Unaffordable

Anger is, most often, generated

by the assumption that you know best

and more about what matters than others,

combined with the subconscious assurance

that, because you are so enlightened,

the world spins at your command.

Think about it. Once you understand

that it's barely possible to fully know

the why and when of your own self,

and fairly impossible to walk in others' shoes;

once you see that your little mass

in the universal scheme and

your tiny dot on the continuum of time

are quite insignificant in the story of creation,

anger becomes a luxury that reality cannot afford.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

Minimalism

The Future popped-in again today,

re-inviting you to continue the journey.

She said the road will feel

much less steep if you don't  

carry your past the whole way.

The best parts of yesterday

are what make you into

who you are today,

so there's no need to keep

dragging them along.

Continuing to remind others

of them will diminish both you

and today by keeping you

trapped in the past tense. 

The worst parts of yesterday

have also impacted your present.

Learn from them and drop them off

at the recycling center.

When others try to drag them up,

politely decline to handle them.

You won't have room for today's gifts

if you keep picking up yesterday's garbage.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

Mount Jerusalem

Moses and Martin didn't make it

up the mountain on the bypass. 

Easy Street seldom leads us

into the presence of God.

Pharaohs and water hoses,

angry Egyptians and snarling dogs,

wilderness and jail cell;

all struggles along the climb.

Arrival of the true peace

of God’s desired shalom

awaits room at the table

for the twin sisters of Justice and Mercy.

At the table of holy presence,

where humanity is the common denominator,

the feast wafts its inviting aroma

into the hearts of those hungry for God.

When justice seems to flow

like January molasses,

righteousness like a giant glacier,

keep us on the steep and narrow way.

Let us daily make our upward trek

through our own tribulations

that we might one day reach

the top of mount Jerusalem.

© 2003 Todd Jenkins

signed copy

A collection of 64 prayers/poems titled: Tuesday’s Muse: Visual and Verbal Appetizers for the Great Banquet of Your Life is now available.  

You may order directly from Amazon: 

Tuesday’s-Muse    

For a signed copy, send $15 and your shipping address to:

Todd Jenkins

Tuesday’s Muse

92 Lovers Lane

Fayetteville, TN  37334

You may arrange to pick up a signed copy locally for $11.

Grace,

Duplicity

Give me your tomatoes,

your peppers, your hybrid  melons,

yearning to be consumed,

but not so much your tired,

your poor, your huddled masses

yearning to breathe free.

The wretched refuse of bowing

to chemicals and corporations

has our shores teeming with toxicity,

and our hearts quivering with xenophobia.

The tempest-tossed who dream

of hope will not so much be met

 with lamp at golden door

as laser sight and incarceration.

All the while, our consumptive greed

turns a blind eye to the duplicity

of deportation and the rending

of family's fabric, to which

we claim undying allegiance.

Who will resurrect liberty?

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

“Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:

I lift my lamp beside the golden door.”

― Emma Lazarus

Tears

They are the ocean upon which

life sails; waves lapping steadily

against the shore of our stories.

Each wave brings in the broken pieces

of former journeys, some as jagged behemoths,

others as tiny chunks worn smooth.

It is your own beach, yet not even you

know tide’s syncopated struggle.

Stay put, and be washed each day,

letting the moon's pull have its way.

The vessel of your relationships

anchors just beyond the first sandbar.

The day will come when you

find the courage to swim,

with fragments in your hand,

out to the waiting ship.

The you who climbs aboard

is not the you who last sailed,

neither are you alone.

Collective wisdom and comfort

from previous journeys

guide and hold you now.

This, the tear’s path,

safely carrying both you

and your fractured history

into a hope-filled present.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

Static

Listening for God's call in life

can feel a lot like listening

to NPR on an old truck radio

in a remote, small town.

Every once-in-a-while you find

a place where there is no interference,

the static and bleed-over are minimal,

and the message comes through loud and clear.

The rest of the time you stay tuned-in,

despite the cacophony of distraction,

hanging on an occasional phrase or revelation,

piecing together a larger picture

based on what you heard more clearly

when you were closer to the tower –

on the mountaintop, as the faithful

are wont to call it.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

Pursued

Still

It is a verb of muscular inaction

and mental/spiritual focus;

a description of not-yetness;

an expression of deep longing;

perhaps the most complete

description of God's image

we are created to reflect:

relaxed, intense, journeying, desiring.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

Fulfilled

When our need for specialness

has been met by the reality of grace –

when we begin to comprehend

even a small portion of how much

God loves us, and that the only string

attached to this love is our being created

(over which we have no control and

with which we have nothing to do) –

all other means by which we self-identify

over and above others begin to fade

into insignificance. Competition, conquering,

and correctness, yield to community and creativity.

The universe itself and everything in it

become our web of communion.

Holiness is too pervasive to hoard,

even if we could. Rather than declaring

its bounds and location, we are free

to listen to it, swim in it, taste it,

let its aroma fill our nostrils, marvel

at its beauty, gasp at its expanse.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins

LML

Seek ye first to be and then to find

a Low Maintenance Lover:

someone who recognizes their own

broken needs for and expressions of love

as the wonderful imperfections they are;

someone who gives love,

not for reciprocation,

but for the sheer joy of catching glimpses

of how even broken-to-broken

expressions of it are capable

of calling forth the joyous

divine purposes hidden

deep within us all;

someone who often realizes

that sharing intimacy in all its

glorious manifestations is far closer

to imago dei than reproduction could ever be.

© 2013 Todd Jenkins