Month: March 2022

“Come Play With Me”, Said God

“Mud Puddle Stompers” by clappstar is marked with CC BY-NC 2.0.

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“Come Play With Me”, Said God

By Jane Tawel

March 29, 2022

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There is always so much noise out there, and so much noise within. I let it play within my mind like an endless loop of commercial ads. Increasing the volume, I buy my way to shallows of meaning, hoping to find resurrection in more stuff. My fears are like puddles of mud that I have stepped in once accidentally, but keep on stepping in again and again, as if I could not walk around them. They seep into my soul like vinegar held on a sponge to anesthetize the feelings of the crosses we bear.  And we do all bear them, do we not? –what with the silence that roars with the absence of peace.

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They, (and you know who they are), keep telling me that God is just like me and I am just like God, and while they say that will fill me with hope for a better day and a better me and a better god, most of the time, it only makes me feel hollowed out and angry and afraid.

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Some of us find making words helps to clarify what we mean and the words can act like breadcrumbs dropped from our mouths as we try to find our way back. Back to God. Back to home. Back to ourselves. Crumbs of bread and this is My Bread, given for you. Take. Eat. Follow the crumbs from My Mouth.

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I said to God: “I am not like You, am I? I don’t want You to be like me.  A humanly-god, is too small for me. I want You to be Other.”

God Said to me: “I AM what I am, but you are not yet what you will be. Now you choose to be small, but a godly-human is as big as you should be. I want you to be you and yet not you. Just as you long for Me to be Other, I also desire for you to be Other.”

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I wept and cried to God: “I am sad. I am alone. I feel lost. I am lost. The whole world is sad, and lonely, and lost. It feels like it is always night. It is too much for me to bear.”

God wept and cried with me and said, “You only bear it alone because you choose to. I created day and night. I can bear all sorrows and turn mourning into Morning, and darkness into light. Your sorrow is the path towards Me. I am The God who weeps. Our tears will make a stream. Let us follow the stream of our tears towards Home and there we will live together in joy.”

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I said to God: “I don’t know how to love them without worrying about them and wanting to fix them.”

God Said to me: I love you without worrying about you or trying to fix you. Love as I do.”

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I raged at God: “I hate. I fear. I am so afraid that it makes me angry. I don’t want to die.”

God raged with me: “It is unjust, I know. It makes me angry, too, but not afraid. I am never afraid. Be One with me, and fear not. Know that in My Spirit, when you die, you are only then reborn. All is for The Good in Me. All is open and anticipating, like buds to rain and sunlight, ready to bloom into glory, ready to grow tall and strong under the canopy of My grace.”

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I searched for something more to say and something true to pray and the words were not in me but where of me and I could not frame the words because they were not of my frame, but I knew the words because they were of my spirit-soul.

God Said: “When you are able, stop looking outwards, you will not find Me there. Stop following your doubts, and trust The Way of faith. Stop your words and know My Word. Stop looking for your worth out there, and look within. And there you will find My Spirit within you. There you will know Our peace.”

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 I knew I was a human of unclean lips. And yet, I spoke to God the only word that is: “Love!”

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And then, without words, I was.

And when I had nothing left to say to God, I finally had found the vision of Who God Is and Who I am becoming.

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“Come play with Me”, said God.

And so I put on my big-girl boots, and began the Great Creation Dance; a dance with God in puddles, and messes, a rain-dance and a sun-dance, and an embracing of all the hurt and pain and laughter and happiness of growing. And all my words were childish joyful scribbles on the palette of World-Soul. And I began to see my muddiness as the fertilizer of Our Spirit.

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And with very few words, God and I began to Become.

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I am becoming a child who seeks the God Who Hides. And in my wordlessness, The Word finds space, and I find my becomingness and worth.

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God was silent and it was good. It was very Good.

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God was still.

And in the stillness, I found The Hidden One.

And The Hidden One found me.

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© Jane Tawel, 2022

The Drop is of The Flow

“Ocean” by ouistitis is marked with CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.

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The Drop is of The Flow

By Jane Tawel

March 22, 2022

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Is a little drop of water, less important than a wave?

Is a single link less worthy as a small part of a chain?

Is a ray of sunshine, shining, not the reason we are warmed?

And do single clouds contribute to a needed good rain storm?

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We are small parts of the Cosmos.

We are solitary souls.

Yet we share the Heaven’s matter,

and we share Creation’s goals.

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Oh, to ride the Wave as just one drop,

to be within The Ocean;

to find within my own small self,

the reason for the motion—

The Motion of the rise and fall,

The Motion of the light,

The Motion of the great and small,

The Motion of the day and night.

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In God, all life is moving,

and moving ever more.

God is the motion of our being,

The Endless Flow from shore to shore.

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I know not where my speck began,

Nor where my wave will go.

I only trust that in God’s grace,

I’m One within The Flow.

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© Jane Tawel, March 2022

The Centered Life

dreamstime

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The Centered Life

By Jane Tawel

March 16, 2022

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There can be no circumference

without a center point.

And though all points surrounding,

wobble;

The Center can and does still–

and it holds

still.

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It is we who let the unsteady legs of our small compasses,

bend and rust,

and always feel we must,

create something apart

from that which holds our hearts,

and holds the world in Her turning,

And with our childish yearning,

we twist the method roughly;

unsteadying in our haste and waste,

 our whole circled meaning,

created self, created design.

And flawing the Flawless

in our attempts to move the Center of Our Being,

we search for a freedom to scribble crooked lines

apart from the true Trued.

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It is we who let the outside dividers

divide us.

Buckling, folding, veering,

we stretch our outer points too far.

Reaching away from the Center Point,

we find we are no longer whole.

And we have flatlined,

far from that point which Centers all.

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Oh, Great Law of Divine Geometry!

Create in me a new center, O God.

Bring to bear upon my childish patterned ways,

the loving kindness of the

never-ending multiplying Sum of Your Infinity.

Create me anew.

Make me as pi to your Eternal Focus;

that all the small points on my life’s line,

may point inward, always to You.

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We commit this day,

to start at just this point.

Not knowing where each circle

begins and ends,

but trusting that in God’s kingdom,

circles have no horizons, that the Center does not see.

We enclose as we are enclosed,

looping together our own small circles;

that in this great Circle of Life,

we may find the Path that

whirls and revolves

gyrates and wheels,

and orbits round and round eternally

together……All…..One……

Wholly and holy circling round and round,

in that Divine Spiral,

in and within,

the Center that does hold.

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© Jane Tawel, March 2022

With Their Death

by Jane Tawel

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With Their Death

By Jane Tawel

March 5, 2022

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With their death

comes understanding.

And suddenly–

like a magic trick of the mind,

a magician appears

with their meaning,

and the brightness is so blinding,

as blinding as a sun;

and the pain is deep,

it is a pain as deep as the earth.

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With their death,

comes the end of feeling—

Oh, to only–

— just once more!

touch and see and hear and

smell the rose in loamy soil

that they were.

To touch and be touched again

by the tangible love

of their hugs and crooked smiles.

And the feeling is so palpable at times,

that the heart beats hard

as it struggles to swim up,

fighting through the years of mud,

day and night

through past and present tears

not yet shed for them while they lived.

At least not enough.

Never enough.

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And one’s life goes on.

Because it must.

But something has died inside.

Is there enough hope in me

for them,

for me

to be reborn,

as a phoenix?

as eternal presence?

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And as I wake,

and in the hours of my nights,

 there is always now,

a real and tender presence,

whispering,

“I forgive you.”

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And as the tide of Time

rushes towards me,

I ask,

“Who will forgive me, when I am gone?”

“Who will take my own small meaning,

and live on?”

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© Jane Tawel, 2022