Song link -- He chose me

He chose me

Goodbye, cruel world

Goodbye, cruel world                                                            

Holding tightly to Your damaan,

I’m losing my grip on reality.

Serving You and myself ... it’s like

straddling two horses at full gallop.

But, in truth, You’ve given me no choice.

For that I am grateful.

Boxed into a corner, fending off the blows –

You above me, battering me to my knees –

I glance into Your eyes and see ...

Infinite Compassion.

The fight goes out of me.                                                     

I’ll never again be the man I was.  

         

I’ve received an inkling of Your love.      

Your love – the whole world is drenched in it

as You labor to bring forth

from my recalcitrant body,

the true, the pure, the immutable.

Your love requires two

to slip through the ropes,

One to emerge ...  Victorious!

O child of God, bid the world farewell

and see the compassion upon which it is built. 

                          (Unpublished)                            

                            

This rare mingling

This rare mingling                                                                     

From a child’s downed back

sprouted wings of loneliness –

propelling me, through a lifetime

          of distances,

randomly and erratically, to You.

Your stone brought me down –

wrestling like Jacob with the angel;

   

feathers dirtied, wine-stained;

collapsed upon the tavern floor.

 

Fiercely embracing You,

loneliness fled in a wash of tears.

After much doting and fussing –

my Companion whispered, 

“Drink deeply this rare mingling of dust and wine.

Drink to honor your loneliness .... 

It has led you to the threshold of God.” 

O child of God, existence was built upon

the loneliness of the One without a second.

                        (from A Jewel in the Dust)