don’t care about the answer.
I give up, I get sad, I leave You, I turn out of habits and You are there.
And it all goes away and it’s just us.
I want what was promised.
My purpose, identity and lover.
But I’m stuck and what am I going to do?
