Month: April 2019

         Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard,
         anointed Jesus’ feet, and wiped them with her hair.
                           —John 12.3

God does not promise to save you from suffering,
or to remove you from this life and its jagged edges.
God shares your space in it, offers blessing in it,
anointing your nights as well as days.
The cross is no scheme to get you off a hook somewhere;
it’s the Beloved, with you in your pain.

Let the Beloved pour herself out on your troubles,
let her pour out a jar of tears for you,
wipe your aching feet with her hair.
Let the whole house of you be filled
with the fragrance of God’s blessing.
Others don’t feel your pain but she does,
they will flee but she will be with you.

Lay before her your sorrows and your rage.
Feel her hands upon you, her hair, her heart.
You are in the holy of holies.
The world’s derision fades away outside the gate.
She looks at you with love
that will stay with you forever.

  —April 3, 2019

         “She bought it so that she might keep it
         for the day of my burial.”
                  —John 12.7

His Ash Wednesday.
At the home of one who has been anointed by death
the others carouse oblivious but
a woman of sorrows, and acquainted with grief
surrenders what she has clung to,
anoints with her treasure
—what breaking this outpouring asked—
blesses with her body
feet soon to be pierced.
The house is filled with the fragrance
of death, the dark coils that face us
toward completion.
Dust to dust.
Death is not our end but our guide.
“Now are the days you have,
this is the moment to love.”
He speaks to himself.

Buried now with love,
he will live these days even more truly.
Even the last is the first of the rest.
Having repented, repointed
toward love most giving
he too is ready to wash feet,
to pour out his body,
to face death with love.
He rises from the table, risen.

   —April 1, 2019

The “real world” is a house of illusion
built by a trickster with no jollity in mind.

So much you think is real,
but is only for the devil’s merriment.

To truly see you have to know your are blinded
and see what cannot be seen.

True wisdom is courage to look foolish.
Don’t fall for what your fear takes so seriously.

What you cling to, drop awkwardly.
What you have been instructed, forget.

Death is a practical joke.
Stand outside it, and see.

First you die, then you live.
Don’t let the ashes fool you.

   —April 1, 2019