Tag: mountains

Letting Go

On By Charis PsalloIn Black and white, Mountains, Poetry, Sky9 Comments

And Forgive Us our Debts

Nothing left to give.

Look into my empty sack,

my empty jar.

See my cold black torch.

How am I to live?

I cannot pay back what I owe

‘til I get payback for my lack.

And they took it.

They squandered it.

They spent my joy on riots.

They spent my innocence on games.

They threw my peace on the bonfire

and danced around it.

Let go

I’ve squeezed my eyes until they bled,

I’ve held my breath

until my heart pounded on death’s door —

still I cannot disappear

into the disheveled dirt bed

And here you are

–and you want more.

How dare you?

How dare you, God?

How dare you?

How dare you shove

your saber hand into my chest

and divide spent spirit from sullied soul

to reach the hissing python.

Let go

I can’t let go!

It’s only anger —

it’s only hate

that coiled around my crooked spine

enables me to stand up straight

and curse them!

Let go

Aren’t you gentle Jesus

meek and mild?

Go take your love to some purer child.

And stop that!

You’re hurting me!

Let go

They poached my song!

They caught my rhyme!

They raped my soul!

They took my time!

They grabbed my mind

and jammed it on a fearsome pike –as a warning.

They took my gates forever.

I’ve damned the light

and sealed the sash

with dark green plastic meant for trash.

What good are thickened walls of stone

when the door’s been burned to ash.

Let go

The bill’s right here;

I have kept track.

My hands will tighten ‘round their necks.

My hands are strong —

they’ll not be slack

‘til I get everything I lack.

Give it back!

Give it back!

Give it back!

Let go

You let go!

I’m offended by this “loving hand”

that feels more like a gunshot wound.

Let go

I can’t let go!

I won’t let go!

I don’t want to let go!

They owe me!

Let go

Help me.

Let go

You know if I let go it will kill me.

I know

It’s hard.

I can’t fill your hands until you empty them.

Who is going to help me?

I am.

(This poem was written about one of the toughest steps in healing from chronic depression  –forgiveness. To me forgiveness is about letting go of legitimate debts owed me and allowing God to supply my needs.)

Wild little prophets

On By Charis PsalloIn Flowers4 Comments

I saw these guys on my walk in the woods yesterday.

Crocus flowers, or pasque flowers as they are sometimes called, fascinate me. As forerunners they are the first to demonstrate the change in season by the prophetic act of blooming before any of the other wild flowers in the Rockies.

I read this recently: Hope is hearing the music of the future; faith is being able to dance to it today.

The crocus reveals, as it folds back its furry purple robes, a heart of gold. It’s mere presence between patches of dust-weary snow in the mountain meadows sings to me songs of stepping into destiny by faith.

Come out of your caves! Don’t let your past define who you are today!

Open to the light! Let it dispel all the dark fear that keeps you from letting anyone see your heart! You are beautiful!

Wakey! Wakey! Even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed in as fine apparel as the Lord has already given you who love him. He has equipped you with every good gift you need for this season.

Are you listening? Can you feel it?

Ready…

Set…

NOW!

Hamartia

On By Charis PsalloIn Mountains, Poetry1 Comment

Hamartia

The snake asleep lay cold and hard,

Deposit of forgotten age

My path crossed its eroded rest,

determined by sequestered rage

How long it takes to bear without

the pain that wears so deep within

I stood atop the withered bluff

and nudged the heart of willful sin

I cannot curse you, man of dust,

for pain that keeps the truth from view,

for all alone on bitter hills

I have killed Him, too

Seek, seek, seek the Lord

On By Charis PsalloIn MountainsLeave a comment

Perplexed.

I feel perplexed a lot.

I don’t have the answers to all of life’s problems, or even most of them. Ater I have tried the same old solutions that didn’t work last time (is that not the definition of insanity?) I keep coming back to the same plan of action that does:

Seek the Lord, seek the Lord, seek the Lord.

When will I learn to make this my starting point?

When all kinds of trials and temptations crowd into your lives my brothers, don’t resent them as intruders, but welcome them as friends! Realise that they come to test your faith and to produce in you the quality of endurance. But let the process go on until that endurance is fully developed, and you will find you have become men of mature character with the right sort of independence. And if, in the process, any of you does not know how to meet any particular problem he has only to ask God—who gives generously to all men without making them feel foolish or guilty—and he may be quite sure that the necessary wisdom will be given him. But he must ask in sincere faith without secret doubts as to whether he really wants God’s help or not. The man who trusts God, but with inward reservations, is like a wave of the sea, carried forward by the wind one moment and driven back the next. That sort of man cannot hope to receive anything from God, and the life of a man of divided loyalty will reveal instability at every turn. (James 1:2-8 Phillips translation)

Can you relate?

When facts get in the way of truth

On By Charis PsalloIn Mountains, Trees and forests5 Comments

Fisher Peak from Environmental office ch rs

I love the valley we live in. Snow, clouds, and sun continually change the texture and colour of the mountains. I drove my old Saskatchewan farmer uncle up to a viewpoint expecting him to admire the vista as much as I do.

“It’s okay,” he grunted, ” but those mountains kinda block the view.”

To him beauty was a thin band of waving wheat domed by an enormous sky. I suppose mountains could look like giant rocks that would impede the progress of a plow. His eyes feasted on open space.

My eyes feast on rivers, lakes, trees and mountains.  I particularly like being surprised by the mountains. The other day they suddenly emerged after hiding in a moody dark cloak of cloud all week. A fresh fall of snow glowed in the morning sun. The beauty kind of took my breath away and I pointed them out to another person in the parking lot.

“Too bad the telephone wires ruin the view,” he said.

I was so enthralled with the light I hadn’t noticed the poles and wires. Nothing was “ruined” for me. If I was taking a photo I probably would have moved to change my perspective -maybe to a spot right under the wires. At that moment I was not focusing on telephone poles. I could still see beauty.

Facts can be like annoying telephone wires that keep us from seeing a bigger truth. Have you ever been in the middle of sharing a really good anecdote to illustrate your point when someone interrupts with facts?

“No. It was a Thursday and she was the niece of the Schufflemeier boy with the plate in his head, not his cousin.”

Clouds sailing to Alberta on the high westerly winds sometimes look like they snag on the Rockies on the way to the waving wheat fields. They can stay there for hours. I think some people’s minds snag on facts like the clouds snag on the craggy peaks and they miss the beauty of both the mountains and the prairies.

My stories are not always accurate for detail -although I am trying to be more respectful of  those who need documentation. Fiction can speak truth more plainly than court evidence. And honestly? A lot of my photos are photoshopped because I am trying to communicate the truth I see. I take out the telephone wires -unless it’s a comment on the shape of sunlit frosted wire garlands, which can be kind of cool. So you can correct me if you were there and remember it differently, but I’ll probably ignore you like I ignore the telephone wires.

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