Category Archives: Faith

Do not be afraid

As you are an ocean of tears, so are you a world of forgiveness. A haven of justice filtered through human imperfections that allows opportunity for love with each challenge to your comfort.

You possess free will enough to elect whether you embrace change or if you allow fear to petrify your heart into jaded segments. How can you gaze upon a child’s pain with no desire to make the world innocent for them; for yourself?

It is inevitable that your faithful trust in your brethren will be accosted with confusion or anger towards your generosity. But, the price you pay now, will be small compared to the cost of refusal should you deny your righteous compass.

Turn to your true north, even being different than your friends, to find what makes your spirit, your very essence scream with the ecstasy of rapturous delight. Give permission to yourself to be extraordinarily outstanding in a world that only allows what is nurtured to bloom and grow.

If you find yourself in the forest of darkness with bruised, bloodied, or damaged limbs falling from your own family tree, notice where they’re planted. See how shallow or how deeply those roots linger in the earth by releasing your primal self to its care.

Drink from the knowledge of the river bend that granted your ancestors life to flood your own flesh. Sing in the voice of your grandmother, your grandfather, and those back to the beginning of time’s pacing.

Decree your path without word because what you say can be erased, what you do is how you progress through your life unhindered; calling like-minded to your shores. The shores of the ocean of tears that surrounds your world of forgiveness are yours for the sake of personal redemption.

Setting down the son

I wanted to love you beyond reason

to tuck you under warm blankets

inhale the scent of your freshly bathed skin

pressing my lips to your cool forehead

stroking your hair back from your face

so I could memorize it until dawn.

I wanted to embrace you with hugs

to protect you from the angry, vengeful world

to be your advocate for justice until you spoke

your first words in defense of your right to exist

that I could offer you a vocabulary for peace

that would last throughout your lifetime

I wanted family intimacy to gestate organically

with inside jokes created with one another

stories built upon our common history

beliefs based on a mutual understanding

goals set and met together in blood-line unity

Cherished memories transmogrified into legends

BUT

I stand here holding a bin full of dusty artifacts

every imagining I’d dreamed about abandoned

discarded into a tornadic swipe of desolation

Emptied of sacredness into the seasonal winds

My love, hugs, and hope for a family with you

have perished due to your intentional self-destruction

I mourn for you as if you had passed the veil

I see evidence of you in portraits lying happily

with smiles that don’t eat your eyes with joy

except for mine which shine with implicit trust

passionate encouragement radiates towards you

so brightly that you cringed away, scalded by love

that didn’t hurt but should have flayed your skin

because that’s what you were taught by my blood

I wish you peace.

I wish you love.

I wish you happiness.

I wish you a life worth living.

I wish you to know that I’d do it all again.

Season with Earth

The Autumn Sky

The Autumn Sky

The colors of the Autumn breeze

dancing rainbows round naked trees

Browning of the greenest grass

brightness of the death contrasts

Orange, yellow, green, brown, red

briefly

intensely

witnessed as dead

The icy winds begin to blow

hailing

beckoning

oncoming snow

I watch in mourning staring cloudy skies

the loss of warmth from Summer’s prize.

Deep in the earth seek slumber’s redemption

Awaken in the Spring as Winter’s confession

Pearls=Wisdom

Unrefined wisdom

Unrefined wisdom

Oh, how I longed for a string of pearls

I wished and hoped since I was a little girl

I dreamed someday they’d be boon to me

Yoked around my neck as an adulthood key

Offered with adoration from generational knee

For as a foolish child, I believed wisdom to be free.

Polka Dot Salmon (Fish Ladder Blues)

Fishing the Grand River

I was born in your arms

cradled but not protected

shunned, rejected, refused

a starving babe to river’s teat.

I cried colic at your shores;

survived despite your abuse.

Like a battered lover, I, escaped

ONLY

to believe your honeyed promises

to desire your rushing waters

to climb above my station against odds

to find my true love begetting fruition

to linger too long where love dies

I avoided your calls

I dodged your temptations

I surpassed any lack you created

I became, am becoming; power

Infuse me at my request

with the Grand Rapids river’s ravishing rush

pour your shores to return my blood

reunite my spirit with yours

Let’s embrace intimately

passionate with endearing lust

so we may fall in love, again

on my terms.

Wealthy Street

I was a beggar on Wealthy Street

where I was accused of being vibrant

arrested in my quest for murdered time

charged with being an artist

convicted of faith in more than I do

as an accessory after the top hat

In my sidewalk cell,

I became an advocate as a willing-faced pauper

begging for change on Wealthy Street

Opinion: Rev. Morrill addresses ‘Black Lives Matter’

This past July, a church committee requested a new message on the electronic sign, which faces the Oak Ridge Turnpike. The message they requested was “Black Lives Matter.” The board of the Oak Ridge Unitarian Universalist Church, or ORUUC, voted to approve it, and the message was added to the sign’s series of scrolling messages.

Source: Opinion: Rev. Morrill addresses ‘Black Lives Matter’

Commemoration

It seems so long ago since yesterday

when you grabbed your toast,

shined your sunshine smile through the clouds

and scooted out the door because you were late.

I followed you, halting at the doorway

You dropped your toast on the sidewalk

You cussed, waved, shouted “I love you”

got in your car and vanished.

I didn’t have police officers showing up at my door.

I didn’t have alarms screaming

I sat on the back porch watching the sunrise

with a hot cup of coffee in my hand

your words warming my heart.

“Hey, doesn’t he work at the Towers?”

called the neighbor over the fence.

I didn’t even realize they’d been talking to me.

“What? Oh, yes.”

“Why aren’t you watching the news?”

I didn’t understand. I thought it odd.

I waved with a friendly wrist making my way to

nothing

Cold pillow. Cold toast. Crystal blue sky.

gone

Gutting of commerce, ashes of hope, lost

It’s years later and it still seems so long ago since yesterday

But I’ve never forgotten your last words to me

Every morning I walk out to lay toast on the sidewalk

Every morning I sit on the back porch and drink coffee

Every morning I watch the news

Everything a sacrament commemorating your unintentional sacrifice.

Not as it appears

Peace on Earth Love Thy Neighbor

Peace on Earth
Love Thy Neighbor

You are merely a distraction

meant as a detraction

from the deep dissatisfaction

of a dying way of life.

The marionette strings you’re dancing

are pulled by those amassing

obscene amounts of financing

with your divisive strife

You are the sleight of hand

given up as sacrificial lamb

with back-room deals grandstand

back-stabbed by Judas’ knife

I am not to judge your place

or spit into your unwitting face

as you spout you’re in god’s holy grace

while playing at Lot’s wife

I hope that what you’re saved from

in total and in sum

bring you to a better place to rest your bum

with a small bit of advice

Matthew 22:36-40,

and although it may feel a tad bit warty,

is what Jesus said while commandment sortie,

Commanded not once, but twice.