A Day Without...

I am sure I have mentioned sometime in the past that I can remember getting drunk only twice – perhaps the fact that I remember it means that I was never drunk in the first place or that there are times that I did get truly drunk and I don’t remember! Actually I love my self-control too much to relinquish it. There was a time in my early days of teaching that a half pint of lager at the end of the week eased by troubles. Then one glass was not sufficient and it turned into two. I decided there were better ways to ease my troubles and began praying more!

Someone asked me at the end of last week, learning that's I was about to go on holiday, whether I was planning to spend some of the time, if not all of it, drunk. She was insistent that a good time could not be had whilst sober. I’m not teetotal by any means it’s just my addictions lie in other places. Give me a large slice of cake any day.

On Sunday our church hosted a lovely lady from the charity Hope UK, which provides drug and alcohol education and training for children and young people, parents and youth workers.

She talked about the week she spent at a Keswick Convention some years before. Hope UK had a stand and she spent the week avoiding going anywhere near. She didn’t want to get involved. God had other plans and when she wandered close enough to the stand, the woman manning it told her boldly that God had chosen her for the job. A card was thrust into her hand which she put in a pocket. Once home she put the card in a box under the bed, deciding not to think about it. The card kept finding its way out of the box and onto the bedside table, until she relented, filled it in and sent it off.

I have to say that I didn’t go anywhere near the woman after she spoke.  I didn’t want to give her the opportunity to tell me that Hope UK was my next placement. I have had my time with young people. And besides which, I really don’t have a history of alcohol or drug abuse, which might perhaps be an essential part of the story of what you learned through experience and would like to pass on to the next generation.

I have to say that I have heard it all before – identifying different drugs, the colours and shapes of different tablets and their effects. Have I heard it done better? The police did a good one years ago with a good visual aid. Was I just lucky that I never fell down that particular rabbit hole? God made me best friends with a wonderful girl who loved reading, and another wonderful girl who loved music and another wonderful girl who introduced me to tinned sweetcorn.  He then introduced me to His Son and I fell in love. He also introduced me to my brain, not the size of planet, but in good working order and I discovered I loved learning. Of course, then He also uncovered in me a passion for writing. Would I write better if I was drunk? It might work for some, but not for me.  I never was the experimenting type and nerd-like kept my focus on my degree.

As with other charities, Hope UK has its plastic bracelets in rainbow colours. Not a marketing gimmick the words on the bracelet are something along the lines of “an alcohol free day”. For friends that make the pub their meeting place, a man needs only to show the bracelet to his friends and they are supposed to respect his choice of having an alcohol free day and not push a pint in front of him. She talked about a man who was homeless who chose to put his bracelet on daily to remind himself that alcohol was not the solution to his problem.

A friend of mine was sitting next to me in church. We have known each other a long time and have quite a volatile friendship. We don’t just speak truth to each other, we shout it, standing on doorsteps, yelling at closed windows! It’s only just recently that my friend has started to come to my church. She has replaced the quiet contemplation of a small chapel with boisterous clapping and songs that make you cry. God is on her case and every meeting has touched her heart. She needed one of those bracelets and took away a red one. She couldn’t guarantee that she’d wear it every day, but she’d try.

She looked at me carefully.

“Everyone’s got their addictions, Mel.”

If I could have a plastic bracelet mine would have nothing to do with an alcohol free day. It might be “a day without cake”. I have a sweet tooth. Or “a day without chocolate.” Perhaps better it would be “a day without worrying”, or “a day without negative thinking”, or “a day spent saying thank you” or “a day singing God’s praises”.

So many days and so many opportunities to remind myself that this day can be different.

What We Build

I came across these words in a poem I was reading this afternoon -“Was Blind” by Dave Harrity. It was a poem, for the most part, I didn’t really understand.

“There are words we haven’t ever made with our mouths,

But that we built with our hands.”

Earlier in the day I was flicking through Facebook as I was eating my breakfast. There was a youtube link. A very creative dad had built a ninja assault course in his back garden. I watched, and held my breath, as a wee girl hopped, skipped and jumped from one part of the course to another.  There was a row of every doll and every cuddly toy she possessed watching and cheering her on. A little clock in the corner registered her time as she made her way around the obstacles. There must have been a button to press at the end of the course and she jumped up and down with delight. It was amazing.

I thought of every child in the neighbourhood queueing up to have a go and a leader board being fixed somewhere.  Of course, health and safety issues would not permit that to happen.

I am sure that every day her father told her how much he loved her. They were words spoken with the mouth, but what he had built with his hands also spoke a message of love. Perhaps it put a little bit of pressure on all the dads in the neighbourhood to come up with something equally impressive.

When I read the two lines of the poem I didn’t think of the youtube clip straight away. I thought about the things that we build with our hands and came up with Auschwitz. What a horrible thing to build! And what it says about how we regard people who are not “us”. And how we don’t speak out loud about the incarceration and death of so many people, but we whisper. It was never a proud moment in anyone’s history – never something to cheer or to celebrate – though people did, and still do.

I went on to think about the other things we build with our hands, or plan to build - Donald Trump and his wall along the border with Mexico.

Or perhaps it’s to build a new road and uproot a row of ancient oak trees.

Or perhaps the things that we build are not physical things at all but made from words, not spoken but written – zero hours contracts that some workers prefer, but many workers dislike, that really favour the employer more than the employee. Or re-writing human rights laws because it doesn’t suit “us” to treat “them” with such respect that it costs us “too much”. Not so much building something but dismantling it.

There are just some things we shouldn’t allow other people to build.

Then I remembered the youtube clip – the dad building the ninja assault course for his daughter. It’s encouraging to know that there are people that are building a good things with their hands, or with their words, spoken and written. 

What are you building?

I am building my second book of poetry which makes it was to the publisher sometime this week! Thanks to all the people who have been a part of the project.

Prayer

“With what shall I come before the Lord and bow down before the exalted God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousand rivers of olive oil? Micah 6:6-7

 Lord,

Yet again I find myself

In Your throne room

I have learned that my good deeds

Don’t grant me entrance

My brownie points mean nothing

To You

Jesus is my letter of introduction

The only key that opens the door

Sometimes I come

Empty handed

Not asking You to mend the things

I have broken

I am content simply to sit

To gaze upon You

To watch You and

And feel the thrill of knowing You

I bring only my adoration to

Place before Your throne

Today

My hands are full

My heart aches

So many concerns

Burdens too heavy to hold

Where words refuse to be spoken

Tears spill

You listen

To my heart

You lift me up

And straighten the shoulders

That bear Your yoke

And I am strengthened

Fig Trees and Fertilisers

“Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree growing in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, ‘For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?’ “‘Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.’” Luke 13:6-9

 

I read this story earlier this week. Fig trees always put me in mind of a lady called Dora, a friend of mine who taught with me in a school in Cyprus. She lived with her parents and there was a fig tree in the garden. I don’t recall ever having seen fresh figs before, certainly not as fruit on a tree. There are times when our local supermarket does a deal on fresh figs. I buy them only to be a little disappointed that there’s no juice to them to drip off my chin!

I had written a poem about fig trees earlier in the year as a part of a challenge to write a poem every day of Lent.

Soil Space

twelve million square miles

just thirteen percent

of the earth’s surface is

arable land

how much soil space does a fig tree need?

none at all if it bears no fruit

for all its leaves

for all its appearance of life

it cannot meet my hunger – it is

a waste of soil space

two point two billion people

thirty two percent of

the earth’s population are

Christians

how quickly can we turn the world upside down?

not at all without love

for all our buildings

for all our programs

we leave too many people hungry – are we too

a waste of space?

As I was reading the parable I had a picture – just an image. I imagined myself to be the fig tree. I looked down to see the roots had been dug around, the soil loosened a little and piles of manure being shovelled in. (I am assuming that it would have been manure the famer was using as a fertiliser.)

I remember looking up the man who took care of the vineyard. I was incredibly distressed.

“Am I not bearing any fruit?  Am I about to be cut down?”

The farmer laughed very gently, “Of course you have been bearing fruit! I want you to bear even more fruit – that’s why I am digging around your roots and piling on the fertiliser. Do you think I would do anything less for a healthy tree?”

I have to admit that I have felt challenged by so many things of late – a little unsettled and uncomfortable. God’s word, his fertiliser, has been demanding a richer, more defined response from me.

Finally!

Poetry in Motion - Autumn

Yesterday was that time of the month for spending time with my friends from Poetry in Motion. The plan was all set, a short walk somewhere, a coffee shop for tea and biscuits and something to write about.

I wasn’t that sure about a short walk. My usual walks anywhere are based on the availability of a toilet. And it looked like rain was about to spill. My brolly was in the boot of the car.

We decided it wasn’t really a day for walking. One of us was really not up to it so we drove the minibus up to the woods. Beside the woodland classroom, on the veranda, under a sloping roof, was a picnic table that we could all sit around.

The topic was autumn. The forest wasn’t quite there yet – just the occasional splash of golden leaves on an otherwise green leafed tree.

Autumn isn’t my favourite time of year.  I’m a spring girl at heart. Autumn speaks to me of short days, long nights and an absence of much required sunlight. It’s not the absence of heat that bothers me, but I need my dose of sunlight.

We listened to a few autumn inspired songs and there was a sheet of famous poems - Yeats and his season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. We settled into writing.  I made lots of notes but there wasn’t an emerging poem in the words or phrases. I had an idea of a just-before-bedtime feel about the forest.  The year of spring with its furious bursting of life, and summer with its enjoyment of sunshine and breezes was not yet at the winter sleeping under the snow blanket stage. It was as if the forest was in the time just-before-bedtime. There was a changing of the outdoor playing clothes of green, to the indoor almost-bedtime of something softer and gentler like gold. I know some children that resent going to bed and put it off, and put it off, and get grizzlier by the moment.  The forest seemed to embrace the winding down of the year.

Short poems are good, right? We sat around the picnic table and read the things we had written. As ever, I recognised that I was in good writing company.  There were poems and pictures of squirrels and the autumn scavenge for food to hide away. There were poems of blackberry picking and pie recipes to bake them into. There were childhood memories, and observations about the wood itself and the dogs and children we could hear exploring.

A forest drifts into rest

Bright green garb softens to gold

As birds sing lullaby songs

I liked my line about the birds singing lullaby songs. It’s a first draft.  I will plough through my notes to see if I can see some other gems in my scratchings.

We had been there no more than ten minutes or so when it began to rain. Such rain! It was the lightest sprinkling of raindrops. We were under the shelter of the sloping roof. The sun was shining on the rain creating what looked like as gossamer jewelled shawl.  So light was the rain and the so delicate was the sunshine hitting each tiny drop – it really was beautiful. Turn your head just a smidgen to the right and there was no rain at all.

“We’re in a rainbow!” someone declared. Had we been back in the town looking up at the forest, we would have seen the rainbow.  But we were too close to see the rainbow from the right distance and the right angle.  Apparently there is a way to see the rainbow you are in if the light comes from behind you at just the right angle.  I moved to stand in the shower to see if I could have my rainbow moment but sun was at the wrong angle and the curtain of water had moved on.

We headed back to a coffee shop to tinker with our words.

As ever, the afternoon didn’t disappoint. I might not have written my best poetry but I sat in the quiet with a group of my friends and we enjoyed the silence and the peace of a forest almost in autumn. There was, as there always is, a lot of laughter, a lot of teasing, a knitted bonnet that did the rounds of various heads and people enjoying each other’s company. Take away the poetry and I would still want to be with there.

Why here? This Moment?

A friend posted a link on her website to a youtube where a poet, Dave Harrity, encouraged his viewers to take ten minutes out of their busy lives. They were to find a bench, to sit and observe people and traffic, and then write something about them. I think it was supposed to be a busy town centre where there were lots of things to observe. I chose a bench beside the river, not in the centre of town, not much traffic, but people strolling, and dogs, and bikes and pushchairs, and a river in full flow. The trees were in heavy leaf and the paving stones were damp with almost dried-up rain. It was nice to sit still and watch the water, and the people, and to be just an observer rather than a participator. It was restful, a space to breathe, to do nothing, to think. I made notes.

Afterwards I downloaded his book “Making Manifest” which promised a programme of meditations and writing prompts on bits of scripture. Apparently I was supposed to put away any other notes I was following and allow my writing heart to be exposed to the stirring of the Spirit.  I’m supposed to be discovering myself, peeling back the onion layers, as it were. I’m not sure that I’m doing it right. All too much of my thinking life is navel-gazing already.  I’d much rather think about God – which is probably where the book is heading!

At the end of every chapter there is a writing prompt.  Exercise 3 - What events led you to this moment? Take time to think about the recent epiphanies in your life – moments of awakening and realisation.  Pick one and reflect on in in no more than ten sentences.

It’s my notebook and no one is going to read it.  I can write more than ten sentences if I want to. No doubt keeping to the task is all about discipline and developing essential writing skills but it wasn’t a recent epiphany that came to mind. What events led to this moment? This living in Inverness as opposed to somewhere in the Midlands where I have my roots? This job that I do, teaching in a secondary school? This church that I go to?  This poetry writing vibe I possess? “This moment” is too vague.

I settled on why Inverness?  What event led me here? Nothing recent.

I went back to 1986 or thereabouts.

It was a letter written by the pastor of a church that my mum had started attending. I was working in Cyprus while she was living in Rugby. I was a member of a highly conservative Plymouth Brethren church and she has just joined a happy-clappy charismatic church planting project.

It was a neat letter, a very long letter, written by someone I had never met and had every intention of distrusting.  Plymouth Brethren and happy-clappy churches had little in common. Did I not know my 1 Corinthians 13 – the gifts of the Holy Spirit coming to an end now that we had the complete written Bible truth? It would appear not – that same Spirit and His gifts were soaked into every line of the letter. The pastor spoke of a way of living as a Christian that had little to do with the way I was living mine. A walk of faith went beyond following rules and regulations.  If the Holy Spirit was like the white rabbit, and I was like Alice, I was supposed to be on an adventure.

The letter provoked a response. A yearning, a hunger, a longing for the adventure. My mum had found a way of being a Christian that brought her joy. Now, I’m not saying I was not joyful. It just seemed that joy oozed out of her. She breathed joy, she sang joy, she prayed joy – she enjoyed Jesus in a way that I didn’t.

Somehow, in those pages of the letter, the Holy Spirit, leaked into me.

I still went to the Brethren Church on a morning and on an evening, but I went elsewhere in between – a charismatic church that met in a hotel somewhere along the beach.

The Holy Spirit settled and made Himself at home in my life. He rearranged my spiritual furniture and put His pictures on my wall. He was never intrusive.  I don’t think He ever needed to ask because He already knew I’d say “Yes”.

And then one day He asked me to make a decision. It was time to choose. My Sundays had become almost unbearable. I was finding it increasingly harder to live as a Brethren – the kind of Brethren in that place and at that time which is not everyone’s experience of the Brethren Church. The charismatic “me” was becoming hard to restrain. I was leaking in the Sunday evening gospel meeting. I became a woman who would not be silent.

So I gave in. I recognised the call and began an adventure.

I wouldn’t be here in Inverness without that letter, the words of the pastor, the hunger it created in me and my capitulation.

And the adventure continues.

The Public Reading of Scripture

Sunday saw me up in the hills at the Moniack Mhor Writing Centre.  I had been lured there on the promise of writing poetry and exploring different poetry forms. The theme was “family” – not necessarily said with an Eastenders’ accent. I am a part of a family that expands often and shrinks occasionally. My own little branch is not really expanding apart from waist-wise.

The first prompt was to choose an object and use it as a prompt to describe a family member. Jewellery scored highly when describing mothers and grandmothers.  There were also pianos, fishing rods, teddy bears and false teeth.  For me there was a veritable mine of possibilities – but what to choose? I wish I had written about my brother’s urn resting on a shelf in a pub in Fuengirola in Spain. It might have made for a better poem than the one I did of my husband’s green dressing grown. I’m sure I have commented that I don’t do poems to order.  I’m never that creative on the day.

The second prompt caught my imagination.  This time it was about an activity we did as a child that we shared with an adult. Memories of playing endless games of rounders in the field at the back of the house came to mind. My mother was a child magnet. She was everyone favourite mother. The parents should have paid her for keeping their children occupied and entertained during long summer evenings. Two ever growing teams met to field or to bat. Children abandoned bikes, slides and climbing frames to join in.

I was never a sporty person. If awards could be given for trying hard I would have won a cupboard full of them. I just didn’t have the coordination.  The bat never met the ball.  There was no satisfying "thwack" as the ball sailed high and long.  No one had to chase after anything. I was rarely quick enough to drop the bat and make it to first base. As the looser I was told to join the fielders. I couldn’t catch balls either.  I wasn’t an asset to any side.

I wrote the poem, but was in the reading of it that it came to life. So much emotion was poured into such a few words! Did I really resent the other kids that joined the game?  Did I really feel that insecure that my mum might have preferred another, more athletic child, to me? I wasn’t the most secure child, nor indeed am I the most secure adult!

We commented about the reading of poetry. It was nice to hear different people reading poems. Among us there were different voices, different accents, different speeds of reading and a different imagining of what was happening in the poems and how they affected us. We bring our own baggage with us and can make connections, or not.

Reading out loud is a powerful thing when it’s done right.

“Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching.” 1 Timothy 4:13

I am reminded of Ezra’s public reading of God’s book of Law and the impact it had on people. It mattered who did the reading, I think.  It wasn’t like an actor delivering the well-rehearsed lines of a play. Ezra read words of life, words that he lived by, words that he knew were transformational, God’s own words spoken reverently. It mattered that every word was clearly spoken, nothing mumbled or fumbled.

Sometimes scripture doesn’t need to be picked apart. Sometimes in the picking apart we slip in our own truth, or we soften it, or dilute it, or tell it a hundred different ways in the hope that someone understands it. We talk to the brain and the reasoning in a person, when sometimes all we need to do is talk to the heart and the spirit.

“...the public reading of Scripture” – God’s word without the spin. And the Holy Spirit indwelling to explain it to our heart. I think we ought to have “a public reading of scripture” revival and see what happens to us all.

I’m up for it.  Are you with me?

Never Making it to First Base

This is our game of rounders

Our bat, our ball

That’s our house just the other side of

                the wire fence

and that’s our mum

My mum

waving you over to join in

You could say, “No thank you,”

but you don’t

Do you think that because she

                knows your name

it entitles you to a relationship?

She’s my mum – not yours

I cross my fingers  and hope you will

drop the ball

but you don’t

You cup it in your hands as it falls

I wish that, bat in hand, you will miss

Thwack

The ball sails high, thudding into

                the grass beside the slide

Maybe you will trip as you run

Perhaps you won’t reach first base

but you skip the circle -

first, second, third and home

That’s my mum

hugging you

and now I feel a prickle of anxiety

Inadequate

I can’t catch the ball

or hit it when it’s my turn

Only sometimes do I get to first base

I pray to God to

                let the sun set quickly

                so the game can end

and you can go home

and I can go home

with my mum

What is God?

This poem is based on "A Meditation on Question 4 of the Shorter Catechism" that my friend Jeanni led us through one Sunday morning at church - What is God? 

I have started reading through 1 Timothy and Paul cannot emphasise enough how important it is to have sound doctrine. Teaching false doctrine doesn't advance God's work.  It does nothing to transform the lives of believers.

What is God?

He is “I am”

Always

Unchanging in essence

Never ceasing to be

He is wisdom

Always

Marking every good path

Building houses on solid rock

He is power

Always

Laughing at impossibilities

Dismantling the storm

He is King

Always

Sceptre secure in hand

Increasing His government

He is love

Always

Laid down life

For His friends

He is truth

Always

Word in flesh dwelling

Sharp sword cleaving to core

He is “was, is and is to come”

Always

Without parallel in the universe

Everything bearing His fingerprint

Alpha and Omega and

Every letter in between

Now

Always

Yesterday, today, forever

Constant…

He is mine

Jonny Rook and His Offspring

Yesterday we went to the Moy Field Sports Fair.  The weather forecast promised a dry morning with rain later in the afternoon.

Dry? We should have checked the weather for the previous day.  Not so dry, methinks. It was saturated underfoot. The paths between rows of tents selling wares were churned up mud.  The small margins of grass just alongside the tents that weren’t mud were soggy. It was a welly wearing event and I don’t have any wellies. I’m not one that forges ahead confidently in mud or wet grass.  Every footstep is cautiously tested. I have fallen too often on dry ground for wet stuff not to be a hazard. Yes, I minced delicately along, my socks soon wet in my trainers. The clouds that had threatened for most of the morning broke in the early afternoon for some warm sunshine.  I fooled myself into thinking it was drying out just a little.

The show arena was the just behind the food tent.  Food had been macaroni cheese and chips – not really enough of either to justify the price they charged. The tea was hot, though, and with the tea bag left in, strong too.

Something to do with birds of prey was being exhibited in the arena. 

The first bird to take to the stage was a very young owl. Not yet at the flying stage, he was a brancher, out of the nest hopping along the branch but not yet up to flying. It was his debut appearance. I learned a lot about owls. Their eyes don’t move in their sockets. Their ears do all the hard work.  When they fly silently it has nothing to do with sneaking up on their prey unheard. It’s all about them not being able to hear the sound of their own wings beating and being a distraction to hearing their prey on the ground.  Put food by their feet and they are unable to see it and feel it out with their feet. Interesting!  He looked quite big and fluffy and ran around a lot with his wings outstretched.

The next bird was an adult owl. He was quite happy to fly from perch to hand and back to perch as long as he had the wind behind him. He didn’t like flying into the wind, but was prepared to make the sacrifice for a treat.

The third and final bird was quite a rarity – one of only a few hundred in the country. I can’t remember the name of the bird or the country of origin. Quick google – the caracara from the Falkland Islands that goes by the alias Jonny Rook. Where according to the commentary owls are not as wise as they are given credit for, this bird was the Einstein of the bird world. He was also the boss of the bird criminal underworld – a nasty piece of work.

Where owls and other bird species reared their young responsibly, making sure they had taught them the skills to be successful hunters, these caracaras were not so conscientious. It was all down to the food supply. In a place where the food supply is limited, these birds had a “me-first” mentality. They were not food sharers. When they had chicks they reared them. They didn’t always take dead stuff to the nest but watched to see how cleanly, or not, the live stuff could be dispatched and eaten by the chick. Once the chick did that it was kicked out of the nest, violently, to fend for itself. Juvenile birds would form a gang, maybe eight or nine birds, and egg each other on to meanness.

They were not trusting birds. They had found out the hard way that mum and dad couldn’t be trusted.  The gang they flew with couldn’t be trusted either. It was every caracara for themselves.

I got to thinking about good parenting and bad parenting. The owls were good parents, taking time to make sure their offspring had the right tools to succeed. The owls had time to grow and learn how to fly. Mum and dad didn’t trip up junior as he hopped along the branch. He flew when he was ready to fly and not before.

The caracaras were not good parents. It was a practical move to protect a limited food supply but junior didn’t get taught stuff, he had to learn it for himself in a very hostile world.

I have been thinking about human parents. There are plenty of parents that follow the owl way of doing things. The offspring they send off into the world are well equipped for whatever challenges they face, and they have all the tools necessary to be successful.

However, there are a lot of parents that are more like Jonny Rook. For the birds they are simply being practical in kicking their youngsters out of the nest to fend for themselves. Is there a kind way to do it if you are worried about your own food supply? They end up creating the next generation of caracaras that don’t know how to trust anyone or anything. These are birds that opt for the pre-emptive strike – hit before the other bird hits you. Strike first, ask questions later. Juvenile caracara birds learn how to fend for themselves at an impossibly early age, hang around in gangs that terrorise a neighbourhood and don’t trust authority figures because of their parents. Perhaps part of the problem lies in the food poverty that the caracaras live in. If there was an abundance of food, would they be better parents?

So much of what happens in nature has a people-application. How the next generation of people turns out depends very much on us and how we treat them. It’s not the government’s job, or the responsibility of teachers to take over the job of raising children. It’s not only the parent’s job either to equip their children with the right tools. It’s a communal thing – all of us together involved.

Name Him Great

These hours, these days so full of tears

These weeks, these months, these barren years

Nothing green and vibrant growing

No seeds in hand for harvest sowing

In the turmoil God meets our fears

Times when locusts fall like rain

Destroying wine and oil and grain

Scaling walls and breaking through

Snatching all we’re clinging to

God, in love, restores us again

These things that injure, God permits

The hostile place that snarls and spits

Such times convinced we’re cut adrift

He grasps our hand, to rescue, lift

Sovereign on His throne He sits

The Lord, extravagant in grace

Bids us turn to find His face

“Come rend your heart, return to me

Surrender now and bow the knee”

Of enemies no hint or trace

We raise our hands to celebrate

We lift our voices, name Him great

Restoring fruit, lush meadows green

God’s fingerprint so clearly seen

On Him, our faithful God, we wait

(Joel 2:1-24)

Poetry at the Museum of Childhood

“Poetry in Motion” was out at Strathpeffer this afternoon. We spent an hour or so in the Museum of Childhood at the old railway station. The first task was to write a word or phrase about the first ten objects that interested us, something that stirred a childhood memory or a feeling attached to the object.

I had two problems here. I can say with hand on heart that I remember very little about my childhood. Currently I am reading the first book of Maya Angelou’s biography, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”. She writes with so much detail and depth.  It’s unlikely that I will ever write my own biography.  Certainly not the early years. Not only can I not remember much, but I think it was not particularly that remarkable. I have a feeling that the things I think I remember were stories told to me over and over again that I have made my memories, if you know what I mean. I don’t know where the dividing line between story and reality lies.

Second problem – the museum wasn’t about my childhood.  The people I was with poked and prodded the dolls and the marbles and studied the pictures of cutting peat and collecting clams on a muddy beach. They remembered leather satchels and Peter Rabbit books. It was an interesting hour – but not evocative of my childhood. I had dolls. I might have had marbles too. I never cut peat or collected clams. I remember the occasional afternoon spent gleaning rosehips from hedges.  I don’t remember ever tasting the rose-hip syrup they became.

I made my list of ten. It wasn’t a satisfying list or one full of surprises.

The next task was to choose one or two of the objects and write about them – the colour, the shape, the function and anything else that comes to mind.  I took myself off to sit in the sunshine at a picnic table.

The Pram

Hers was not small and neat.  It never folded away to take up as little space as possible on the bus.

She never used the bus anyway. There was something of the claustrophobic about her. She imagined the bus crashing.  She knew she would be unable to climb out of a tiny window should the bus come to rest upside down. She was a woman of generous proportions.

Her pram was big and black, fashioned out of iron and springs. It was a station wagon rather than a nifty compact vehicle. A nest on wings, if you will, housing the next generation of Wilkinsons, silent and wide eyed, rarely mewling.  Three girls and a boy.

She fretted about the next arrival, due in March. The pram couldn’t take five children.  She scrutinised the current occupants and wondered which one to evict.

She kept close to the edge of the road. There were no pavements. A hedgerow of nettles and brambles, punctuated with dog-rose bushes and pale pink flowers, brushed against the side of the pram.

She thought about her children and worried that just as some had inherited her blue eyes and mouse brown hair, they might also inherit her fear of busses.

The pram, big and black, iron and springs, the nest on wheels, was her excuse not to face her fear.

Chosen

Before a word

Was spoken

Before the world

Became

Before the Spirit

Hovered over the void

And order was carved

From chaos

You chose me

Before a spark

Ignited in the hidden place

Before bones and flesh

Became

Before cells

Multiplied and divided

And ciphers concealed in DNA

Dictated character

You chose me

Before light

Greeted birth

Before breath

Became

Before eyes opened

And fingers twitched

And a mother’s breast

Nourished

You chose me

Before I learned

Right from wrong

Before aware I

Became

Before sin engraved its name

On cruel words

And careless actions

And selfish ambitions

You chose me

Before You called my name

And claimed me

Before Your child I

Became

There was no beauty in me

No worth

No advantage

No reason for choosing yet

You chose me

In a world of

Fatherless children

Seven thousand million lives

Disconnected and drifting

I am humbled

Pressed to my knees

Amazed beyond understanding!

You chose me

Holiday Snapshots

Last week was a visit down south to see family. Although I took the camera down with me I took very few pictures. I used to be a keen picture taker and worked my way up through different cameras and their levels of sophistication. I stopped printing off pictures with the arrival of digital cameras. Anyway, rather than drag you through pictures of people you don’t know, I will highlights some of the events of the week.

Most miserable day

I know.  Holidays are not supposed to have miserable days. And most people wouldn’t classify this as miserable. Tuesday was a very hot day. It was the kind of temperature that was good for the Costa del Sol but not for Warwickshire. Temperatures peaked at 33^oC which translates into the high 80s or 90s on the Fahrenheit scale. I have lived in Scotland too long and become acclimatised to cooler weather. By mid-afternoon, my body really didn’t know what to do with itself.  I am convinced I have more sweat glands than anyone else and every one of them was overworked. It was nice to sit in the shade, but even nicer to sit in a room with a few fans shifting air. It seemed as if every part of me was dysfunctional. I can’t believe that I lived in Cyprus for five years in similar and hotter temperatures! Is it an age thing? This intolerance of very hot temperatures?

Nicest niece or nephew

It constantly surprises me that I am related to so many beautiful young people. There was a newspaper article yesterday about the UK population being taller now than a generation ago.  I think that the niece and nephew generation on our family might not be taller but they are a good looking bunch! I was probably quite good looking too when I was their age but middle age spread happened and other aging events.

All of my next generation are nice, but I will highlight two of my nephews.

It’s not often when we go down to visit that we see my nephew Tom. It was really good to see him.  He has a wicked sense of humour. He seems to have reached a place of liking where he is at in life – not the physical place where he lives or the people that he encounters – but just being himself. I like him a lot!

The other nephew, Micah, I hadn’t seen since he was a boy. We lost touch when his parents were divorced and I miss not having a hundred photos of him and his sister, Melody, growing up. I apologise if I stared too much. I do that sometimes.  In my head I had all these deep conversations about his dad, Michael, and the last week of his life in Spain. I reality I talked about Brexit and Scottish independence. It was nice to be in his company and his wife Angela is awesome, confident and friendly.

Most interesting meal

Was the meal that great? The food? Maybe not to my taste. Richard and Linda, my brother and his wife, help out with a cookery club once a month. It’s a multi-cultural thing. Someone had funding from the council to buy half a dozen plug in induction hobs, half a dozen pans and chopping boards and kitchen utensils. The idea was to teach people to cook healthy food. A local church offered a room and the use of the kitchen. It is a great way to learn to cook meals from different cultures.

We cooked a stir fry. Everyone chopped and grated and sliced and quartered different vegetables, threw them into a hot pan with different sauces and sprinkles of spice. Joe is a purist when it comes to stir fries – the spices go in first.  They didn’t stir fry Joe-style. We got to taste one another’s meals. Linda’s chickens had an abundance of left over vegetables.

It was the desert which I really loved. Fruit salad with meringue and vanilla yoghurt. The meringue was vegan. I had no idea you could make a meringue without egg whites. I am wrong! Chickpea water! How would someone even go down that path of using chickpea water? Creativity at its best.

Best afternoon activity

I discovered a shopping gene one afternoon. Clothes shopping has often been a bit of a chore. What looks good on a coat hanger doesn’t look good on me. I also have a little voice in my head that reminds me that I possess knitting needles and a sewing machine and tells me “you could make that yourself!” Let’s not rake up the knitting and sewing days – yes, once upon a while I could have made things, and did.

Linda and I hit the sales one afternoon. She was looking for bedding for spare rooms in readiness for sons and families to stay.  She wasn’t hostile to dresses and other stuff. She collected dresses and skirts and tops much as a bee collects honey before heading off to the dressing room to try things on. She came away with a couple of dresses and ordered other things to collect later.

I caught the shopping bug. The hot weather helped in the sense that what we had packed wasn’t suitable. I bought a pretty top – sleeveless – I don’t really do sleeveless.

I suppose what made it so enjoyable was Linda. She took her time looking through the rails. There was no sense of urgency or hurry. Time was there to be spun out. I wasn’t hurried from one place to another. I wasn’t required to make snap decisions.

More vegan deserts

One of my nieces is vegan. She introduced us to vegan alternatives to some of the stuff we eat. I was just about to say I could become a vegetarian perhaps, but not a vegan, but I like meat too much. Bacon sandwiches – there are probably vegan alternatives.  A vegan lifestyle doesn’t sit well with my basically lazy nature.

As well as the vegan meringue, we also tasted vegan ice cream. It’s not made with the usual ingredients but tastes very much the same. I liked the vanilla ice cream, but didn’t like the chocolate one so much.  

The whole week was one of healthy eating and we have managed not to fall back into the fish and chip takeaway and cake and chocolate eating rut from before. So, although I am not about to embrace veganism or vegetarianism, or the two/five diet, trying to eat better is a good idea.

It was nice to see the family. I miss them. I admit to thinking often about returning to Warwickshire – but I love Scotland too much, and Nicola, and life in a slower lane.

Written on Your Palm

Lord, I ask

I beseech and plead

Show me Your palm

Outstretched and open

Let me see my name

Written for all eternity

Let me gently trace

Each letter

With my trembling fingers

My name

Carved with love

Cut into flesh

By the nails on the cross

And stained crimson

By the blood of Your Son

My own name

Written on your palm

For I have forgotten

And need reminding

That You love me

That the trials that I face

Are light and momentary

That the yoke on my shoulders

Is not so heavy

That the silence between us

Will soon be broken

By a gentle word

That soon

I will be lost

In Your strong embrace

Tears

Cloud my eyes

So that I cannot see

So I must feel

My name

Written on Your palm

Chosen

Cherished

Precious child

Which name is mine?

I hear Your whisper

“All are yours.”

© Melanie Kerr 2007

Cheese Dreams

I am a vivid dreamer. 

Some dreams seem to be very obvious God-dreams. They contain something very profound, life changing perhaps. They have got God stamped all over them.

Other dreams I call “cheese dreams”. Nothing profound happens and they seem to be linked to something that happened at work.  I assume that it’s just the way the brain sorts out stuff from the day. They can be interesting, or not. They can leave a bad cloud hanging over me in the morning, or not. Does the fact that I remember them mean they are not true cheese dreams at all? Sometimes I sit down and pick the dream apart looking for some kind of revelation. Sometimes there is vague insight to be gleaned. Most of the time I put it down to cheese.

This morning I fell among dream interpreters. The intention was a cup of tea with a friend and a handing over of the poetry manuscript for book 2. She had offered to take a look at it and cast a poet’s eye over it.  I’m not looking for any major overhauls of any of the poems, just a gut reaction about whether they made the grade. I have a few poems waiting in the wings for last minute evictions.

Another friend joined us. Apparently I was sort of gate crashing their weekly dream interpretation meeting. The group was usually bigger than just the two of them, but it is school holiday time and people fluctuations were to be expected. It’s possible that it was just tea or coffee on the menu with a break from the dream interpretation side of things – but I tossed a cheese dream onto the table. I was expecting confirmation that it was a cheese dream and no more.

It appears that cheese dreams don’t exist.

I’m not sure what I expected in terms of dream interpretations. I think I was looking for eyes closed and silent prayer and a particular connection to the heavenlies that I don’t possess. I was waiting for “I think God is saying this…” Instead, they took out notebooks and asked probing questions and drew spider diagrams. They went online to hunt down the meanings of the names of the people in my dream. There were corresponding numbers and related Bible verses to explore. They made interesting connections. It was very different from what I had expected. Very thorough. Significant looks passed between the two of them.

I thought it was all down to my insecurities at work. The dream featured people at work being given slices of my responsibilities leaving me lots of time and nothing to do.  I was being overlooked or passed by, or replaced by someone, who in all honesty I felt knew nothing at all about how to do my job better than I could. In the real world much of what I do has been cut down to a minimum and I often feel like a spare part. I know that “they” said I was indispensable and irreplaceable when “they” denied me voluntary redundancy, but that doesn’t mean that I feel particularly valued at times.

I soon discovered as I answered questions and listened to the conversation between the two ladies that unlocking dreams is not always as obvious as it looks. Even if it is just about my insecurities at work, that gives me something to bring before God to talk through and see His perspective. My ladies were not content with that.

My boss, who in real life is so supportive, in my dream showed little concern about my plight.  After some research on his name and linking in numbers and Bible verses they concluded that he could represent God. We all have expectations about God and how He should act – yes, God is supportive. I have been doing my own research into the faithfulness of God for a poem to be included in the book. God is faithful to His purposes in my life not to my purposes. Times when God wants to push me on to a deeper awareness or intimacy can be uncomfortable times. He has begun something in me and He is determined to see it to completion and doesn’t always get my full cooperation. God not acting the way I expect Him to act is something I know in my head, but don’t always embrace in my heart.

There was no dialogue in my dream just a one sided commentary on how badly I thought I was being treated.  I said things and no one answered. I expressed my sense of betrayal and no one said anything. I thought my sense of betrayal was significant. My dream interpreters thought otherwise. The fact that there had been no dialogue about it meant it might not be that important.

They didn’t come to a settled conclusion about the meaning. They missed the usual crowd and the varied tossing of thoughts into the pot. They agreed that despite the dream storyline there was a very positive message coming out. There are, or have been, new beginnings.  It could be work related, or church related or Mel related. It could be specifically poetry related. They didn’t say hard times are coming, strap yourself in. They did say God will show His grace and mercy. And, of course, I should never doubt that God loves me.

What I really valued about the whole experience was the permission granted to express my fears. Dream interpretation wasn’t something done to me. In the context of trying to figure out what my dream meant there were opportunities to look closely at some aspects of my life, to prod and poke around my psyche in a safe environment. All my “negatives” were balanced out with their “positives”.

So, yes, it may not be just about the dream interpretation but providing that opportunity to really talk and explore the hidden part of ourselves.

Those Curveball Moments

The Urban Dictionary defines a curveball as “a particularly difficult issue, obstacle, or problem. Named after the equally tricky baseball pitch.”  A friend of mine was talking about curveballs last night at our Women Aglow meeting.

I almost didn’t go. Imagine the scene - the Council of Nicaea in AD 325 and the three hundred men debating which inspired writings made it into the Bible and which didn’t. Think about that on a much smaller scale.  We are not talking about the Bible this time, but my second book of poetry. Working out which poems would make it on to the page and which wouldn’t has been a challenge. I’m still not quite there – the urge to tweak is strong. So, yes, saving the document, my precious manuscript, switching off the laptop and walking away – I almost didn’t make it! Even then, over my fish and chip supper I was still scrolling through the poem list in my head.

It surprised to me to discover that my friend and I share a very similar trait. It appears we are both nervous speakers – except that we are also very confident speakers too. In some situations we are shy people.  Out of our comfort zones we need to take the deep breath and launch out. Our comfort zones aren’t the same. I am comfortable speaking to large groups of people but not so easy with the one to one conversations.  My friend is the opposite – she does the one to one stuff brilliantly, but faced with the large group she is out of her comfort zone.

She talked about Joseph – the one with the technicolour dream coat. She chose not to read his story from start to finish, but picked out his curveball moments. Being thrown into a pit, and then sold into slavery by his brothers. Then to be accused of having an affair with the boss’ wife was not good either. Meeting his brothers later on when they came to Egypt for grain he chose not to take revenge testify to God’s plan for his life. God never approves of the evil that people do, but He works His own plans through it. Everything that Joseph went through was a part of God’s plan to make him into the man He could use, to put him in the place where he could best be used and in contact with the people he could have the most influence over.

I didn’t have a notebook so I couldn’t take notes – a shock to the system, a writer without a notebook! In one of the creative Bible communication course sessions the man leading the course scorned taking notes. He said that it was the responsibility of the speaker to make his word so memorable that taking notes should almost be an insult! I am not sure I agree with him on note taking. I take notes not because the speaker isn’t memorable but because weeks, months or perhaps years later I want to remind myself of the word. Whatever – I didn’t take notes.

One of the points made was about not allowing the curveball experiences to make us bitter or hard hearted. It is all too easy to build walls and tell yourself that you will not let them hurt you a second time – staying soft hearted is a challenge. We might never take revenge in any physical way, but thinking of the numerous ways we could cause harm to someone hardens our heart. We talk about learning through the experience but there is a right thing to learn and wrong thing. Letting God teach us the right thing is important.

She also talked about how easy it is to draw close to God in the difficult times. We have no solutions to the problem so we fall back on God. It is the times when all is going well when we are prone to let things slide. We think we don’t need God so much.

My friend talked about her more recent curveballs. Her son was diagnosed with Crohn's disease that causes inflammation and ulcers in the digestive system. He was admitted to hospital for treatment. She stayed with him for the two weeks sharing the same room. Theirs was not the ideal mother and son relationship, strained at times. The two weeks spent together brought about a new relationship.

She talked about the different people she met in the hospital – other mothers with sick sons, doctors who were praying for her and her family, those who had watched love ones die. God had put my friend in that place at that time to touch people with her words and her prayers. The curveball that the enemy would have liked to use for evil, God put it to good use.

When we are dealing with life’s curveballs there is always the opportunity for a wonderful witness to the power of God in our lives. So many conversations ready to happen, prayers ready to be launched, lives waiting for a touch or blessing. Too often we surrender the curveballs to the enemy and allow him use them to badmouth God or other people. Let’s wrest them from enemy hands and let God use them for His glory.

Me Because of You

I’m redeemed and stand before You

Dressed in a robe of righteousness

I’m amazed that I should be here

Treated as Your honoured guest

I am humbled that You chose me

Before the world began to turn

By Your grace I have been given

Blessings I could never earn

From on high You stooped down

To lift me up, to help me stand

You tell me I am precious

Write my name upon on Your hand

Undeserving yet You love me

Paid so much to bring me home

I am nothing, I am no one

Yet You’ve claimed me for Your own.

Evanton Woods

I’m hesitant to declare that fairies don’t exist. They probably don’t but I don’t want to be responsible for killing Tinkerbell.  I’d like to think that there is a little magic and mystery that we haven’t quite explained away with science.

The last few months I have been hanging around with the Poetry in Motion gang. It’s an offshoot of Creativity in Care. While other creative writing groups huddle indoors with pen, paper and prompts, Poetry in Motion heads out of doors, taking inspiration from nature.

Although I was invited, I felt somewhat a gate crasher as I arrived at Evanton woods late Saturday afternoon. It wasn’t really about poetry, although poems were shared.  Saturday was a celebration of winning an award. The woods belong to the Evanton Wood Community Company.  A long time ago I knew people in Evanton. It turned out that the people I knew then were part of the company. It was nice to catch up although I admit to fluffing names of kids now grown up that I’d once taught in Sunday School. The company had won a health and wellbeing award. There was a plaque and a cheque and a need to mark the occasion.

Being a few days after the summer solstice and mid-summer’s night, Shakespeare was on the menu. The plan was a short, steep and slow walk around a part of the forest not keeping to the main paths but forging through the foliage. We stopped every so often to read a poem or a quotation or act out a scene. We were accompanied along the way by two young musicians. A guitar and a fiddle provided lively tunes as we travelled along.

“Let’s take our hearts for a walk in the woods and listen to the magic whispers of old trees.” Author Unknown

Evanton woods was new territory to me. Although I spent time in Evanton years ago I never visited to woods. My younger friends had a passion for playing hide and seek, in the dark, in the woods, but I deemed myself too grown up for such frolics. I am not afraid of the dark, but neither am I at home in it. I am less grown up these days and much more inclined to frolic. It could be the onset of early eccentricity.

I doubt the trees in any woods have ever been so sweetly serenaded as they were on Saturday. Do trees smile? The Bible uses images of trees clapping their hands. Had I been a tree I would have clapped. They were not just somewhere in the background doing tree stuff while we walked and chatted and breathed in forest fragrances.  They were centre stage, being applauded.

“For in the true nature of things, if we rightly consider, every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver.” Martin Luther.

It wasn’t too fanciful to imagine that the trees were being entertained. They understood a message that some people, the ones in the community wood company and friends, recognised the need to connect to forests and nature. We are the takers in this world, very rarely the givers. The company gives its time to maintaining the woods, chopping bits back, replanting new stuff, finding ways to teach people bush craft and educating people about the diversity of plants, insects and animals.

I have done a lot of reading over the last few months about issues to do with creation and evolution. I am not a creationist but they talk about God's two great books that reveal His nature. One is the written word – the Bible. The second is God revealed in nature. The one doesn’t contradict the other. I may be able to read the Bible, but I fumble to read nature – It’s a language that I am not fluent in. Saturday’s people were fluent nature speakers. It was no wonder I said so little.

“The trees are God’s great alphabet:

With them He writes in shining green

Across the world His thoughts serene.”

~Leonora Speyer

Do you know, I think I said “Thank you” to at least one tree? There was a steep part of the path and I was making my way down hesitantly gripping one tree trunk after another. I traced pattern in the bark. Has I been on my own, chances are I wouldn’t have taken that path, but had I, I would have stopped and touched and dreamed a little. I would have strained to hear tree conversations. One tree trunk was so covered in rich green moss that my fingers wanted to linger.

It was not hard to think of fairies. The wood was so quiet. If, as some fairy-lovers suggest, we have pushed these mythical beings into hidden places, I would suggest that they hide in Evanton woods!

Us sing and dance, make faces and give flower bouquets, trying to be loved. You ever notice that trees do everything to git attention we do, except walk? ~Alice Walker, The Color Purple, 1982

There is something un-striving about nature. That’s not true. What appears to be peaceful isn’t really. All forms of life are in competition whether for food or water or adequate space. Another thing I learned on my creation/evolution travels is that the Victorians were shocked not about the apparent lack of a need for God when Darwin shared his observations. He talked about survival of the fittest and the dog eat dog way of life. Nature wasn’t about peace and harmony and lambs and rabbits frolicking (I like that word – frolic) but about predators and their prey. It didn’t tie in with the Victorian idealistic view of nature.

I hear the wind among the trees

Playing the celestial symphonies;

I see the branches downward bent,

Like keys of some great instrument.

~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

In all my encounters with woods and forests I feel better for having walked there. I breathe a different air. I think settled thoughts. My imagination is given permission to see fairies and talk to trees. I feel connected.

The Boy with the Flame Red Hair

She wakes to laughter, love and song

And peers through leaves – a happy throng

That stops, share poems, moves along

So confident that they belong

They glimpse her but see other things

Like butterflies, not fairy wings

She rises, dances, lightly springs

From twig to branch and softly sings

She sees him, fiddle in his hand

As men and women, children stand

Beneath an oak its branches spanned

And feel the magic of the land

She loves the boy with flame red hair

His grace and youth beyond compare

A life together could they share?

He doesn’t even know she’s there

She thinks to conjure up a spell

To draw him to her side to dwell

A love for her his heart compel

All thoughts of other worlds expel

But fairies almost never stay

It’s just part of the fairy way

To love a while and then to stray

She blows a kiss and turns away

Their journey through the woodland weaves

Stroking bark and catching leaves

A dry stick tossed a dog retrieves

And peace of heart each one receives