When I was Young
When I was young
I thought to change the world
The big idea, the noble cause, heroic exploits
all with instant fame of course
Now my little life goes by
a whisper in all history
one leaf falling from the canopy
And I could pass my futile time
with pleasures, or maybe just survive
and browse through snaps of memories now gone
But, I have found a people
inconspicuous and few
and God is here unnoticed by camera crews
The kingdom infiltrates our lives
and drives out dark from hearts like mine
We lock ourselves to God, his church
at least to burn a little in our time.
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A Severe Beauty
Why is it all like this?
Such a mixture, such a mess?
One man only answers and makes sense
Beauty is for the looking
truth for the hearing
if you will
Love will lance your poison
drain the darkness
declare heaven
like a dandelion clock still telling
in the teeth of a gale
This severe love is no sweet tale
Life and death don’t play games
but love embraces all
with a driven heart like driven nails
Draw near, stretch out to hear
for only one thing matters
and all will be made clear
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How does love sit there
as children cry in pain and fear?
How does love stand by
as people hurt and cruelly die?
How or why?
So love showed me his hands and side
and showed me how alone he died.
But how does love do nothing
when evil rules the day?
And why does love not intervene
when justice looks away?
How or why? I pray
So love became all sin to me
and justice executed him for all to see.
Love cut at the root of sin
to heal our hearts and make a way
for love to enter in.
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Is that hard enough?
Let’s show what is the best
and celebrate
So said love
Invitations to a feast
But first
make a world with beauty
and let it be infected
with evil to the core
And those who struggle
every rebel
shall be subject to that fall
to sickness, fear and death
with toil to stay alive
Is that hard enough for love?
It must be
that only love survives.
But love died
It was not hard enough
to be a snowflake on a fire
or grace in a far gulag
for only love could die
forsaken
and still rise
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Wisdom
The whales do not need us
or the frozen mountains
The swifts’ careering games
the beetle’s heedless eating
Regardless of the city
or our sorrows
Out of reach
is understanding
to man who walks in space
The why, the key to suffering
a love that does not fade
The patient poor
the working mule
a child with a cat
a rolling storm, the rolling dice
the mask of death or angry eyes
So close at hand
the work of God
a curtain drawn
a word
a turning round
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Ordinary shapeless people
Forgettable faces
Making ends meet
Carrying their thoughts
Down a dull street
Lord lighten our darkness
Lift us into life, a walk on a higher way with a hope of glory
Only Jesus came this low to rise
