Places 39: The Trumpet Call
Pray now, before they lift the trumpets, draw breath to sound the call, before pure metal’s pressed on angels’ lips. Then, watch for hail…
Places 38: Safety
Safety Within, I’m often bound by pride. The heavy weight of self-will asserts it’s right to guide. Entitled, I alone decide to backslide from the innocence of trust. Lord, help my self, my very self to die— I’d not defy Your love. I would abide in Jesus, be sweetly fragrant on His vine; I’d let […]
Places 37: Time’s Fullness
Many years ago, after a humble man of God prayed for me, he encouraged me to write and prophetically said that I’d write two poems about trumpets. I’ve wondered if this is one of them. With feeble cries against God’s time Baal’s priests revert to boys; vast armies turn to toys; tin soldiers shaking sticks […]
Places 36: America
This prophetic cry for our nation is as relevant today as when I wrote it in 1997. Revisions were few. I changed a few present tense verbs to past tense and updated a couple images and changed the ending to a prayer. America — The U.S.A. My country—land of shopping malls, home of bubble gum and […]
Places 35: Watch
Watch! Evocative trumpets sound from high and lonely promontories awakening holy bands across the land. Crying out for grace to stand, intercessors fall in glory on the ground. God will choose His own— Elijahs to oppose the Baals, Gideons to tear down the Asherahs, Aarons and Jeremiahs to speak, and Joshuas to lead. God sows […]
Places 34: A 20th Century Psalm
upside down, inside out, this dyslexic generation drums, hums, whirrs and stirs— beats against all biorhythms scrambling nations, mixing stations— yet our ears still strain to hear. whirring blades and turning belts, clacks, sloshes and slaps, breaking rattles, sudden bangs, uneven tocks, bizzes, roars and hisses like unwanted kisses whelm motors past exhaustion— Lord, where is […]
Places 33: On the Border
On the Border Between Israel and Syria, looking toward Damascus I was forever changed. A humility of purpose, Love’s proprietary gain, remained. Lying there, an unclean woman, face down upon the land, my fingers stroking dust, rubbing such fine grains of earth— they felt like silk, slipping against my thumb, sliding between my fingers. […]
Places 32: At Masada
Inside the jambling noise of tourists and tour guides a little group, in quiet, slowly stepped aside. They stood, in silence. Then five strong sons of Abraham moved as if one man. Each hurled a stone high, high each flew, as if with wings five stones of earth rose high into the distant blue. Then […]
Places 31: Jacob’s Chutzpah
At Peniel 2021 revisions from Israel and the Chutzpah of Jacob. The original of this was an unwieldy four-page history. I Wrestling with God is fearsome. Have we courage to try? Remember the story of Jacob, a man who dared God — and cried, “Touch me, bless me, lest I die” Will we wrestle through […]
Places 30: A New School
Morning Recess on my first day in Eighth Grade in a New School in a changing neighborhood in Chicago, Illinois in 1952 A big blond tough, her skirt pulled taut to muscled thighs, her skintight tee-shirt stretched to fit big curves inside, approached me with an open grin. She roughly demanded, I follow her, so […]
The Pentateuch
In 1982 someone asked me to summarize the Pentateuch. I wrote this poem—a quick romp through Genesis and Exodus—and forgot it. Recently a couple copies surfaced in old files. I had fun revising it and know a few readers will like it. It’s a niche piece, not for everyone. Unless you know Genesis and Exodus, […]
Places 29: Ancestry
The revisions of “Marks of Ancient Boundaries” in Places 2011 turned into nine comments on family genealogy. I Seeking to discover who we were, turning through old maps and deeds, searching Ancestry.com and 23 and Me, links on our computer screens traced strokes of fading inks. Savoring our yesterdays, we documented real people— with real […]
