Dripping poison,
Those little words,
Snarled,
Under the breath,
Then pushed out
With the stomach.
You passed on your mother’s china
To me, the first grandson to marry,
But you wanted to keep a teapot.
My wife wanted the entire set,
So, I said no.
That’s when you got nasty.
I don’t care what you do, you said.
Just sell it!
I had no intention of selling it.
Now that we’ve had it for a while,
We think we’ll pass it on
To your grandchildren.
Isn’t that what you would want?
Crimes unimaginable
Sins unfathomable
Wrongs not righted
With an apology,
A soft word,
Or the stroke of a pen.
Pain to the deepest parts
Of the heart and soul,
The very fiber of one’s being,
A wound that doesn’t heal,
But rather cuts deeper
With every smile,
Every handshake,
On every pay day,
Every trip to the grocery store,
Every night at mealtime,
When they look at their children,
When they look at ours.
Privilege continues
Despite the lip service,
Despite the promises,
Amidst the meager gifts,
The dregs of easy charity
From the tatters of a bursting purse,
The guilt trip laid on thick
To the middle class and even
The working poor.
Those that lack for food,
Clothing or shelter,
Living barely day to day,
Not knowing where one’s next
Meal will come from.
And at the church the preacher
Says try harder, pray more,
Save your dollars
So you can send your little ones
To a good college,
Make them study,
Keep them out of trouble,
Tell them you love them,
That you’re proud of them
For that report card.
What do you say
When the white kid
Calls them the n-word?
What do you say
When you don’t have a job
Because you refused
To kiss your supervisor’s butt
When he would talk to you
Like you were nothin’,
Just a cog in his machine,
A disposable, replaceable,
Optional, neglectable,
Insultable, disrespected,
Used, abused, tossed out
To the street
Like so much garbage,
Black man?
I waited for you
On top of the mountain,
But you didn’t show.
I went down
Into the valley,
But I didn’t see you there.
I sailed on the ocean,
Hoping to catch
A glimpse of you at sunrise,
But I was disappointed.
I prayed to you
To appear to me,
And I looked at my reflection
In a pool of water.
It was then that I realized–
You were always with me,
For you are a part of me.
We can never be separated,
You and I.
We are One.
Are you the hand
That I shake in the pew,
Or on my way out the door,
To the parking lot?
…
Are you the presence,
In the plate and cup,
Upon the altar,
That is given for me to consume?
…
Are you the dirty, scarred face,
Of an abused, homeless woman,
Begging on the street,
Around the corner from the grocery store?
…
Are you the gentle face and eager voice
Of the elderly man
Who comes to my front door,
Struggling to use an iPad to show a video?
…
Are you the pastor at the soup kitchen,
Who tells me the administrative position
I’m interviewing for requires someone
Who can shmooze with the volunteers?
…
Are you the book with all the stories
Spoken a long, long time ago,
Written a long time ago,
For people who lived a long time ago?
…
If so, I’m wondering:
What is your name? Who am I
In relation to you?
Why do you appear differently to all?
…
I’d like to pin you down,
Put your number and your address
In my contact list.
I’d like to feel you.
…
I know that’s not how you operate,
If you did, you wouldn’t be God,
Or would you?
Sometimes I wonder.
Moving towards you, in a roundabout
Sort of way. I feel the weight of my fear.
No, Mom and Dad didn’t tell me how to
Speak confidently, converse about things
Like interests and hobbies, to discuss the
Issues of the day. So, what is important
To you? I want to know, so true.
Sometimes I freak when I go to church. When you step into a church somehow you feel like you should be on your best behavior. That’s not really a Godly feeling or sentiment, since I believe that God accepts us exactly as we are, wherever we are, but that is how I was raised. In fact, growing up, my mother was ruthless in spurring me and my brother to get ready and stop goofing around on Sunday morning. What was important was looking good by being on time, behaving well, answering questions intelligently and in a spiritual way—basically, putting on a front. Lord knows my family was falling apart at the seams in every way, with my grandmother passing away, my parents’ separation and eventual divorce, and my mother’s undiagnosed mental illness. All was not well in the Bowman household. And those feelings come back to me today as I step through the doors of a church, any church, even one as positive, inclusive and accepting as mine. I wonder what deviant thoughts people suspect me of (well, actually, I am quite the skeptic), what deviant acts I am guilty of that separate me from other Christians and from God, what rebellion I am in that alienates me from the same. Going to church is something I want to do, but at the same time, I do struggle with these things every time, and it compromises my experience on the whole.
Sometimes I freak when I try to pray. Yes, God and I are not on the best of terms—haven’t been for a long time. In fact, except for when I pray with others—my wife at the dinner table and the occasional attempt at a weekly prayer partnership, my male prayer partner, something I initiated this year as an attempt to get closer to God because of my lack of an intimate relationship, and the occasional prayer with my Sunday School class and with the congregation in the sanctuary—I am not on speaking terms with God. I know after that enumeration of instances it doesn’t sound bad, but I guess I am a perfectionist, and I realize how far I am from any kind of daily routine which would bring me into any kind of genuine intimacy with God. Being alone with God is a frightening experience for me. Feelings of emotional and physical abuse from childhood along with visions of an angry Yahweh of the Old Testament conjure a being to be faced that is not the loving, caring Jesus that spoke to the disciples in the upper room that fateful night and told them that when we see him we have seen the Father, because he and the Father are one. When it’s just me and God (and I have to admit it is always the vengeful Father that I envision in my mind, not the gentle Jesus), I just freeze up. Gone are the soothing thoughts of “come to me ye who are weary, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light”. Instead it is a booming God that stares down at me and demands to know every sin I have committed and has come to punish me for them in some crazy sadistic way that makes me cringe and from which I yearn to escape. Not a great relationship, obviously.
Sometimes I freak when I open the Bible. I’ll admit, it’s intimidating. Yes, there is a lot of wisdom there. Yes, I believe it is divinely inspired. Yes, I believe there is potential for healing, instruction, direction, inspiration, grace, forgiveness—all that. But you know what else there is? God. He is there, waiting, behind those words. For what? I don’t know. But the potential scares me. I have read the entire Bible many times over, and if there is one thing I know for sure, there is power behind those words. And the thought of being overpowered, perhaps in a scary way, is what keeps me from those words. I have been overpowered, many times, in absolute terror, and I have run from figures of authority, figures who were supposed to be trustworthy caretakers, symbols of love and support, that have turned on me like a viper lunging for its prey. Is God like that? My intellect tells me no, but my heart, and my body, are not so sure. After all, if humans, blood, family, can be tyrannical, how much more can God? And there is something else—God is all powerful. Do I want to surrender myself to an all powerful tyrant? Do I want his thoughts to be my thoughts? No, not by a long shot.
Deep down, I dig to the bottom.
What lies in this hidden depth?
Fear, grief, rage, confusion…
It rocks my reason, clouds my vision.
But what is the answer?
Where is the road out of this darkened wood?
Is it faith? Trust? Logic? Courage? Peace?
Is Love the answer? Where will it take me?
Right now everything is scary.
I feel caught in a cage,
In chains, buried deep underneath
Miles of ground, isolated by time,
Place, and no relationships that bring
Relief, connection, revelation, peace.
Anxiety rules the roost, it conquers all.
Fear is my father, abandonment is my mother.
Rage is my brother, grief is my sister.
This is my family. My friends are shadows,
Ghosts in a mist that only evaporate in my
Hands when I reach out to hold their hands.
I am lost in my mirrors, erroring in my program,
Nothing makes sense, nothing works.
What is the truth? Who is my savior?
From where does my salvation come?
Stumbling along the sidewalk 