Visceral

Painters and drawers and sculptors and countless other visual artists are able to combine and manipulate various physical substances into objects that pique our imagination and show us a peek at the universe and ourselves that we have yet to comprehend. Once we have seen these creative vistas and ourselves reflected through them, we cannot forget or go back to the way things used to be without tremendous expenditure of costly personal energy. 

Writers are visual artists of a different sort. Authors paint word pictures that hang in the passageway running between head and heart. Narrative/prose is a medium in the realm of realism, often hanging closer to the brain's end of the hall. Once a good story seeps into your marrow, the door at the coronary end of the hallway usually swings open a bit wider as a particular vocabulary and its precise ordering provide a view of what's been right in front of your face for years and yet may still have eluded your perception.

Poetry tends toward impressionism, just outside the heart's door. It often makes you want to race back and forth between the cerebral and the emotive, between fading distant memories and the possibility of what lies around the next bend, anchoring the here-and-now in a sense of hope, if not peace. Story's and poetry's art galleries are for the curious; those who're willing to peruse stacks of beauty with only a handful of syllables scratched on the surface, daring aficionados to crack a spine. Welcome to a visceral gallery of words, brushed on life’s ever-flowing canvas.

© 2016 Todd Jenkins

Creature

Photo by Jennie R. Jenkins

Keep a dragon's egg

in your pocket long enough,

pulling it out to marvel,

turning it over

in your sweaty little palms,

   shaking it at the folks

   who stir you from

   the laziness of your

   inherited perch of status quo,

      and sooner or later

      you'll be the unwitting

      (Or is it dim-witted?)

      owner of an uncontrollable,

      fire-breathing maniac.

         It's getting hot up in here!

© 2016 Todd Jenkins

Deeps

Photo by Holly Jenkins

Life is easier when your enemies

are all external, identifiable,

and you get to completely define them.

Yes, easier, smoother, shallower.

Give me the deeps anyway,

where ruts and ridges

surprise and challenge my assumptions;

where mirrors reject

my narrow, retouched imaginings.

© 2016 Todd Jenkins

Planted

When the deathiversary

rolls around each year,

we can hardly believe

it’s here again.

Wasn’t it the day before yesterday

when our hearts were still beating

and normal was something

we thought could last?

It seems like yesterday

the casket was lowered

into the earth or the ashes

were scattered by the wind;

We knew a huge chunk

of who we were 
was dead now, too.

The dirt was like a weight

on our chests, pressing, squeezing.

  We could never imagine that

  our burying was also a planting;

  that the love being sunk and scattered

  could somehow ever break through

  the sod with a shoot, a bloom,

  and perhaps flower or fruit;

    but sometimes it does,

    in ways and places we

    never could have imagined.

You have surrounded us

with the love of those

who can and do sing

the songs of faith for us,

reciting the creeds,

believing on our behalf, 
for a while, until 
we can breathe again.

© 2016 Todd Jenkins

In Memoriam

As we once again enter the room called remember, the edge of earth and sky as clearly defined as ever, we pray you'll grant us faith, O Lord, strong and flexible, to mortar the vast expanse between our tiny bricks of understanding. 

For all the saints 

who from this life now rest, 

we give you thanks, O God, 

for by them we are blessed. 

When hate has been unleashed, 

indifference unfurled, 

into holy humus 

their toes securely curled. 

Inspired by burning bush 

and heaven-descended dove, 

they walked the path of grace 

and lived sermons of love. 

We speak their names aloud, 

and breathe their memories, too; 

open palms release them, 

eternally to you. 

For all the saints 

who through our lives have trod, 

we lift our hearts in praise, 

and give you thanks, O God. 

  2016 Todd Jenkins

Poetic Subtraction

Photo by Ashley Goad

She objected, "I don't know how

to sit down and create poetry."

   I replied, “Neither do I.

   I'm not even sure that's possible.”

      Poetry is all around us,

      all the time. It's the proverbial

      sculpture hidden within the stone.

   Finding our inner poet

   is about learning to chip-away

   at the things in our lives obscuring her.

First, there's what I call noise;

the other voices that tell you

you're already too far behind

in all the things you need

to accomplish and do

to even consider investing time,

space, and energy into something

as unpredictable, unreliable, and

maybe even unproductive as poetry.

   But maybe you also need

   to hear the whisper that asks you

   to consider whether

   you might be even further behind

   in what you were created to BE.

© 2016 Todd Jenkins

7

Photo by Ben Padgett

Sooner or later,

you'll figure out

that my vocabulary

is very limited.

   The list of words I know

   to be true – Or is it that

   I NEED them to be true? –

   is quite brief.

   Let's see... there's:

Grace – the truest of all truths,

never settling for the limitations

of how we experience it

or want it to be. 

Love – the deepest of all truths,

holding us more tenderly

than we ever imagined

when it’s whole;

hurting us almost more deeply

than we can stand

when it’s broken. 

Forgiveness – the richest of all truths,

covering even the grandest failure,

not with denial, but reprieve. 

Mercy – the softest of all truths,

tempering justice into

an ending bearable,

no matter how bleakly

our story begins.

Hope – the largest of all truths,

opening doors and windows,

raising suns after all possibility

has been exhausted. 

Faith – the most mysterious of all truths,

the mortar spanning

the vast expanse between

tiny bricks of understanding. 

Trust – the hardest of all truths,

holding betrayal in a glove

of unimaginable possibility. 

      These seven may be it.

      Everything else is

      merely experiential riff

      in their presence or absence;

   just verbal sketches

   from the storm of sitting

   too near the tracks

   when they pass through. 

When I find myself in stories

where all seven of these are AWOL,

I just sing into the morning,  

or  whistle throughout the night,

or cry, or pray until at least

one of them shows up,

believing that the one(s)

to arrive are the necessary one(s)

for the transformation

of today’s pain and suffering. 

© 2016 Todd Jenkins 

Two Outs

      Grace makes all of us

      "two out" base runners;

      no longer afraid 

      of being doubled-up;

    free to race toward home

    in joy and abandon

    with every swing of the bat;

  trusting God's tender mercy

  and long-awaited plans 

  for the world will deliver us 

  into the eternal presence

with the calm, confident assurance

and everlasting hope

of unconditional love's promise.

© 2016 Todd Jenkins

Post-Parting Gift

Photo by Ben Padgett

John said it was for fear of the Jews

that we were on lock-down

but, truth be told, it was more

a fear of anyone who could possibly

suck any more air out of

our room, our house, our lives.

  When Jesus showed up unannounced –

  or apparated – we were

  initially as afraid of him

  as we were of the High Priest.

    We had, after all, abandoned him

    in his hour of need, fearing even

    getting too close to the Hill of the Skull,

    afraid our own heads might also roll.

  Then he got all "Peace out!" with us;

  it was quite surreal, seeing

  how real and fresh his wounds were,

  yet feeling the integrity of his love

  for all of us as even more real and refreshing.

  

And his breathing on us;

you have no idea how much

we needed that; how deflated

we had become; how desperately

we needed the breath of life

to inspire us once more.

  "Peace" was what we were sure

  we needed, more than anything else.

    His breath was more than life;

    it felt like he put himself

    into each one of us in a way

    he'd never done before;

    like he was going to be

    with us from now on.

  But he didn't stop there.

  He dealt forgiveness

  like it was on the discount rack

  at the local market.

"Forgive them" he said,

without the usual caveats;

no mention of whether

they deserve it or if

they've asked for it or

even if they think they need

to be forgiven.

  Just "Forgive them and

  they'll be forgiven."

  Then he flashed the other side

  of the coin, "Retain the sins

  of others and they'll be retained."

We didn't even have to ask

by whom they'd be retained.

Each of us could remember

all too well the net-full of wrongs

we'd drug around for far too long;

how those holding-ons

had stunk to high heaven,

like week-old fish, and

how heavy they'd become,

piling up one after another.

  We'd all drunk the poison

  of our vengeance, somehow

  expecting someone else to fall ill,

  but always it was each of us –

  the ones holding onto hurt and anger –

  who were eaten away from the inside.

  

    It was those three –

    his post-parting gifts

    that he left with us:

    peace, his very own spirit,

    and forgiveness.

  And we are the ones who get

  to share these; to pass them on

  every day, with all the people

  who cross our paths.

We are church –

the called-out ones –

who get to break the bread,

pour the cup,

and share grace like it's

a blue-light special

at the corner store,

because it is.

© 2016 Todd Jenkins