amidst

Amidst the sorrow

Slung across the backs

Of heroes unsung,

Everyday peasants

Who shoulder

The brunt;

Amidst the pangs

Of bountiful dreams

Of children

Who hunger

Who hope;

Amidst the toil and trade

Of human life,

The precious,

The tender,

The innocent;

Amidst the fury

Among the frail,

The billion we love

And the billion more;

Together

We sing, we weep

Songs of lament and

Screams of silence

For these few moments

And only a few moments more

Between the grave and the tomb,

The flicker and the fire.

For within the travail,

Masked in sacred mystery

Within the wailing womb

Of hope

Of history…

Christmas kicks.

sjb 

12-14-11
Photo: Ray Tollison

tilapia last night

I can pay the school fee now:

I lift my head and laugh.

My child, she wears the uniform

Washed and pressed.

“I’m pretty,”

She says.

We’re in this together

My sisters and me

We come, we pray, we cry

And we put money

To our words.

No more must I choose

Which child to feed

(We ate tilapia last night)

No more must I live

Just one moment

One day

No more must

I

Fear.

This Jesus

Tips my world

Upside down.

Good news

He brings

This Jesus

Who sings

With African tongue;

This Jesus dressed in darkened skin

This Jesus to me

My life

Undone.

9- 8- 2010

sjb

ten

My Allah

Lifts his hand

To strike the moon, my moon

Jabel Moon.

Devils on livestock with

Fire in their eyes.

I swallow fast

my heart

it beats.

My sister went to the bush

To look for cooking wood.

She came

Home today but talks

No more she does.

Daddy says run with me. We flee

The place I sleep.

“It’s over now” she says

“Be still.”

They give Daddy

Some seeds and say

My dreams will bloom too.

They say sister will speak again.

They say the sun will rise to warm

This thirsty land beneath my feet.

They say one day the devils

Of the earth will terrify

No more.

plunder

These children

Sudanese

Plunder laughter

From this scorched land.

Their joy

Lifts the veil:

Behold, a kiss 

A ray of innocence; 

A holy moment 

Bliss.

You mercy

This land

By caressing

These

The least. 

Madame Shiru

Madame Shiru
Gave herself away
So she could send

Dickson and Mary to school.

Then she fell sick

And work no more

She could.

Mathere is a slum

Two hundred thousand people live there

In stalls

On square plots

Circumferenced by sewers

Carrying away the morning soap

And evening sweat.

I said hello in Swahili;

A lady called back:

“We have Obama now.”

The Luo’s pay rent to the Kikuyu’s

But they destroyed Madame Shiru’s house

When Odinga didn’t win.

The people from the zinc-roofed church

Came to Shiru.

Or maybe she came to them.

They helped her gather a bit of courage;

They helped her piece together her house;

They helped her lift her hands again

To pray

This Nairobi Bethlehem

Would crack open

Its beaten, weathered soul

And prostrate forth its lavish poverty

Upon Your peasant wealth.

3 March 2009

a conversation with epiphany

“Jesus shows himself precisely present in those who are absent.” –Gustavo Gutierrez

Magi

We are;

King

I am not

Clinging

This Arabian Sea

Of bitter wind

Of torrid sand

Of jealous star

I ponder

This Eastward summons

Eclipsed

By the long shadow of history

Of suffering

Of toil

The rise and fall

Of civilizations all

Its brunt

Shouldered by those

Underneath.

Oh

This dusty

Sacred day

Poised between

Now and then!

Will You split human history

Between suffering

And bliss?

Will You burn war-weathered boots

And bloodstained clothes?

I tread this holy, earthen

Beckoning:

I believe!

And seek You

As You seek those

Who are

Absent.

And with each coursing

Of my blood

I grip Your radiance:

You

Stretch the dawn

Across Middle Eastern sky;

You

Descend like morning dew

And blanket our quivering;

You

Dress in human flesh

And to a weary world

You

Shout

Salvation

With faint

And feeble cry.

sjb

1/1/11

Every warrior's boot used in battle and every garment rolled in blood

will be destined for burning will be fuel for the fire. For unto us a child is born… - Isaiah 9:5-6

kiss the quivering lip

Families
Wrapped their loved ones
In linens beautiful.
Some wrote epithets
Of grief
Of love
And attached them
To their feet.

Some
Desperate
Some opportunistic
Stole the shoes and clothes
Of the dead.
Naked we come
Naked we go.


There was man
I know him
He rescued
Two, three
And then four more.

I was told a mother ran in
As others ran out.
She flung her body
Across her child.
None greater
They say
Than she who gives her life
For another.

Thamar
Had a baby today
She named her
Jesula,
"God with us".
Her family waited
Until after birth
To tell of her firstborn son:
"He's gone
To where Jesula
Has come."
She wailed, "Please, no, please
Bring him to me,
Please?"

Chase this crowded room
This press of humanity
This weight of history;
Triage the punctured soul
Wash the suffering wound
And breathe the dying flicker.


Lay
Your gentle head
O Mercy
Upon this Haitian bosom
Of anguish
Of grief
And kiss the quivering lip
Of mother
Of child
Of sinner
Of saint.

Port-au-Prince
January 30, 2010 © sjb

rag doll

rag doll

little girl

strewn upon the stones.

hush now

sleep

little princess

little princess of city Prince

peace be still

the earth

the sky

cry no more
little heart

no more

cry.

awaken your sleep

splash your face
lift your gaze;

time to kiss the Sun

to laugh the Moon
to dance the Sky:

time to go home.

everything's gonna be alright

everything's gonna be alright now

little princess of city Prince

little girl

rag doll.

Port-au-Prince
January 24, 2010 © sjb
Picture by Ray Tollison