Waiting for Snow

“WHAT A GYP!!”

With raised fist and gnarled face

I accuse the skies.

I have been waiting for snow,

wishing for snow,

praying, hoping, and fishing for snow.

I have been daring snow,

oh where-ing snow, and

(for reverse psychology’s sake)

not-give-a-care-ing snow.

All this and not one single flake.

But as my fist drops and my eyes come back to earth,

I sigh,

“God knows best.”

And this is the proof:

that between the second coming

and the fall of man,

I can get so worked up about something

like the weather,

and can fill a book with idle words

by which to be judged.

(Did I say not one single flake?

Well, there might be one here…)

Yet, I believe you understand.

I believe you do not think it petty

to be a man,

or to care for the sparrow,

or to pour artistry

into the icy iron-work

whose feathery falling

makes winter crunch deliciously

like the year’s dessert.

For this season

you precipitated:

spirit crystallized as flesh,

deity danced where the wind willed—

out from its cloudy veil,

down through empty skies,

and into arms that waited

faithfully.

The Wind and the Shadows

Around 2:00 AM

I hear the wind roaring

as it brawls

with anything and everything

in its path.

God knows where that came from.

For awhile I try to ignore it

and go back to sleep.

But after half an hour,

I give up

and go to the kitchen

for a glass of water.

On the way back to bed

I pause in the living room,

which seems to glower

in the moonlight

shining through the windows.

It’s been a long night.

Since I can’t sleep

I sit down on the couch.

Outside,

the wind rages

and rounds on itself

in the dark,

filling the room with

shadows

that hold my gaze

as they lash out

and gesture furiously.

Hymne to God the Father*

Before time

            your counsels chose

            that you would lose

eternal ties

            with your one

            and only Son.

Not sparing Him,

            you let the whips

            fall and the blood drip.

Judges condemned

            as the priests quipped.

On a dark hill,

            like Abraham,

            you left your Lamb.

No bright angel

            unveiled a ram

snared in thickets

            by its horns.

            Instead, the thorns

on Christ’s head caught

            the sacrifice

            of God’s own life.

Nails split

            His wrists and feet

            and severed sweet

communion, which

            left you bereaved.

Not even birth

            pangs compare to

            what you went through

at your Son’s death.

            Abba, thank you.

*The form of this poem was borrowed from Hymne to God the Father by Ben Jonson.

 See Ben Jonson's poem here:  http://4umi.com/jonson/hymn

Triptych: A Tree in Three Seasons

I.

Atop a hill there is a weathered oak

whose listless limbs spread so wide it seems

to hang by them and not to stand.  It’s bark

is scarred by whips of wind, by scratching beasts,

by birds that pierce its trunk with beaks.  When fall

arrives, a crimson stain spreads to all

the leaves.  They slowly trickle down beneath

a blanching sky, and then, leaf by leaf,

their reddish carpet covers up the ground.

It seems that with the leaves a peace descends.

The breeze breathes a sigh, perhaps relieved

and ready to forget how summer lived

intemperately.  But seasons change.  Amends

are made.  What was before cannot be found.


II.

Like a single, massive stone, clouds

roll in heavily overhead, sealing

everything in the darkened earth.  Stealing

downward, ashen snowflakes fill the ground.

Hours later, the landscape is buried

under whitish mounds.  The oak tree’s

limbs, covered in snow, slowly ossify

in the breathless, frozen air.  Nearby,

icicles curl over a stream, gripping

its banks like the fingers of a glass

skeleton.  The sun turns its vacant stare 

on the clouds, helpless to move them.  Everywhere,

silence keeps its secrets, and the days pass.

Winter is here: grave, still, and waiting.


III.

Early morning—like the first day

of creation—waits in dark mystery

for the light.  The dawn paints gradually

on its black canvass: first gray,

then color returns to the world’s

face like a man reviving.  All

winter long, the land has drunk the cold,

melting snow.  Underground, in small

gaps and crevices, things sprout and grow,

nourished by the runoff.  Flora raises

above ground, beyond the earth’s hold.

Limbs outstretched, the oak stands in bold

relief, suddenly shot through with the sun’s rays,

which crown spring and renew everything below.