but God by Dwight J. Friesen I walked I ran I put my headphones on I turned up the noise I flipped the channels I changed lanes I turned the page I sampled a taste I couldn’t sit still I
The poetry I write usually flows from journaling or from times of SoulRest. I have no grandiose illusions about the quality of my poetry, yet it is mine. And though it is thoroughly idiosyncratic and amateurish it gives voice the
Today Lynette and I celebrate our fourteen years of discovering our own ways of reflecting God’s relationality. Fourteen years sounds like a long time to me but it sure hasn’t felt like a long time. In fact it’s hard to
A Daily Prayer by Saint Teresa of Calcutta Dear Jesus, Help us to spread your fragrance everywhere we go. Flood our souls with your spirit and life. Penetrate and possess our whole being so utterly that our lives may only
Church by Dwight J. Friesen Restless boy yanking at his neck tie Flipping through hymnals, Bibles and Sunday School papers No match for the sermon fidgets Those warming the pews trade yawns Waiting For the last song and benediction Long
Fake Plastic Trees by Radiohead, on The Bends Her green plastic watering can For her fake Chinese rubber plant In the fake plastic earth That she bought from a rubber man In a town full of rubber plans To get
failure by dwight j. friesen 2×4 skeleton Only partially dressed Weathered Rusted nailed Forsaken A castle never to be A dream awakened too soon? No moving vans No kids doing the “dance of the summer sprinkler” No humming lawnmower Or
Morning Poem by Mary Oliver Every morning the world is created. Under the orange sticks of the sun the heaped ashes of the night turn into leaves again and fasten themselves to the high branches– and the ponds appear like
Comfy Chair by dwight j. friesen Afghan wrapped and curled up in a comfy chair She sits for hours in another world Laughing and weeping with her fictional friends Her heart breaks with theirs Her tea grows cold, in her
Aimless Love by Billy Collins This morning as I walked along the lakeshore, I fell in love with a wren and later in the day with a mouse the cat had dropped under the dining room table. In the shadows
Hurt Covered by Johnny Cash, written by Michael Trent Reznor I hurt myself today To see if I still feel I focus on the pain The only thing that’s real The needle tears a hole The old familiar sting Try
A Prayer of Unknowing by Thomas Merton My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really
brittle branches by Dwight J. Friesen bunches of brittle branches felled – by sea gale and a large toothed saw no life no sap no flex no growth blocking sun cut – pile – burn it takes so little to
A Gift by Denise Levertov Just when you seem to yourself nothing but a flimsy web of questions, you are given the questions of others to hold in the emptiness of your hands, songbird eggs that can still hatch if
City Psalm by Denise Levertov The killings continue, each second pain and misfortune extend themselves in the genetic chain, injustice is done knowingly, and the air bears the dust of decayed hopes, yet breathing those fumes, walking the thronged pavements
Go to the Limits of Your Longing by Rainer Maria Rilke God speaks to each of us as he makes us, then walks with us silently out of the night. These are the words we dimly hear: You, sent out
This is to Mother You by Sinéad O’Connor This is to mother you To comfort you and get you through Through when your nights are lonely Through when your dreams are only blue This is to mother you This is
