Life Was Just Happening

In a darker day,
In the pain and the sickness,
From underneath something scarred and torn
I can still see a light shining.

On nights when cold dreams
Blow through this sleepy town
And windowpanes shutter their last resistance,
I can still hear hope singing love's song.

And she has a voice so beautiful
That everyone stops to listen,
At least for a little while,
To the promise she mentions.

And I can't sleep
(How could I have slept?)
Until I meet her in the moonlight
And she smiles at me one more time.

Hope, where have you gone?
Hope, I can see you burning underneath.
This one is for you,
That maybe one day you’ll come home

And we will all have our hearts burst with light
And laughter that finds our new song for us.

To the Ends of the Earth and beyond

A few weeks ago, I wrote the following poem:


To the Ends of the Earth

Where is a promise when you need one?
Where runs assurance when you desire
Strength and mercy of heart?
It arises like dawn upon the ends of the earth.

When the world flooded,
Did the ocean waves feel redeemed?
Or did they always know the tide's rise and fall
Would one day break beyond the shore's barrier?

When rainbows color the sky,
Isn't the rain given a chance
To celebrate beauty
As well as to bring life to the dust below?

Aren't cloudy days the most joyful of all,
When a promise of refreshment seems imminent?
Do raindrops believe in the ocean they came from,
Or do they just enjoy faithfully sliding on their downward paths?

Is it wrong at all to raise your hands and face upward
In both rainfall and sunshine?
The light on the horizon - it is coming.
The bursting morning is arriving soon, surely you will run with me there.

*******
...And so I figured it was a decent poem, but didn't really put much stock in it. After I finished, I opened my bible and flipped to what I thought was going to be a random passage. And I would have thought so, had it not addressed the questions I had just asked, continuing the thought. The passage is Isaiah 41. Here are the first few verses:

"Coastlands, listen to Me in silence,
And let the peoples gain new strength;
Let them come forward, then let them speak;
Let us come together for judgment.
Who has aroused one from the east
Whom He calls in righteousness to His feet?
He delivers up nations before him
And subdues kings.
He makes them like dust with his sword,
As wind-driven chaff with his bow.
He pursues them, passing on in safety,
By a way he had not been traversing with his feet.
Who has performed and accomplished it,
Calling forth the generations from the beginning?
'I, Yahweh, am the first, and with the last. I am He.'"