Blood orange peering,
Cresting the liquid horizon.
Rolling out a crimson
Carpet on the water.
Red bouncing on wave,
Burning and snuffed,
Curling in the sand,
Rapt into every grain.
Concierge of a new day.
Resurrection.
They passed by.
The waves of storms rolled toward sunrise.
To the west a rainbow was pierced
with a serrated knife of electricity.
To the east tufts of clouds
like pale pink umbrellas hung.
Intervals of solid rain tucked me
under the soffit to read.
Ann wrote about the pursuit of beauty
and there I was under it, in it.
Praise had come as rain.
Praise left my mouth.
Praise was sent to find the source of beauty.
My most significant Other read to me poetry.
I heard His inflections and cadence.
Oh my God, I am undone,
yet what better place to be unraveled
than under an umbrella with You.
“Doubt the philosophies, doubt the prophecies, doubt the Pharisees (especially the ones seen in mirrors), but Who can doubt this, Beauty? Beauty requires no justification, no explanation; it simply is and transcends. See beauty and we know it in the marrow, even if we have no words for it: Someone is behind it, in it. Beauty Himself completes.” Ann Voskamp, One Thousand Gifts
Caps of cumulus grab the first light
and float like golden vanilla scoops.
Blue grey fitted sheets crawl
beneath the infusion of pastels.
The sun brush strokes a new day.
When I close my eyes the leaves,
combed with cooler breezes,
mimic waves from Lake Michigan.
The blue noise settles my soul
and I receive this gift of Another.
*
“Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed,
because His compassions fail not.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.
‘The Lord is my portion,’ says my soul,
‘Therefore I hope in Him!’”
Lamentations 3:22-24 The New King James Bible
How many have written of a sunrise?
The darkness peeled slowly like an orange.
The thumb of God pushed up the dimmer switch.
The light swept the horizon and overflowed its banks.
Silhouettes shed layer after layer.
Shadows stretched, yawned, and shrunk.
It dawned on me.
This day, I will stand in the light.
I will walk in the light.
No sense in tripping over shadows.
“Jesus once again addressed them: ‘I am the world’s Light. No one who follows me stumbles around in the darkness. I provide plenty of light to live in.'” John 8:12 The Message
There it hung,
like a jelly bean on a string.
It was lighter today
as it lay down.
The moon shadows fled
and death is translucent.
The Bright and Morning Star
rolled it away,
rolled it away.
“I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify these things to you for the assemblies.
I am the root and the offspring of David; the Bright and Morning Star.”
Revelation 22:16
There is a lunatic out there
throwing down borrowed light
onto the lowlands.
What right has he to dispel glory
in silver strands upon snows cape?
Has he the upper hand?
I can no longer stand
under evanescent eclipses
of understanding.
Walk with me sunrise, until it is day.
Until the moon shadows
no longer follow me.
© Gerald Allen Barrett and parentheticallyspeakingin3d, 2012.
Someone mentioned the phrase “in the cool of the day” recently. A poetic nerve twitched in me and my thoughts were directed to the phrases origin. It is a beautiful description set in a time when the first “hide and seek” game was taking place.
Please excuse me while I look at this scene through my limited knowledge and imagination. I am not a theologian. There is a phrase out of the Genesis account that got my attention. After Adam and Eve did the deed they “heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day” and they ran and hid behind something. My first thought was what did that sound like? Did God step on a twig? Was God breathing heavy like on a power walk? Was he bending acacia trees with his pinky and slight creaks and cracks were heard? Was he whistling or humming or singing? I mean no disrespect at all I just simply want to know what the sound would be like in case God showed up. I mean, I might need to hide too or hopefully come out of hiding to walk with Him in the cool of the day.
And that’s the thing. The cool of the day seems to me to mean dawn or dusk. Maybe it was those in between hours. Between day and night where the heat wasn’t quite there yet or just started cooling off. Or maybe the “cool of the day” represents the grey, the time of day when shadows are more translucent and the color of created things are washed out. Then I think about how much us humans enjoy the daily transitions called sunrise and sunset. Don’t you look up and off into the distance when the sun plays the angles of the horizon, like God was brush stroking, His fingers dipping a prism through our atmosphere and laying out water color fantasies?
I have written of sunrises and sunsets more than once. I wonder too if God knows how transition gets our attention. Maybe the cool of the day is when we start winding down or winding up? Maybe it is a good time to listen for a twig break or a whistle or a still small voice. My pastor last week was encouraging us to take time to seek out God in the “secret places”. He started whispering what God might say to us. I couldn’t keep the tears from welling and I didn’t want to blink them out either. Could that be the sound in the cool of the day? Whether I am hiding because of some “deed” I did or simply wishing for someone with which to go for a walk I hope I am attentive in the cool of the day.
Oh Bright and Morning star arise in my heart today
and walk with me in the cool of the day.
Gerald the Writer 