YOUR WORDS

 

Are your words like fire spit in my face to burn

Or are they like rain to quench my thirst? 

My need for softness to soothe to heal the dry places-

Will your words pierce my flesh boring holes to my core?

Tell me? Use your inside voice to reach my heart…

Are your words ignited by the flame of desire?

Or are they cold like ice making it easy to turn your back

Leaving me Misery’s company.

The name you spit in my face is not the one

Given at birth yet you swear it belongs to me

Because you say so.

Speak to me from your heart…your inside voice.

Your words reflect you, don’t they?

Each syllable reflects your character-

The gut and realness that is you…not me!

Speak to me in you inside voice…you came 

Under false pretenses to be my beloved.

Yet, your words breathed from a dark place

Scorch and burn and leave a scar where my heart once yearned for you.

Use your Inside voice and write your goodbye’s so-longs 

and make your departure as I stay here to erase 

the essay you have written in my blood. 

My need for softness out weighs your presence

Go and never return…For your inside voice is 

Raspy and off -key, rough and dry…maybe

Next time your words will sing sweet music

Written just for me just to say, “I love you.”

Fearlessly approach me even though my ear may not

Be willing to listen and be willing to speak knowing that

Your return is too late! But speak…with your inside voice

Because you simply had…something…to say!

Photo credit: Kristina Flour for Unsplash

SHE SINGS

She saw the mike. It beckoned her. She climbed the two steps and stood flat-footed, center stage and nodded ever so slightly. Her voice was like magic.

The crowd below waited in knowing expectation. She closed her eyes in a moment of prayer. 

She smiled as she turned to the band. She was ready. Her assignment was clear. Composed, transposed, deported to a place that only the Songstress knew existed. 

She sang of glory; she sang of power!

She sang hallelujah and joy!

She sang of jazz and nights at the

Cotton Club that lived in stories told

And re-told, passed down through time.

Her voice was like honey.

She sang of glory and hallelujah.

Praising the Giver of the Gift.

Her beauty dwarfed only by her voice.

She sang of blues and strange fruit,

Of how her pain had been 

Overcome by joy.

I felt chosen to sit, front row center

to witness the arrival of an angel

From heaven.

She sang jazz and I swore it was gospel,

Told stories of the movement

Of sorrow, and rising

from the dust.

Telling stories wrapped in notes.

Painting pictures with the power

to heal broken hearts.

Her voice was raw, and smooth.

My worries, and tears vanished.

 I sat mesmerized.

The music of a million ages were

held in her bosom.

She sang mending wounds with her voice

feeding souls with each note.

She sang

The lady sang

The blues

And salvation

She sang!

Of overcoming

Pain

Rejection

Brokenness

She sang

And told us

That Jesus cares

He loves

She sang...she sang...

Glory hallelujah...

SHE SANNNNG!

Photo credit: Josh Rocklage for Unsplash