before january 12

At ten thousand feet
Near a village poor
La source de l'eau
Thirsts the mountains
De la Selle.

I wade
A cavern dug
By the French in 1940,
A promise of hope
Cascading
To the masses
Below.

But incarnate
It does not
These waters shaking dry
Their hems
Just before
This Haitian child
Can sunder his lips
To mouth a drip.

Too extravagant
To imbibe?
This abyss too large
To leap?
Too much water
Under the bridge?
This child unable
To convince?
Too much
To pray, to live
One moment
Not pauper

But prince?

Port-au-Prince
May 8, 2003 © sjb

You Shepherds

You
Who plead the soil
Who midwife earth’s becoming
From fallowness
From frailty.

You
Who pray the womb
Who resuscitate the orphan
Who burden disease
Who give beyond the grave.

You
Who gaze at sunflowers
Through welded window bars
Who cling the bottom rung
Who suffer violence.

You empty-handed
You servants
You slaves
You

Shepherds:

Be still
Your trembling.
Annul
Your grief.
Witness this thrill lift the dawn
And rain your weariness.

Ave Sopheary
Ave Fatima
Ave Deng
Ave Baptiste
Ave Sonia
Ave.

For unto you
Today
Your Liberator

Is born.

sjb
24.12.09
Picture by Kerstin Pless

palm

magnificat

Magnificat anima mea Dominum.
Et exsultavit spiritus meus in Deo salutari meo

calloused hands
stretched trembling
to thee
my soul ascends
my spirit laughs
in you  
my liberator.

you cry the periphery;
you lament the edge.
you mercy the thirsty;
you voice the silent.

and you
astonish

me.

yahweh leaps
inside my womb
and mingles
in peasant blood;
you dress
in human flesh
and advent

your tenderness.

sjb 12/20/08

complaint

A volcano presides over Kivu;
It ambers angry the African sky.
The moon, aloof
Hammocks its limbs
And terrors not.

But Your people terror still
The quiet cauldron in the bush
Boys, the age of mine
Girls the age of innocence.
Stolen.

“We need food and cooking pots”
The African man, brave,
Asks only that his people would smile.
I ask only that You defend
The afflicted
These friends
Beyond the edge
These bothers
These sisters
Flesh and blood
Like me

Like You.

adeste fideles

During the holidays, I typically reflect on the year past and prayerfully anticipate the next. Advent is especially instructive: it teaches me to wait, to anticipate, to expect. It splashes paint on canvas in uncomfortable fashion: Bethlehem is for people that have come to the end of themselves, who have no choice but to press into Christ, who desperately seek a miracle in the midst of ordinary squalor, on the periphery, where things aren’t suppose to happen.

Many of my friends and colleagues live in forsaken places, on the edge of humanity—Darfur, Eastern Congo, even Haiti. But I find Christ there, often more present than in our land of plenty. And I find faith that humbles me, faith that disarms my usual weapons—I become more vulnerable; I give more freely; I surrender.

And, I often leave wondering—am I better off or are they?

“We are redeemed by our suffering…” says Dostoevsky. Theological sparring aside, ceteris paribus, I find more faith in desperate places.

holy resuscitation

Three days journey more
This City of Bread
We ascend.
Our nourishment,
Your soul,
Stretched fragile
Against blue collar sky;
Our sojourn,
Your will,
Rhythmed
By weary breath,
Burdened
By Middle Eastern sweat.

All the while
History exhales
Its last gasp
And waits
Your holy
Resuscitation.

Yahweh,
Respire these lungs
Blanket this shiver
And kindle this revelation
But stay not your advent:
Undress Your glory
Slip on human skin
And pitch your tent
Among us—

We who hunger
Who thirst
Who dwell
On the periphery

Come.

now

there are moments
nestled between
the busy
the mundane
indeed so fleeting
(i can't buy it?)
so pregnant somehow
hopeful
peaceful
this instant
present
not before
not then

only now.

caleb

Your eyes are so blue I could fall into them and swim deep into your soul beyond your beginning where hydrogen and oxygen first kissed you awake and fired the dolphin sea into your starry gaze then sprang happies into your tigger tenderness and now I remember the morning sky and so surface from your thirsty spongy heart to hear you whimper.... mommy?

between moments...

The rain kneels
To kiss the earth
Soiled as it is.
October shivers

Stretching its
Tender flesh
Between moments
Birthing
And dying
Until

December
Thieves again
Garmenting,
Hushing

A thousand
Arctic gasps
Falling strong
On their swords.
Now

The lilty dirge
Sings May
As winter
Pools dying
At spring's feet

Awakening

Hatching.

christmas kicks

her water breaks
across the back
of a middle eastern ass.
darkness
wraps itself
around her skin
but gives no
warmth.

christmas kicks.

his lips quiver
sylllables
of plea
of prayer
he fumbles
his shawl
to warm his wife.

yahweh
you
who dangle
the universe
now dangle history
in this shivering
virgin womb

only thirteen.

ray

Once in a while a ray breaks through and shines. Joshua rode his bike today, the first time without training wheels. He squealed at his success. Caleb learned a few weeks ago which made for some jealously from his older brother. But all that is gone today. The sun is shining, Joshua and Caleb are riding, and two boys are proud and happy and content.

The day before yesterday Belinda was laid out on a dilapidated gurney with an IV hitched to her flesh. She dehydrated in all but three hours and her white count went through the roof. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like we'll have the luxury of naming the culprit. But today she’s swallowing water and some juice too. Strength is paying a visit.

After tasting a measure of success on his bike, Joshua yelled, “I’m never gonna fall again!” Three minutes later he managed to launch himself over his handle bars onto the concrete driveway. Abrasions on his face and legs prove his pain. But by evening he was back on the bike that bit him.

Today’s sunshine is sandwiched between rain clouds. Who says suffering and pleasure shouldn’t join hands once in awhile? Truth be told, they instruct me better together, than alone.

she smiled hello

As she whirled
Her African dress
Caught the wind
And we all felt
Her sunshine.

She sat down
And smiled hello.
Then she gripped a spade
And began to shovel
Out her life.

I said, "Do I see flowers
Among your sorrows?"
She said,, "The rain calls from afar

And waters my dreams."

I took that to mean
She likes rainbows.

cheeza

Cheeza is tall like a tree, his trunk thin like his branches. Lavender sandals separate him from the Rwanda dust, and his African smile beckons heaven. He’s 15 at best.

Every other day Cheeza and I jog the streets of Kigali. In between gasps, we take turns trying to understand each other’s world…

A white person is a muzungu unless a black person is rich. Fanta is the best you can drink. Clean shoes mean you don’t work. Streets are sidewalks and sidewalks are work if you want to dig dirt for 700 a day. The church betrayed the people but pastors are always right.

Cheeza says he doesn’t have a mom; he doesn’t talk about his dad. Still he finds hope, and many days he puts mine to shame. It seems Cheeza has risen above Rwanda’s thousand valleys and, somehow, he still slips through Africa’s grip.

Rwandans say you can only understand a person with your feet. To know someone, you must go to their home; you must enter their life from the inside out. I understand less now then when I first arrived.

My journey has only just begun…

the wealth around her...

Her arms lift fire
Beyond the edge of earth.
The winds sweep
Her feet;
Distant sounds
Rhythm the night.
She is a Degas dancer
Abandoned
To her gift.

She drinks in the wealth
Around her—
The mango head-dress.
Ebony skin chalked white
By the village mill.
The communal hymn
Sung while harvesting
The water.

Hope falls softly
Around her
Dangling.
Her resilience
Salutes the sun's wrath.

She astonishes.
She’s a child
Innocent
Lunging laughter
Flinging faith
Trusting
Someone
Somehow...

Africa.