The only answer

The only answer

I've been making inquiries lately.
It's not apostasy but affirmation -

a broadening and deepening of faith.
The evidence of doubt is not questions

but the answers.  I've come to hear
(I may be mistaken) all strategies

as mere wishful mimicry; all answers
inverted questions clothed in faith.

We rattle off our answers
rather than placing ourselves

silently, vulnerably at His feet.
If there is an answer, it's Him. 

Surely, there can never be  
any answer other than the Word.

O child of God, how daunting!
To believe the only answer is God.

                       (Unpublished)

The garbs of sainthood

The garbs of sainthood

The aura wanes; the halo waxes -
no tangible angels, nor saints among us

now that the mandali are gone.
Each soul suffers the same ignominy -

our lower-than-angels status;
shame at our nakedness

sans the garbs of sainthood.
In the shadows, we chase

drunkenly after angels,
cherubs in the thickets,

tearfully aware of the heights
from which we have fallen; our souls

not at home in this world, nor in the bodies
of which we are so enamored.

Fear to the soul like pain to the flesh -
something awry ... in need of repair.

The aura wanes; the halo waxes -
a natural evolution over the aeons.

What makes so painful our shortfalls
are the selfsame antonymous qualities

we have yet to conquer -
impatience, conceit, distrust and willfulness.

O child of God, perhaps sainthood begins
with the acceptance of our own naked humanity