answered and unanswered prayers

you were there yesterday as i sat

at the edge of my wit and desperately cried
and today my those needs are met
with my faith in you multiplied!

again i am in your presence

knowing too well that i cannot put you
or, your providence to test but i’ve the awful
memory of all unanswered prayers!

teach me the art to live and feel your presence

though unseen, absent and place my confidence
in your providence to receive my daily bread
and more that i may cease to fret and frown!

Note: Photo credit to Mario Flores!

pleadings from a bleeding heart

i am tired and i need to sleep

but by sticking to the truth and equality
of all persons made in your image
i have lost that sleep that i long very much!

in this world money in wallet

with size and location of ones abode
determine the value of men
and women demolishing all your values!

hence i sit here tapping my keyboard

to utter my unutterable pleading
bleeding from my soul
that has been sold and sold to you!

how long and how long should i tap

before you open your ear, your heart
to let my cries reach your throne
to release some relief, that grace!

hasten, Oh God! hasten to re-make

your world, where men and women
of all status will enjoy that respect
we give to the throne we have built here!

 

perfectly still

i thank you, though it is a silly act

to praise the providence unlike the moon
in size and strength increasing and decreasing
but shines consistently like that mighty sun
unaffected by the drifting clouds
nor bullied even a bit
by the transient permanent change in season!

keep me away from running after success in personal

professional, or spiritual kind, uprooting from my soul
that weed, that inclination for sainthood
the tempter secretly sows in moments of my slumber!

assist me with your grace to be still, perfectly still

like that pond heron standing on one leg!
press me hard with pain, your grace until
in you i am well grafted
leaving behind, and loosing
from my mind the thought of my growth
or, that greater fruit bearing!

 

Emma and Eva

your ways in the world, for me at least

is always a mystery, and often
very irritating to my sensibility!

Emma at her old age turns to you with great love

but all she reaps in that turning is more pain!

Eva despite her own misfortune works so hard

to care, but hardly anything comes easy on her way!

in this, how do you expect me to announce

your providence, your intimate presence
with those who call your name!

i pray that you heal Emma

and make the burden easier for Eva
proliferating your presence in their path!

 

late hour

the clock alarm rang at 4.00 am

i woke and pressed and i am
out of bed only at 6.14 am!

the bed is warm and i pull

my blanket right up to my neck
rolling and curling to make
my body more comfortable!

later, i call that my laziness

chaining my creativity and eroding
a life of potentials and this is where i am
now when i turn to you to confess
my wasted aeons and i beg for grace!

my repentance for the left-over days

i realize, is not deep enough
to turn my life inside out and make
a new path, to joy, i may walk!

hence i cling to you at this late hour;

please, push me not out of your abode
though many a chance i have missed!

for you and your hug, that grace is all

i need to which i am now a sure slave!

peace and tranquility

i do not turn to you for my peace and tranquility

though i will enjoy both if they are a by-product of truth,
righteousness and a sense of equality with no discrimination
towards the small, the poor, the less fortunate -

those who live in a humble

abode, and use little
or, no weight to throw around
to make life easy for themselves!

i find my moments with you filled with agitation

for i bring much conflicts to your table
ending up battling you like Jacob with the angels
on his way to make peace with his brother Esau!

i pray that you give me grace when the going is tough

that i may never disown that which you own
deep in your heart and soul that i may learn your will
and live the same even when that brings nothing -

nothing but a constant pain

for there is more peace
being grafted to your mind
than in all peace and tranquility!

road less travelled

road less travelled is the path

i want to traverse like the Man from Nazareth
refusing to flow with the flow
that had its benefit package and perks!

road less travelled is the path

not for the feeble and frail in heart and in soul
but only for those with a mind that Man
christ carried emptying emptiness of the world!

road less travelled is the path

of transformed non-conformity flowing
from the choice consciously made like the Nazarene
in wilderness battling the tempter!

road less travelled is the path

to death of that ego, the picking up the cross
to follow a crucified Master, the plain son
of a man with no place to lay his head!