Original Works – So Bright

I found this original poem/litany/thing in the archives of my old LiveJournal. Looks like it was written in April of 2007. It doesn’t have a title and is one of my early, flimsy attempts at being poetical. 

why so bright a generation
lost in desperation
believing the lies
fed through the lines
that are supposed to connect us
we feel even more alone
purposeless
we’re defenseless
lost in self-pity and self-doubt
scared

is there hope
can we make a difference
if we’re all so stuck on the confusion
no affirmation
no clear direction

rudderless we float
in an abyss void of hope
we struggle and splash
hoping to last
knowing we’ll fade
wishing it wouldn’t go so fast
this life we’re wasting
seconds to minutes and hours fade
the years go by
and we’re left trying to keep the next
generation from failing like we did

futility
what’s it all for anyway?
my head and heart are heavy
crying out over the despair i read of in so many of my friends lives
i’m there, too.
failing, kicking and screaming in a silent facade
john, i don’t know where the bottom is, but i feel, like you, that i’m determined to reach it
sarah, i don’t know hwo i ended up waiting on things to make sense either, and now i’m scared i’ve screwed everything up
chels, your pain wrenches my soul, i wish i could heal it, but i know i can’t

sometimes i think healing and hope are the lie
my words are jammed up
i’ve forgotten how to praise, to be more than a conquerer
i want to stop being a shell of myself
and i wish the same for you

Pain & Hope/Light & Dark

When I heard Rob Bell speak late last year I had my trusty journal in my lap the whole time, armed with a pen, so that I could write down the many things he would say that I knew I would want to remember later. There are days that I’m grateful for my bizarre love of journalling… today is one.

I was just flipping through the  bound home of my errant thoughts and found the transcript from Drops Like Stars and stumbled upon this bullet: Michelangelo said – David was inside the marble the whole time clamoring to get out. The quotes I’ve found online from that famous sculptor range from, “I just chipped away the pieces that didn’t look like David” to “I saw an angel in the marble and chipped away til I set him free.” But something about the way I wrote down what Rob said seems more poignant.

This week has been an interesting one. At times I’ve felt very much the pain of the chisel chipping pieces away from me. Other times I’ve been grateful for the release of dropping something that is not really a part of me. The release has come in several forms: talking to precious friends, focusing my heart and mind on positive things, reshaping personal goals.

Sunday morning, in the midst of an Easter service a quote from Nietzsche popped into my brain – “When you stare into the abyss, the abyss stares back at you.” This reconnects with another idea from Rob Bell via DLS when he talked about the first century Christians knowing Christ as the God who put on flesh and suffered alongside them, I thought of Garden State when the three scream into the fault. I imagine Jesus, in a raincoat, screaming with me.

Pain is real and scary. Sometimes it is easier to shove it down, use anger as an outlet, and pretend that everything is fine minus the irregular outbursts. A good friend urged me not to settle with this solution. So, I’ve been trying. And it’s tricky, but baby steps are taking me forward. I’m not a Theologian yet, and I’m not close to understanding the mysteries of God, I just try to make sense of the themes I see in my life. So, there was Good Friday and then there was Easter, and I’m somewhere a little bit in between.

To add a quick turn to this post, that sounds pretty bad, I will say that today was awesome. I got to spend time with a friend of almost a decade: Adam Darragh. We went to see the play he wrote Married and Ravenous in New York performed by some students from his alma mater which was awesome. And we talked for a bit and watched Cool Runnings and watched a bunch of students do team-building activities. I suggest you read about his adventures & musings. And I still managed to keep this under 500 words….