when you sit on a garden bench
with the Friend
hands intertwined in the evening light
no words are necessary

a creed for the moment

I have set my mind free
given myself permission to turn away
allowed my heart the silence it craved

I have given up a voice I thought was truth
have learned to speak a different language
careful and quick to love paradox

the path is set before me
I walk with joy, with confidence
even though I walk alone

I come home

I come home to
the “I Capture the Castle” soundtrack
cry all the tears I didn’t cry this week
in the first song
the joy and gratitude
too much for my heart

I come home to
the bits and pieces of wisdom
still making their rounds
through my head
Dr. Seuss and Julian of Norwich
both reminding me that all shall be well

I come home to
the safety of a God
who doesn’t use many words
isn’t afraid of a little darkness
a God I don’t have to perform for
will never have to prove myself to

I come home
to quiet
to solitude
to beauty

hope

there is poetry
in the veins of leaves
there is music
in the swish of your cat’s tail
there is magic
in the smell of sweet roiboos tea

there is enough
there is wholeness
there is enough

Generate

Hey Everyone,

For the emergent minded among you, a new magazine is being launched called Generate . They are currently offering a great rate on a subscription to the first four issues. Generate is run entirely by volunteers, so this is a great way to support them in supporting the arts. You’ll find me in the inaugural issue coming out in October!

Enjoy!

Jess

suffering

*for my family

I hold the pain of the world
in these two hands
balance the groans of organs and bones
with the unspoken fears
of minds lost in thick cloud

I carry the sorrow of the healthy
between these shoulder blades
anger at the cruelty and confusion of the universe
the hollow grief of futility

I cradle the hope of beauty in chaos
in the chambers of my heart
and my blood carries a measure of peace
to heavy hands
tired shoulders

in the Mount Carmel Chapel

my whispered words shimmer
out across the chapel floor,
swirl around the candles
like so many dust motes
weaving toward the altar,
heavy and wooden,
a gravitational centre
for the orbiting light
filtered through blood-red glass.
eventually
it trickles through the choir stalls
and lands at my feet.

the Christmas Eve Service in the Basel Cathedral

the men’s choir sang old carols
to red sandstone walls
where the shadow of Erasmus
nodded in time
to flickering candles
the rhythm of liturgy
eight hundred people
gave birth to hope
as the bells called
“joy to the world”
into the centuries.

I am most real

for this hour my feet follow
the heartbeat of the universe
I shed dead skin, lay aside faces
it is here, in these petals
that I am most real

ambition

if the work of my life
is nothing more than this:
I loved (bravely and foolishly)
and reached for grace

I will lie down in eternity
with contentment.