Monday, February 22, 2010

The God Part

. . .13 Then the LORD said to Abram,
"Know this for certain,
that your offspring shall be aliens in a land that is not theirs,
and shall be slaves there, and they shall be oppressed for four hundred years; 
14 but. . ."- Genesis 15:13 (NRSV)*

Some may like to think when we've turned back the buzzards
from the dead cow, birds,
and little goat couple,
we might come away from this deal
with a clear deed.
It's still in the courts.

A torch passes among the dead and fallen
as someone lowers a kettle of dry ice 
to the stage.
From the back a flashlight clicks through the trailings.

It's a slim hope, friends,
but it's all we've got.
The Amorites won't budge,
and there's another Egypt scene to go.

© 2010 Andy Gay

*strike-throughs indicate text deleted from lectionary selections.

Sunday, February 28, 2010: Concluding Sabbath Prayer

Dear God, as I rest safely ensconced within my borders,
I see the reports of those who suffer in Haiti and Chile - 
those for whom the ground has crumbled under their feet,
unmooring their homes from the solid earth.
I gaze upon the losses of those who remain
to pick up the pieces as best they can, 

confessing this spector would nudge me into a safe landscape
where I and my kind are, ostensibly, the firm possessors.
In these parts,
victims are rendered on the same media as reality TV posers. 
As I loiter among the streamed images, 
I am not unlike the Amorite
dallying among things that failed them utterly: 
the property we call “our possession”,
the nation-states we call “our countries”, 
the neighborhoods we call “our homes” – 
the shared imagination that is “our culture” – 
these are all being undone in a mystery that is unfolding
in the watery depths of our baptism. 
It is enough to know that we have a visitor within our borders 
who is unraveling the threads of our tight-knit compact -
one whose every footfall touches the ground 
wih the acumen of a pilgrim.

He reminds us in that ancient creed that
we are the children of a wandering Aramaen.
May your spirit disabuse us of our illusions of possession 
by one such child of Abraham,
your son, Jesus of Nazareth, our savior,
by whom we measure our steps with the others
across this faulty ground.

Truly.

© 2010 Andy Gay