Jottings and Meanderings:

For anyone who leads an incredibly boring life, and would therefore like to read the rest of the poetry that was scribbled into odd corners of my notebook during this year- this post is for you. I thought of giving this some really impressive title, such as 'The Complete Unpublished Works of Sharon L. Moore', but I fear, gentle readers, that you will see all too clearly why the various artistic efforts of 'Sharon L. Moore' remain unheralded and unpublished! So, here they are, a scrambled collection of jottings and meanderings, to be enjoyed or ignored as you please:

Lamentations 3:22

And yet- (O praise Him for that yet!)
I call this promise to my mind
Though every hope I may forget,
Still happiness in this I find:
By His great love we still prevail
For His compassions never fail!

3 A.M. View From My Window in January: ( That sounds impressive! :-P )

A dreaming haze of pale azure
And golden lights rests on the snow;
Dark tree-shapes cast a blue allure
Where shadows stretch along the glow
Of sleeping ice and frozen street.
They strain, elongated and slim
From deeps where tree and shadow meet;
Arch past the realm of shade and dim
To burst in brittle lines of bloom-
Strange fragile bones of gilded blue-
A skeleton of flame and dew-
Shivered to powder at a touch;
No living hand can finger such.

The Question:

And what is Love? I found it at His hand
When every other love of mine had failed
And left me crushed- do not misunderstand;
I did not come to Him a supplicant
For grace or tenderness, but rather, railed
Jeered, spit into His face- wholly rebelled,
The more He wholly loved- I never meant
To rest upon His strength, and yet He quelled
Hatred in me, and spite, and He has nailed
The gate between us to the side until,
My Love, He could cross over unto me
And bring His captive over into Him!
My Life, My God, Belovéd! dwell and fill-
Work, praise, abide in me- hads't Thou not moved
The walls that parted us, I had not loved!

~~~~~
But here I stumble at the rim
Of dizzy heights; my prayer will be
Since I lack strength to cry to Him
'Lord, cry in me!'

Lord cry in me, I cannot call
My eyes burn, ache, but do not see
My God, I cannot come to You at all
So come to me.

Lord humble me, chasten and rend
My knees are stiff, and will not bow.
I have not any love to give,
Love in me now.

Lord pray in me; my heart is cold.
Replace the stone with flesh and fire
I cannot yearn for You- then Lord,
In me desire.


An Informal Sonnet:

The saying goes, 'Love does not dominate;
It cultivates.' My face is hot with shame
To think of all I've gilded with Love's name
That did not bear Love's Spirit, or its trait
Of self-forgetting- how can I but blame
My soul-corroding pride, or too much hate
This seething love of Self that did create
Such lovelessness, which childishly I called
My 'love'? Was that indeed such 'love' as I
Thought worth receiving? Thinking now to buy,
And now to grasp- which sought to elevate
Itself, and not its object- love that mauled
The very name of Love- O, God create
THY Love in me, that I might imitate!

~~~~~~~~~

A rushing murmur is the creek;
The quail burst from the grass a whir
Of stuttering wings- the things I seek
Are but a ripple and a blur.

I may cup water in my palm-
I cannot cup the greenish pool
Nor every golden light and stone
And mossy branch that makes the whole.

I may pluck feathers from the grass
Or let the wind rush past my arm
I cannot pluck the speeding birds
From out the wind; their wild alarm

Their frantic wings, and wilder flight-
Are beyond reach of touch or sight
Neat-patterned plumage, coat of gloss
But flashing memories of loss.

A rushing murmur is the creek;
The quail burst from the grass a whir
Of stuttering wings- the things I seek
Are but a ripple and a blur.

~~~~~~~~~~

"And so they melted all their gold
And cast it in a bovine mold
Where now their offerings they bring
To bow themselves before the 'Thing'.

And when by prophets they are governed
Yaweh as their lawful Sovereign
All that the silly creatures crave
Is, "Kings, like OTHER nations have." "

History has not treated kindly
Israel, she who followed blindly
Hand-fashioned gods, and sinful men
For this was wrong- but then again,

We of today are not much better-
Israel balked when Yahweh led her-
Still the ancient impulse lingers-
We want a god in reach of fingers.

Man, who cannot see much beyond
Himself, forever must be fond
Of asking ('if it's not too much!')
For gods that he can see and touch.

Man, who must play the ages' fool
Chafes at his wise Creator's rule
Favors abuse and subjugation
Under a human domination.

Well may we laugh at Israel's blunders
Yet, there come moments when one wonders
Why we should deem ourselves exempt
From this we treat with such contempt.

Moderns, eschewing wood and stone
Hunger no less for gods their own
Humbly exalt, with reckless vanity,
Struggling and sorrowful humanity.

Often we fill our 'obligation'
Toss God some phrase of approbation-
Rarely will foolish man commence
With worship and obedience.

Humans instinctively disdain
Life underneath their Maker's reign-
We're glad, of course, that Christ would die
But will not call Him Adonai.

From the beginning we've colluded
Plotted and schemed (myself included)
For the illusion of control
Over the sorry human soul.

Lord if I come now, brokenhearted
Back at the point from which I started
Sickened to death of self and sin
Will you receive me yet again?

Lord, I'm afraid I still am fighting-
Even this moment, as I'm writing
Longings to throw off bit and bridle-
Take to myself another idol.

Knowing from trial that the conclusion
Surely will shatter my illusion
Still I go hungering to find
Solace from one of 'my own kind'.

Help me to keep to this decision:
Though far beyond my hands and vision
Vast though You be, though broader, higher-
You will I make my sole desire.

Every heavy hanging minute
All of my life, and all that's in it
Loneness, bewilderment, and pain-
All that I am is Yours again.


View From My Window On a Blustery May Afternoon: ( :-P )

A flash of butterfly-winged
Leaves- in a lime-bright whirl
Like a storm of stars
Flutter between the mystic gaze
Of an April sky and me-
Sunlight bursting
In fiercely yellow blooms
Sprinkled in glints across
Leaping ripples of grass-
I lean
Into the boisterous air,
Past the thrust of the wall, and
The decorous bounds of the window
To catch
The glad heels of the romping wind
Painting the gold-green world
Cerulean blue.
The horizon
Rushes before me- a barricade of towering trees
Stamping and tossing their heads
In their earth-bound fury
Of root-anchored, green-swelling
Impatience- the world swings upward, then down,
Patterned with billowing shadows.

~~~~~~~~~

The night was a slavering Thing of shadows
and fever- the pillow hot with it. Night
was a claustrophobic weight- a smothering of darkness
a suffocation of darkness like blankets
Heaped upon blankets- Life, Sound, Wind, Liberty, Light and Coolness
Were words from another realm whose meaning jarred
Upon low-ceilinged, black realities. Parched lips muttered
And cracked with soreness. Fought to draw air
in- gasping with flattened lungs- then silence.
The nightmare prospect of years stretched in a grim line
Where leaden feet must stumble.

It was some writhing hours later I stood
A cold, broad plain stretched out before me, rose
A slope. Where sparks teemed in the stillness- flung
Wonder into a gaping sky- then music soared
Passion and tenderness, eagerness, loveliness
For You came gladly singing, Morning Star.
Beginning and end for me- You, never begun nor ended.

Your promise brightens on the clouded rim
Of earth- dawn sweeps horizons, and I gaze
At that white creeping radiance- a glow
Lights up my farthest sight- the whole world lifts.
It turns its head to catch the throb of drums
And pulsates as the sunrise, thundering
Rolls crashing past the black-edged wall of hills
And over greyish fields- the promise holds-
Eternal, Morning comes.