2: Find a job that requires courage.

3: Encourage others to eat healthy.

4: Try not to be the biggest hypocrite about resolution number 3.

5: Start translating the Gospel of John

6: Help one person at great expense to myself.

        The levy in his mind broke, and that night, the last night he saw her, flooded his memory. It started with his best friend Frank, and a difficult conversation that no best friend wants to have. Frank broke the news: Sarah had slept with her ex.

           There, at times, is an irony to relationships. Mark felt as if he was drowning, in fact something in him died that day. Yet Sarah didn’t want Mark to leave; she never wanted to hurt him. It was as if, her ex lured her out to sea with the sweetest song only to let her drown. Mark did not know that she hated herself. It was a mistake, but in her eyes, she was the mistake. After the break up, she spent nearly a year concealing the cuts underneath her shirt sleeves.

        Still looking at his phone; he tried to make sense of this intrusion. Now what? What could he do? If he texts her back, then would he fall again for her Siren song? He should tell her to leave him alone. She has done enough damage. With each passing second, he grows more resolute. He is not going to let her in. He will cut this off right now, and he types, “I don’t want to talk,” and he hit send. It was done.

      It was thirty seconds, maybe a minute at the most, and his phone buzzed: “Please, I’m so sorry.” He was irate; he started muttering, “If she wants to talk, okay, I have a few things to say to that bitch!” He could hardly control himself. It was no ordinary rage. It was the rage of emptiness, the rage of betrayal, and the rage of fierce loneliness, that to a half closed eye, could be mistaken for something entirely else. He could hardly slow his fingers down slow enough to type: “fine go ahed talk! better yet how bout u go ahead and fuck urself.”

      She didn’t reply.

      It was four days, before he realized. Four days of sickness. Was it an ulcer? He didn’t eat. His stomach did feel better when he drank milk. His best friend dealt with the brunt of his frustration on the first night, and they both agreed, that he will absolutely not talk to her. He threw up twice. It had been a year since the breakup, why is he sick?  

       He had been hurt before, so what was so different? It was a new kind of hate. However, he is not a contemplative, and certainly not a philosopher; he is just a college freshman. It question was more like an intuitive whisper, as distracting as a repetitive drip-drop in the basement of his mind. A whisper, this week especially, he was content to ignore. Between classes, he filled his head with screaming rock music, and kept his I-pod head phones in with the intent of ignoring the world.

        It was Thursday night, Mark went to bed early. His roommate would be studying at the library to roughly 1 am.  His roommate left his computer on, and the screen saver was just enough to keep him up. He, half curled on his side, faced the wall next to his bed. With the covers half over his face, he embraced the quiet in his room. He knew pain almost unreal. He actually missed her.

           Friday was a blur of classes, projects, and even eating more than a few bites. In fact, it was right after dinner. Alone in his dorm room, in a moment of weakness, because he wanted to be weak; he sent her a text. They would meet at the park in an hour.

           When he got into his car, he cut down with the thought: “you are falling for this again?!” He pushed it aside by giving him the excuse that he was going just to talk. He slowly turned the music up. With each red light and with each turn, the tension grew. He thought of what it would have been like; when her bastard of an ex pulled Sarah close. He thought of his hands unbuckling her pants, and he remembered why he was so harsh. She gave herself so easily to him, and after he was the one who put the time in. He was the one who listen to her problems. He was the one who bought her flowers and gifts, and he even bought her prom dress, because her parents couldn’t afford it. After all of that, she cheated. He needs to be mean, he reasoned, because it is good boundaries. She is just going to hurt him again.  She is a cancer, and he knows he needs to cut her out of his life. She is a flashing lure, which this fish will swim by. She is song on the crescent wave, which this sailor will ignore. It has come down to this; she is a grave, and today, he will leave a flower and walk away.

            He hurried to the spot, and he was there alone. The sunlight was fading, and its tangential touch covers the grass with gold, yet this is the spot where he will say good bye. The quiet wind carried a flame red leaf and softly laid it before his feet. This is what made him look up. This is what made him look skyward to see the mural of dying leaves burning bright and letting go!  When he looked down, she was there.

          Her eyes were soft.  She looked wore out, and ready to hear the worst, ready to feel his hate.  She didn’t say anything, because in this quiet, all excuses and apologies fail. In her silence, she gave her heart to him, because she wanted him to crush it. Anything to make up for what she had done.   In this quiet, Mark saw her, for who she really was. A passivity in her downward glance that signified change; Sarah was different.  This time, in the fading evening half-light, they both knew that the other had held on. He felt why his hate was different, because in that moment, he cared. 

       She was statue still, with the grace of a ruined angel.  He moved to her, and brought her head to his chest and his arms pulled her in. His hand, for the first time in over a year, felt her hair. Her hand clenched the back of his shirt, like she never would let go. And, the silence was broken with healing, when they realized that their hate was love, and together, they wept.

-js

“A Thought of You”

The cerebral cortex

Is a house with no back door,

No back yard with a dog on a string,

No neighbor kid

playing on a swing,

No morning light

No touch of mythic night.

No weeds growing by the fence,

Or flowers in spring’s suspence.

Just walls,

Corners and corridors,

Walls entending, walls peeling

with a thin layer

of faded compassion.

—

I keep the front rooms cluttered,

Receipts, a crumpled submission,

And yellow nespapers scatterred,

Among

Broken spine books and dirty dishes,

Magazines stacked crookedly,

The floor creaks

But the past rests silently.

—

A few pictures

Of you:

With broken

Disjointed frames

Asymmetrical shards of glass

That I cut my fingers on,

_________That is,

_________If I ever clean over there.

—-

Love, spacial distance of where you are

and my front door,

Conmtemplation  of your cold starlight:

But i don’t visit the window anymore.

—

Time, scar tissue thought,

The electrical burn of

What memory brought,

Into the dim lit prison

Extending endlessly

Into the chasm:

A house decrepid.

Blue walls, you liked blue so much.

*

7/10/2011-11/26/2011

-js

It’s hard for me to accept the fact that the some of the origins of my anger issues comes from something that is my own choice. It is a decision that I make from time to time.

 Yes, I choose to feel alone.

There are certainly time when I was rejected, when I was told I was not good enough. Obviously being treated unfairly is not my fault, and we all have experienced this type of hurt. Relationships and friendships are messy at best.

So what is my point? What I am saying is this: it is wrong for me to allow this hurt to hurt all my relationships after the fact. There is an old saying which kind of explains this: “hurt people hurt people.” And I do not want to perpetuate any more hurt.

I want to say that even with past hurts, I have close friends who love me and accept me for me.

If I have friends that accept me, then why do I feel lonely? Have you ever ask that question? It’s a tough question for me. I’d rather blame someone else, whether it is a girl who won’t acknowledge my existence, or a hard-to-please boss, or a distant friend. Yet, the question remains: why are you angry Joe?

I’m just trying to keep it real here. Sometimes, it is my own choice, and I need to own that to overcome it. If you feel the same way, then we understand each other, even if it is only in small way. Kind of like, two people looking at the same star.

-js

I think too many christians cultivate an image of who they think they should be, then they fake it to everyone. I’ve done that before, but it only leads to loneliness and hypocrisy.

However, it’s such a beautiful experience when someone shares their hurts and frustrations, and they realize that they are not alone. Yet, there are people right now who feel alone, who feel no one understands, and who feel like they are not acceptable to God. I know, because I was one of them, but there were some people in my life that reached out and showed me love, and let me tell you, love changes everything.

I know in some churches it is down right hard to be real, because often times, the atmosphere doesn’t cultivate openness. There is a real risk of being rejected by legalistic jerks.

Yet, the church should be the one place someone is safe to share their struggles. You know why, because spiritual growth is not primarily an individual effort, rather it is grown within community. As Romans 12:1b says, “present your bodies [plural] as a living sacrifice [singular], holy and acceptable to God, which is you spiritual worship.” The church is made up of many people, but we are to be one living sacrifice to God.

Lord, I pray that we can learn to be real and not fake. I pray that we walk in grace and forgiveness with one another. And I pray for those with hurts deep within, that your love will ease internal warfare and bring a peace beyond understanding.

Amen.

-js.

The sound bothers him.

-

Snow speckles the grass

Just like the weather man said,

A picture of his brother before his tour in Vietnam

On the desk beside the bed,

-

Annoyed, he leaves the radio on and heads outside

He has work to do.

-

Crooked arthritic gait, grass stiff under feet

Mixed with half glossed mud,

A half a mile from the paved street.

-

A humbling chill

Fifteen miles per hour

From the west, 

Turns his face red,

Breathing in burns his chest,

Silently

Sets his face downward,

Like the day he prayed

In the chair beside her bed,

At the conclusion of her mortality.

-

Different now, indeterminable to know when,

Gradual as the rot of his barn,

A realization as he bears the work

With the flannel shirt, wool lined jacket

And worn leather gloves,

many winters as such, many winters…

  ——-yet the wind.

When did life lose its warmth?

-

One of resolutions was to live life like people can change.

-

This is something that I honestly want to believe, but there is a problem. It’s not that I don’t believe a drug addict can become sober, because I know recovering addicts who are now awesome examples. It’s not that I don’t believe a sinner can become a saint. Because, i do. I have trouble believing that I can change. Because, I know myself too well. This trouble is not in my head, but it is in my heart.

-

In my self hatred, I don’t feel like I can change. In my self pity, I don’t feel like I am worthy of change. I feel like Peter in the Gospel of John, who after spending three years with Jesus. I mean Peter saw miracles. He saw courage when Jesus challenged the corrupt leadership. He saw love when Jesus cared for needy children, and mercy when he touched the lepers. Yet, Peter was continually botching it up, and when Jesus was being falsely accused. Peter was scared and disowned his friend. If anything would show that Peter hadn’t changed; it would be this. He betrayed Jesus.

-

If I was Peter; I would be like, “Man, I really messed up. This is so me. Why do I do this? I’m never going to change.”

YET JESUS CHANGES EVERYTHING.

–

I don’t know your story, but I can tell you this. There are so many times that I feel like I betrayed Jesus. Yet, Peter did change. Jesus asked Peter three times, “do you love me?” Peter replied, “you know that I do.” Jesus, just asked him to take care of his sheep, which means, love and care for other Christians. You see, Jesus saw PETER’S HEART. Peter’s heart was different. He was a mess on the outside. And, he may have had lingering feelings on guilt. He may have had lingering worries about persecution from the authorities. Yet, Jesus’ words “follow me” resonated deep within the chambers of his heart, and Peter followed Jesus.

-

I, honestly, feel like Peter. Four years of college, and I feel like I still have the same struggles that I had freshman year. But, Jesus says that I am different. I can change, because he says I can change. It doesn’t matter how I feel, because he is beckoning me to follow him. I don’t know where he will lead me, but I have somewhere he needs me -the flawed, messy, and contradictory me. He wants all that. I don’t know if you feel stuck in life, but He is beckoning you too.

I have often been asked what I want to be after I graduate, and I usually respond with the career path that sounded good that week. lol. And I do have a general idea of what I want to do, but that’s just it, a general idea.

But throughout my last semester I came to realize something. When someone talks about who I am, I don’t want them to label me by my job. “oh I know Joe, he worked at campus security…” Or, “he went to LeTourneau and went on to do this *insert job title*” That is really lame to me. Because, my job does not = who I am.

I want people to know me by who I really am and want to be.

I am follower of Jesus.

I want to be a good man, a just man, and a loving man. That just seems a whole lot more meaningful to me.

Mom seeking quiet

Hurried me outside:

-

Forgetting my shoes by the front closet,

Leaving my socks on the back porch

Through the screen door, then,

Running to the canopying maples

Just past the clustered pines,

-

Mom had things to do, but she gravitated towards

The double paned glass.

-

Star burning energy, glimpses of sensation:

-

Climbing high enough to see Robin’s nest,

It’s fluttering wings, perched on the twisted twigs,

Feeding its young.

I perched myself a time or two. Watching my dog, Nicky, chasing squirrels

Along the fence. Sometimes, seeing my mom through the branches.

-

In the crossing of brief moments,

Childhood eclipsed.

-

*

-

Time made me responsible,

Education is learning

That I have things to do.

-

Yet sometimes, I climb the wooden stairs,

Past hastily labeled brown boxes,

Stacked on the floor,

From memory‘s dim attic window, I,

Look out from the height of order

Upon that field of summer’s revelry:

-

A taste lingering

Of sweet chocolate and sugar cane

I had got for being a good boy,

Wearing proudly my red ball cap

From playing spring baseball,

Jeans that already had a grass stain,

I see a challenge of bark and sap,

Over twenty feet tall,

And that branch just low enough

To start my adventure off.

*

1/29/2011-6/21/2011

-J.S.

What does a fractured mirror show?

And hidden in your room,

Away from daylight,

Away from love,

A face finds a pillow,

A pillow soaked in tears,

Saying, “that’s not me,

It is not enough.”

*

Down the stairs

Through the screen door

Is a yard,

Is a fence,

Is a world.

*

What the mirror doesn’t show

What you fear is what you have to let go,

And the conversations in your head

about who you would rather be instead,

Are quieted to silence

As you pass down the street

And you look up to see kids on swings,

Then and there, a picture incomplete,

Because they have years to grow.

You look up to see a freckled face

And you see yourself for the first time.

-js