incantation

dark eyes sheathed in mystery and all the enigma of
an onion-skinned soul that never ends, but simply peels
again
to discover layer over layer of the hiddenness...

they, seeing all, somehow understand deeply what was given not to them
for understanding.
they, piercing beyond all superficialities, comprehending even
past the incomprehensible to the fundamental being of the
infinite indefinite
possess the knowing of an ancient sage.
earthy erudition
as of old.

ancient, aye, and infantile.
those mystic eyes be either- or be both
at once.
times once, they, young and open, wond'ring see
times twice they sorrow-laden be
as age
that knows the aching of a world gone wrong.

peeled soul, exposed yet not laid bare
in dark eyes of uncertain age.
seeing, almost uncomprehending. seeing, understanding more than
they can truly know.

enigmatic eyes conceal a paradox surprise.


this is a look into the past: written by naomi laine, about age 16.

of hope. and money.

spring break?

hah.

'twasn't lazy at all, but it was obscenely lucrative. i've been trying to decide if it's a fair trade, and i think i'm about to conclude that it is. money as a value might be petty and temporal and shallow, but you know what? it's handy.

a while ago i told hannah i felt like a hoarding, miserly wretch. she said that's perfectly okay, sometimes, and not to let my conscience get the better of me.

how freeing. this is what RAs were meant to be.

*
things are hard right now, in more than one sense and in more than one way. but Rest comes soon, and oh it will be beautiful when we are Revealed- for now, we are breaking, broken, and bleeding. but then again, so was He. and that's okay, too.






come find me at sunrise.

i'll be waiting.

in memoriam

find rest, o my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him.
he alone is my rock and my savation;
he is my fortress, i will not be shaken.
my salvation and my honor depend on God;
he is my mighty rock, my refuge.
trust in him at all times, o people;
pour out your hearts to him.
for God is our refuge.
ps. 62:5-8.

[next stop: anywhere but here.]

time.less

"in the reality of Now, the clock is always ticking. one might suppose, looking at the glossier advertisements of watches -ever more exact, ever more spectacular flashings of the passing second- that modern man considers time to be a lovesome thing, or, possibly, has a watch-fetish. we might be better advised to throw the lot into already-polluted lake erie.

and yet, after all, the clock is not always ticking. sometimes it stops, and then we are happiest. sometimes -more precisely, some not-times- we find the still point of the turning world. all our most lovely moments are, prehaps, timeless."
-from A Severe Mercy, by sheldon vanauken.

***
[reflections]

"the still point of the turning world..."

storms have an eye. a calm place in the midst of intractable fury. in the storm, but not partaking of its essence. the world is composed of time-things -watches and schedules and dayplanners, color-coded for convenience, just in case having your every move pre-planned is not constraint or indignity enough.

but somtimes, or rather, as 'van' says, "some not-times," i find the eye of time.

the eye of time is that indefinable non-moment (however long it lasts, whenever it chooses to come) when i am in the world, yes, but beyond it. not of it, not of its limitations and the things it is subject to. like the eye of a storm, it is a place composed of the storm, yet daring to defy its very essence. a place not subject to itself.

i can remember many afternoons spent with friends in the eye. friends and coffee (both unquestionably essential to existence), and long, drawn-out conversations of life, the universe, and everything. discussions of love, and reality, and captial-T-Truth, and beauty.... always beauty. other times, we would simply be quiet (as the best friends can). outside on a sheet, our ship on an ocean of rainbowed, flowering fields. we would play pretend (yes, pretend! and me nearly 20...), or read (silently, independently, though we always shared the good parts). we wondered. we dreamed. we thought. enjoying the eye. and each other.

they are, these measureless moments, foretastes of eternity.



if we really all have a kind of appetite for eternity, we have allowed ourselves to be caught up in a society that frustrates our longings at every turn.



although time is like air, in that it is part of our environment, we hate it instead of loving it, as we love air. time spoils our lovliest moments. animals don't seem to notice time. it doesn't trouble them. time is their natural environment. why do we sense that it is not ours?


we try to subject ourselves to time and always go away unsatisfied.





....i have seen the burden God has laid on men. he has made everything beautiful in its time. he has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end....

blue like [jeans]

don't forget me, god.
looking through these ragged soul-strands that
(stragglingly) hold together just enough so that
i don't go spilling
everywhere.
*
see me in my worn out jeans.
broken- bent, but beautiful
(i think)
in the way a child's misshapen masterpiece has beauty-
poignantly.

fighting, no holds barred, for a glimpse of Reality.
*
yesterday, i saw an old man, smiling on the sidewalk in his
torn and dirty clothes. his face was worn and creased with
all the parts that make people old, you know. the worries about
bills and kids and family life.
his smile was young, though. young and bright, despite the yellow of his
uncorrected teeth.

somewhere near the origin of his smile, there is hope.
*





yet i am still confident of this: i shall see the goodness of the lord in the land of the living. wait for the lord. be strong, and take heart, and wait for the lord.

a small reflection.

so. numero uno.

i'm realizing how much my soul has missed contemplation. i'm not cut out to be a college student. i thought i was, at one time. but i'm not. i was made for quiet. for slow. for coffee and, yes, intellectualism, but over a fire.

for tonight, i burn my candles on every end.



the mercies cover me still.

on prayer.

Then a priestess said, "Speak to us of Prayer."
And he answered, saying:
You pray in your distress and in your need; would that you might pray also in the fullness of your joy and in your days of abundance.
For what is prayer but the expansion of yourself into the living ether?
And if it is for your comfort to pour your darkness into space, it is also for your delight to pour forth the dawning of your heart.
And if you cannot but weep when your soul summons you to prayer, she should spur you again and yet again, though weeping, until you shall come laughing.
When you pray you rise to meet in the air those who are praying at that very hour, and whom save in prayer you may not meet.
Therefore let your visit to that temple invisible be for naught but ecstasy and sweet communion.
For if you should enter the temple for no other purpose than asking you shall not receive.
And if you should enter into it to humble yourself you shall not be lifted:
Or even if you should enter into it to beg for the good of others you shall not be heard.
It is enough that you enter the temple invisible.
I cannot teach you how to pray in words.
God listens not to your words save when He Himself utters them through your lips.
And I cannot teach you the prayer of the seas and the forests and the mountains.
But you who are born of the mountains and the forests and the seas can find their prayer in your heart,
And if you but listen in the stillness of the night you shall hear them saying in silence,
"Our God, who art our winged self, it is thy will in us that willeth.
It is thy desire in us that desireth.
It is thy urge in us that would turn our nights, which are thine, into days which are thine also.
We cannot ask thee for aught, for thou knowest our needs before they are born in us:
Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest us all."


-kahlil gibran