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A New Story

2009-08-22T17:00:00.000-07:00

So, I guess I haven't had a post in a really long time, but I would really appreciate it if you would take a look at this story. I haven't settled on a definite title yet and I would love some suggestions. I'm thinking about "Something Like Rain," but I don't think it's quite what I'm going for. I would love suggestions concerning the story itself also. I apologize that the paragraph intentions don't show up in this version, making it a little harder to distinguish between paragraphs. Without further ado, I present to you the untitled story.

Day 7

The day drags on its fierce heat rays the more I think of him. Signs of him are everywhere in the house; half the bedroom closet is filled with his dress shirts, dress pants, camouflage, camping gear, and shoes. Half the bed is empty. Half the plaid coach in the living room is empty. But he still smiles inside the picture frames on the walls, his fingers twirled in my wedding veil. After all, this is Rain's house, and it's waiting for his return. The ferns by the window are thirsty for his notice. The remote control by the television is dusty from anticipating his touch.

And yesterday I found out there are signs of him inside of me, too. I have to smile when I put my hand up to my stomach and rub it slowly. There is a tiny baby forming inside me. When the nurse told me for sure, I was shocked; I had thought I had probably been imagining things, that the pregnancy tests had been wrong. For being natural, pregnancy just seems so supernatural. I think of holding a little baby, seeing Rain and me both in the tiny features. I think about names. Copeland, Sailor, Patrick. Kristin, Lydia, Meridith. I think about the little being in my womb, growing, growing, growing, through each trying stage of life, through each joy and each trial, to be something like me someday and something like Rain.

I look out the window now. Just by gazing into the sunlight, I can almost feel the intensity of the sun and the heaviness of the humidity. The heat slows me, and forces me to question myself. Should I tell him now? Should I write to him and tell him?

He's two thousand miles away in Fort Lewis, Washington at the Leadership Development and Assessment Course for Army ROTC. Today he's been gone for one week and he has four more weeks to go. I want to be able to see his reaction when he hears about this. He wanted to wait until we graduated from college and then try for a baby because we're just making ends, and we still have one more year of college. He's happy right now with the prospect of our future and we're okay with where we are. We don't even want to have everything, but I know he wants to have enough to provide. At the same time, though, I know he will marvel at the idea of us having a baby no matter what this means for us.

His last night here we bought a bottle of sparkling white grape juice. He made a toast to the Providence of God in our lives in the past, present, and future. I guess he's right. God has worked everything out in the past, even when it didn't seem like it. I understand more now, and yet it's hard to trust God is at work here when Rain is away and our lives are changing before I even know quite what to think.

I remember when I met him. I was friends with James, Laura, Kendall, Parker—any of those easy going people who liked adventures and tried to push the limits on teachers, parents, laws. Sometimes we smoked, drank bear, or sneaked into R-rated movies.

The first day of the eighth grade school year, Rain was sitting two seats to my left in Reading. Mrs. Simms asked him what he wanted to be called because his full name was Theodore Rainer Matthews. “I go by Rain,” he said, and everyone in the class turned to look at him. I turned, too, of course. He was wearing camouflage pants and a black polo shirt (because collared shirts were part of the dress code). “Rain?” voices said in hushed tones all across the room, like the first sprinkles before a storm.

Rain seemed reserved most of the time. He listened attentively in class, studied, and made good grades. Reggie, the guy behind me who always put his feet on the back of my desk, would ask him things like, “You actually studied for this test?” and, “What are you gonna be up to this weekend, reading through the dictionary again?” But Rain didn't tense up and close off the way most people would do when Reggie would pick on them, and neither did he respond by insulting Reggie. Instead, Rain would just laugh, like he appreciated Reggie's sense of humor, and say, “Yeah, I did study for this test a little last night,” and, “No, I'm not that bad; dictionaries get a little tedious after a while, but encyclopedias on the other hand...” He made Reggie laugh, too.

“Your weird,” Laura, who sat in front of Rain, told him constantly the first few weeks of the semester.

He always just said, “I know,” and smiled like he was proud of it.

I started noticing a pattern with Rain. He wore either camouflage pants or a camouflage shirt every single day. “Rain, why do you dress like that?” I asked him.

“I like camouflage. I play paintball and I'm a boyscout. And someday I want to join the military.”

“That's nice,” I said enthusiastically. Joining the military was an amiable ambition, but it automatically meant that he was off my list. Yes, I had a mental list of possible husbands; any guy who was interesting and available had a place there. Someone who would probably be on the other side of the world for half of our lives did not qualify as available. I had another list, though, of possible friends. Anyone remotely interesting, which constituted pretty much everyone, was on this list—and Rain was exceptionally interesting.

Rain had been homeschooled from kindergarten through seventh grade, but over the summer his dad had discovered he had brain cancer. It was a serious case and Rain's mom had to take a job to make ends meet. Rain had an older sister and brother who were away at college, but were coming home as much as possible on the weekends to visit their dad in the hospital. They were one of those families that was completely into homeschooling and never planned on sending Rain to school.

“You know, you're not like most homeschoolers,” Karly said. “You actually know how to talk to people.”

He just said, “Yeah, it's quite a challenge to figure out how to talk to you guys.”

“What do you mean by that?”

Rain just laughed in his charming way.

“So,” Rain said one day at lunch, “do you go to church anywhere, Catherine?”

“Not really,” I said.

“Do you want to come with me sometime?”

“Sure, as long as they don't split us up into guys and girls and make us talk about modesty and anorexia.”

“I think I can work that out for you if you come on a Wednesday night.”

That Wednesday before Reading started, I told Rain I was going to hang out at James's house that night.

“No, you're not.”

“Yes, I am.”

“No, you're not. You're going to church with me, remember?”

“I haven't committed to anything.”

“Yeah you did. You told me you would come.”

“Did not!”

“Did, too!”

“Shut up, Rain. You don't rule me.” I smiled as the whole class was watching us by now.

Rain looked at me hard. At that time, I thought it was just pain and disappointment in his eyes, which made me feel a little guilty. However, I kind of liked the control that look gave me over him. Now I know that he was grieved for me. He knew about my friends and the kinds of things we did.

That night, I went to James's house. He got his hands on a couple of his dad's beers and he, Laura, Kendall, and I were drinking them and eating frozen pizza. A storm came and we could hear the rumbling of thunder and the pounding of rain against the roof. As we talked, anytime one of them used the word “rain” I wouldn't think about the weather.

“What do you guys think about Rain?” I said at last.

“It's alright sometimes,” James said.

“No, the guy Rain.”

“He's weird,” said Laura.

“What does it matter to you anyway, Catherine, after you the way told him off today?” Kendall asked.

“You heard about that? I didn't tell him off. We were just joking around.”

“That's not what I heard,” Kendall said.

“That's the way it was. I like Rain.”

“Uw!”

“No, I like Rain the way I like you guys.”

“Right. So, why did you embarrass him like that?”

“Come on. Rain doesn't get embarrassed.”

“By you he might. I bet he likes you.”

“No way. We're nothing alike. He's just trying to be nice.”

“So, why didn't you go to church with him tonight?”

“So, why don't you just forget I brought him up?”

It's strange to think about the way I was then. I've changed so much. And yet, it didn't happen all at once. I have to wonder why I'm so scared of change now when I can see that God's work in the past was good. Somehow it seems like this time, things are going to turn out all wrong. I sigh and put on my black pants and white collared shirt to go wait table at Sandy's Sandwiches and More.

Day 12

My younger sister, Mallory, is here to visit me on my day off work. She's sixteen and so she still lives back home Spiro with Mom and Dad. I'm sure neither of them said much of anything when she wanted to drive the two and a half hours to come see me.

Mallory and I eat vanilla ice cream on my back porch this evening. Our immediate view is only a little grass in need of mowing and a wood fence, but the sky takes my breath away. The sun sets steadily, putting a pink glow over everything. Mallory closes her eyes, letting the creamy substance settle in her mouth. “It's so peaceful here,” she says.

“I guess it's still not too peaceful back home?”

“Are you kidding? Kevin's still so out of control. Now that he's twelve, I'm scared it will always be this way. He still gets everything he wants.”

“You have to admit, though, it wasn't too much different with us. You know, I did a lot of stupid stuff in middle school and Mom and Dad really didn't care.”

“I remember you and your friends sneaking stuff into our house when Mom and Dad were at work. I didn't know what it was half the time.”

“I wasn't too good of a big sister I guess. You had to figure everything out for yourself.” I look up at the display of colors in the sky—blue, purple, pink, yellow, orange—and run my fingers over the cup of ice cream. Then I gaze at Mallory. She has long, blond wavy hair and blue eyes like I do. “I'm gonna tell you something.”

She looks at me, fully alert.

“I haven't told anyone this yet, not even Rain.”

She waits.

“Six days ago I found out I'm pregnant.”

“What? Are you serious? Catherine!” Her voice lifts and her face glows.

“Yes, I'm definitely pregnant, as in, I'm gonna have a baby, as in, I'm gonna be a mom.”

Mallory hugs me and shrieks several times. “Why haven't you told anyone about this? Aren't you glad?”

“I am glad. I am, but I just don't see how I could possibly be ready for this. And Rain doesn't want this yet.”

“Don't say that. Rain will want it when he hears the news. You know that.”

“I know, I know, but I'm not ready, Mallory. I just, I don't know how to handle this. I don't even have a good example to follow. Let's face it, Mom and Dad didn't raise me. Rain raised me, and he can't teach me to be a mother.”

“But can't God teach you somehow, Catherine? Where's your faith?”

I'm silent. I'm out of ice cream now, just licking the sweet, sticky particles from my lips.

“You need to tell Rain.”

“I want to tell him in person.”

“You can't wait for that. He won't be home for more than three weeks. And you tell him everything. It'll stress you out if he doesn't know.”

“I know. I know.” Uninvited tears cover my cheeks and I say, “I need him to be here right now.”

Mallory clutches me. “It's okay. He's coming back. It won't be too long.”

I can't talk anymore because my throat feels so hard.

“It's like this for a reason,” Mallory says. “God has a reason.”

When the tears finally dry from my cheeks and it's dark outside so that mosquitoes are biting at us, Mallory says, “You know, you were a good big sister. I saw how God changed your life. And that's how God showed me that real Christianity is more than a bunch of phrases and church visits and fake smiles. God used you, Catherine; He used you to get me to believe.”

Mallory has such as a hard determined look. She's so much stronger than me about things that sometimes I hate to admit that I'm five years older. “You know, we should go inside before we get eaten up by these mosquitoes,” I say.

Now I lay in bed. Mallory is sleeping in the other room. It feels good to have someone else in the house even if it it's not Rain. I remember the first time I asked Rain to come over after school.

“Will your parents be home?” he said.

“No, why does that matter?”

“I can't go to your house if your parents aren't home.”

“If your parents make a big deal about that kind of thing just tell them you went to Chris's house instead.”

“It's not about my parents; it's about me. It just wouldn't be appropriate for me to go over to your house if your parents aren't home.”

“Appropriate? If you're worried about that, I'm not going to seduce you or anything.” I laughed, but this was one thing he didn't seem to think was funny.

“My answer is no, okay? I don't want to talk about this anymore.”

I went to church with him off and on during eighth grade. People were nice there. I didn't tell them, of course, about all the bad stuff I did. It wasn't that I felt bad about the way I was; I just didn't want them to have to think about it. I knew they were different. The teachers at church taught us not to make decisions based on questions like, “How do I feel about this?” and “How do others feel about this?” but instead to ask questions like, “What does the Bible have to say about this?” and “Will it please God for me to do this?” Crazy enough, I knew Rain actually followed this advice. It would be nice to be like him, to be so unconcerned about the opinions of others, but I knew I couldn't actually do that. Even if I quit the smoking and drinking, I knew I couldn't actually think about God instead of myself. That just wasn't me.

Day 18

The solemn feeling of responsibility is settling in on me like another day's heat. I'm watering the daisies in front of our house before work. Rain surprised me one day by buying and planting them while I was working. When I came home I thought our house finally looked like a home. He usually watered them every couple days; he could do it just right. Surprisingly, the flowers are beginning to bloom unlike plants usually do under my care. I just wonder if I can really handle a baby, a human being fully dependent on me.

After all, I've done so many stupid things. One night, the summer after eighth grade, Kendall and I were beading bracelets in my room, listening to Monster Magnet. It was hot like today and we were sweating as we tried to tie little bracelet strings. Then, through the window we saw James walking alongside the road toward my house, shuffling along in a large shirt, large shorts, and a untied tennis shoes—his normal attire. We went to the front door.

“Hey, James,” I said leaning against the door frame. “Hot enough for you?”

He smiled slightly and pulled up his shorts a little so they showed less of his boxers. “Hey, guys, can I come in? I've got something to show you.”

I looked at Kendall. She shrugged and so I shrugged at James. He walked past me into the house. I noted his yellow plastic bag. “What's in it?”

“Patience, patience. Are Mally and Kevin home?”

“Yeah, they're in their rooms.”

“Let's go back to your room then.” We followed him. He laid the yellow bag down on my carpet and pulled out a clear sandwich bag with white powder inside.

“What's that?” Kendall said.

“Try it and see.” He tried to hand her a white, plastic tube that looked like a cigarette.

“What is it?”

“My brother gave it to me.”

“It's coke,” I said.

Kendall shifted. “You do it first, James. Show us how.”

“I'll do it,” I said. “I know how.” I did know how. I had already found a website that explained the process precisely and I knew James hadn't tried the stuff without us. I took the white tube James was holding. It wasn't really like a cigarette because I could see through it if I looked through long-ways. James poured some of the white powder on my dresser and I put one end of the little tub up to my nose and the other down to the powder. I inhaled so that I could feel the powder going up my nostrils. I nodded. “Alright, your turn.” I handed it to James.

He did as I had done. Then he handed it to Kendall.

“How did it feel?” she said.

“Fine. Just do it,” James said.

She did. Then we all looked at each other.

“How do you feel?” Kendall asked.

“I feel good,” I said enthusiastically. “Let's go take over the world or something.”

They laughed.

“Seriously, guys,” I said. “What do you want to do? Hey, let's go see if Parker's home. He would like this.”

James laughed. “Catherine, Parker's mom would flip.”

“We're not gonna tell her, smart one. A plastic bag looks innocent enough. What do you say?”

“Let's do it,” said Kendall.

“Alright, I'm in,” said James, “but I vote we go to Rain's house instead. What do ya'll think about that?”

Kendall laughed.

“Cut it,” I said. “Ya'll wanna walk or take a car?”

“Your suggesting you drive your dad's old junker that he doesn't trust to get him to work?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“Have at it. I'll meet you there on foot.”

“Come on, James, where's your sense of adventure?”

“I'm just back to the whole Parker's mom thing. When she sees you driving that thing...”

“What day is it? Wednesday, right? Parker's mom's never there on Wednesday afternoon. She's always helping with that Mother's Day Out or something.”

“Yeah, you're right.”

“So, you in?”

“Sure, why not.”

“Your dad actually leaves the key here and trusts you like that?”

“Of course he trusts me. Why should he not?”

I made it the half-mile to Parker's house, but I started feeling really sad while we there and I wasn't sure why. While I drove James and Kendall back to my house we didn't say anything. I put the car in park back where it had been in the garage.

“I liked that,” Kendall said.

“I liked it, too,” I said.

“You were pretty fun on that high,” James told me. “We should do that again.”

We did do it again whenever we got our hands on some cocaine, which was about once every month or two. We still did other things, but smoking and drinking had lost a lot of their appeal in comparison with this new stuff. I didn't mention it to Rain of course. We just talked about school, church, and fun legal things like paintball and video games. This stuff was enough for him and I couldn't understand why.

Day 22

We're slow at work tonight. Molly and I are cleaning tables. “So, why couldn't you take my shift yesterday morning? You always take everybody's shifts.”

“I was just feeling bad.”

“And you're feeling better now?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“What is it, like morning sickness or something?”

“Yeah,” I say in a sarcastic tone, “morning sickness.”

“Hey, you don't have to tell me. I'm just trying to look out for you.”

I look out the restaurant window into the darkness. The thought comes to me of standing with a baby in my arms, singing to it, and looking out into that. I can never know quite what is out in that darkness I'm a mother now and I have to be strong and trust God that He knows what is around us and ahead of us and that He will take care of things. I know all at once this is a good thing. God must know I'm ready for this, as ready as He wants me to be. Patrick, Sailor. Kristin, Lydia. We can turn our office/spare bedroom into a nursery/office/spare bedroom. If the baby is a boy, Rain can teach him to play video games and paintball and be a mighty warrior, and I can rock him to sleep at night. If the baby is a girl, I can teach her to play with dolls, cook, be a wife and mother someday, and rock her to sleep at night. I'm not going to be afraid anymore. God knows what is best.

“No, I'm serious,” I say to Molly, “it is morning sickness. Why does that surprise you?”

“What? You could have told me that before!”

I shrug.

“No, really? You're pregnant?”

“Yeah. And you know what's crazy? Rain's still gone and he doesn't even know.”

“Uh, I think he's gonna find out sooner or later... unless you're not planning on keeping the baby.”

“I'm keeping my baby. God gave it to me and I'm gonna keep it.”

“Good for you.”

I'm five weeks along. I have to tell Rain. This is a good thing and he'll be happy. He's always been in favor of right things.

It was the spring of ninth grade when he took me to that revival at his church. There was a loud band and an energetic speaker with sweat dripping from his red forehead. He talked about hell and how if I didn't pray a prayer to ask Jesus to come into my heart, I was going to hell. All I had to do to go to heaven instead was pray this prayer. I might have thought the message was a little far stretched but when I whispered to Rain, “Is this really what I need to do?” he said, “Yeah, Catherine, this is what you need.” So I walked up the aisle like the man with the red forehead told me to do. There was a man in a suit who met me at the front of the aisle and I followed him to a room right outside the sanctuary. This man told me we were all sinners, that God had sent Jesus to die on the cross to pay for our sins, and that if we believe in Jesus we go to heaven instead of hell. After that, the man told me I would have to change the way I lived, stop sinning and start living right, but this wasn't going to save me. The initial praying the prayer to ask Jesus into my heart was going to save me.

“Do you understand?” the man asked.

“Yeah, but why do I have to live right if that's not what's gonna save me?”

“You don't really have to worry about that right now. You take this one step toward Jesus and He'll take it from there.”

“Okay.”

The man led me in a prayer, admitting I was a sinner, thanking Jesus for dying on the cross, and saying I believed in Him. Then he gave me a Bible and told me I needed to be baptized.

Rain found me outside of the room. “You okay? What happened?”

“I prayed and asked Jesus to come into my heart.”

“That's good.” He hugged me. It was the first time that he hugged me.

Rain's mom drove me home and Rain and I were in the backseat. We didn't talk for a while. Then Rain sad, “Are you sure you're okay?” Rain's mom had the radio on and I don't think she could hear us well.

“Yeah, I just don't know what I'm supposed to do now.”

“What do you mean?”

“The guy said I needed to stop sinning and start living right.”

“He's right. You need to stop, you know, that stuff you do that's bad for you and against the law, and you need to start doing good stuff like going to church and reading the Bible.”

“But I don't understand why. He said it wasn't my actions that saved me. Is that good stuff just like extra for if I want to?”

“No, no, it's not. It's important.”

“You know, I think the problem is you grew up knowing about all this stuff, and I didn't. We're different okay? Let's face it, we're totally different. I'm never gonna understand this stuff.”

“Don't say that, Catherine.”

“I'm just saying how I feel.” He was quiet the rest of the drive home. He seemed sad and I wanted to make him happy. I wanted to be what he wanted me to be.

So I quit smoking and drinking and most other things. When my friends asked me about it, I just said, “I just don't care about that stuff anymore.”

“What? Is Rain getting to you?” someone would always say. “He's gonna ruin your life, you know that?”

“Don't say that, he's the best thing that's happened to me.”

“Sounds pretty serious.”

“No, it's not. We're just friends. I just need to change.” The problem was I wasn't really changing, and I hated that. James had found a somewhat constant supply of cocaine and as soon as I had turned fifteen back in November I had gotten a job at a grocery store and was paying him for the stuff. I just did it about once a week, but I loved the way it made me feel so much that I found myself thinking about getting high throughout the week. When I was high, I felt like I could do anything. When I crashed, I usually felt a little angry with myself. I would tell myself it was stupid for me to do the drug and I shouldn't do it anymore, but at the same time, I couldn't imagine never doing it again. It had become a part of me. I needed it.

Day 23

I see the morning light shining through the window as I slowly open my eyes. It's only seven o'clock. I remember that I got home from work late last night and didn't go to bed until one. I'd like a little more sleep. I smile to myself as I close my eyes again. I know what I'm going to do today. I'm going to write to Rain and reveal everything, or better yet, if he gets to call me, I can tell him everything. I know he'll be so happy once it all settles in on him. I can already imagine him holding his hand up to me and feeling the baby move in the months to come. He has such a touch for everything. I know he'll be a perfect father once the baby is born.

My stomach feels different this morning, though, and all at once I know I'm bleeding. But I'm pregnant; this isn't supposed to be happening. Now I remember the doctor told me that bleeding is common in early pregnancy, but he said to come in if it happens because it could also be a sign of a possible miscarriage.

The afternoon sun is covering me now. I'm sitting on the coach in the living room, rocking myself back and forth, replaying the doctor's words in my mind. “You're cervix is expanding in preparation to excrete pregnancy tissues. When you came in last week, the baby had a heart beat.” I can still hear the doctor's voice. I think I will always hear it. “There's no heartbeat anymore.”

“So, what am I supposed to do?”

“I suggest you just wait. The miscarriage should be complete within a week. If it's not, you can come back and we'll talk about other options.” Wait with this dead child inside of me. Wait on my body to give it up. I'm sitting here, starring into the dusty, black television screen.

I call in sick for work tonight. “I'm sorry, but I'll probably be sick for at least a week.”

“Uh, usually you don't know that kind of thing,” the manager said.

“I've got a doctor's note.” I have tears streaming down my cheeks. “I don't want to do this to ya'll. You know that.”

“Okay, would you mind just telling me what's wrong? You don't sound bad or anything.”

I sighed. “I'm miscarrying my baby.”

“Okay, alright, I'm sorry.” He just hung up.

Oh, God, I need Rain to be here right now. I need him to hold me. Mallory knows about all this. I guess everybody at work knows about all this. But Rain doesn't know and I can't put this kind of thing on him while he's in training. Oh, God, I'm angry with you and I don't want to be. I know how it is to be angry with you.

By the summer after eighth grade, my life was together, from what most people could tell at least. Not many people knew about my fixation with cocaine. Rain had no idea. I was so angry with God for not letting me be like Rain and the people at his church even though I was trying to do all the right things.

Rain started asking me to do things with him—get ice cream, go to the movie theater, eat dinner at his house. We did things with his church friends, too, and they started teasing us about our relationship. In September, Rain turned sixteen and got his driver's license. In November, for my birthday, he gave me a wooden jewelry box with my name carved on the top; he had made it himself. I thought it was sweet, how slowly and progressively he was going about the process. I knew what was coming next and I wanted it. He was the kindest person I knew and I wanted him to be my boyfriend. He was still talking about joining the military, but at this point that felt like a long time from the present. I just wanted this.

One night in December we were in his kitchen, drinking hot chocolate. Along the kitchen walls, pink and blue flowers spread out in the wallpaper. By the window, there was a plant stand that held an assortment of flowers, all bright and warm.

“Catherine,” Rain said, catching my eye, “I really like you.”

I smiled. “You know we're not really anything alike.”

“That's okay. I just like you because... you're beautiful, you're nice, you don't ignore people when they're weird, you're funny. I just like being around you. It gets stressful around my house a lot with my dad's sickness and all. It just makes me feel better to see you.”

“I like you too, Rain, a lot.” Both my hands clung to the warm mug of hot chocolate. I was scared that if I took a sip I would disturb his thought process. He was quiet for a while and I almost said something two or three times like, “So, are we official now?”

He said something just in time. “If we're going to start going out, I need you to promise me something.”

“What is it?”

“You can't do any of those things you used to do—smoking, drinking, all that stuff.”

“I don't do that stuff.”

“I know. I'm not saying you do. I'm just saying I don't want you to go back.”

“I'm not gonna go back. Why do you have to assume the worst?”

“Look, I just care about you, Catherine. I just care about you, and that means I'm going to need some control in our relationship, unless you don't want a relationship.”

I finished drinking the hot chocolate, got up, and put the mug in the sink. Rain was sitting at the kitchen table, starring into his own mug. He wasn't tall, but he was strong. His hair was dark brown, almost black, and so were his eyes. Somehow, I found myself incapable of saying no to him. I could stop the cocaine. Anything I did just once a week I could stop. I would stop.

I came back to the table and sat down. “I do want this. I'm sorry.”

He smiled and put his hand gently on the side of my face.

At my doorstep that night, he kissed my forehead. I thought he must be afraid of anything else. It was three weeks before he said, “Can I kiss you?”

“Yeah.” When he did, I knew it was his first time. I had done it several times in fifth and sixth grade when I first had crushes. The thrill of kissing was then like smoking and drinking in middle school, like drugs in high school.

Day 27

I'm bleeding so heavy right now that it must be almost time. I've kept trying to read the Bible. I've kept trying to pray. Hannah, a woman from church, has come to visit me. She has brown bangs and a beautiful smile. She had a miscarriage four years ago and now she has a two-year-old girl who has her smile. Rain and I have only been at this church since we moved here a three years ago and I didn't know about Hannah's miscarriage until now.

“It was a little boy,” she says. “We named him Brandon. We planted a tree in our backyard when I miscarried so we would always remember. Then we planted a tree for Hannah, too.”

We are sitting in my living room on the plaid sofa.

“Why does God do this?” I say.

“I don't think I have an exact answer. But I know this has helped me to trust God more. And God doesn't seem to hesitate to bring hardship in our lives if it means we'll trust Him more.”

“It just seems like there has to be an easier way.”

“Yeah, God asks us to do hard things, but not without setting an example, not without giving His own Son to suffer and die so that we can be made right with God, so that we can know what it means to trust Him and live through Him.”

“Yeah.”

For such a long time, I didn't understand salvation the way I do now. Rain and I dated for most of tenth grade. We spent a lot of time together. We spent a lot of time at his church back home, but I began getting frustrated with it, frustrated with the lives that the people there lived. I was still on cocaine. I hated it and loved it. It seemed to separate me from Rain in a way he didn't realize. I acted like I was fine. I acted like I was like him. I just couldn't tell him about my addiction, but I couldn't break the addiction either. I needed cocaine, at least every once in a while, on those boring afternoons that come about once a week.

Then one night Rain came over without calling first. I happened to be on a cocaine crash. I must have looked miserable.

“What's wrong, baby?”

We were sitting in my room with our backs against my bed.

“Nothing's wrong.”

“Did somebody die or something?”

“No, everything's fine.”

“Catherine, I need you to tell me what's going on. I don't like to see you like this.”

I started crying. He held me in his arms. “I need you to talk to me, baby. Maybe I can help. Is it something with your parents?”

I was still crying when I said, “You need to go home, okay, Rain? Please go.”

“I can't leave you like this.”

I pulled away from him. “I'll be okay. Just go.”

He sat there for a few minutes and then got up and left. I tried to tell myself this wouldn't happen again, but I knew that wasn't true. Things couldn't go on this way. Something would have to give.

Day 28

Rain and I had fun in tenth grade though. He liked to take me down to the Arkansas River and watch the water surge along its course. He liked to twist his fingers in my hair. He liked to take me with him to visit his dad and we would sit in the waiting room and play card games. He liked to sit in my backyard at night and point out different stars; I saw my first two falling stars that year.

Then on March 17^th it was raining and Rain had come over to take me to a movie. I told him I had an umbrella in my closet on the floor. I also had several plastic grocery bags on the floor, one with some cocaine hidden in the bottom. I thought the umbrella was in an obvious enough place at the front of the closet that he would never think of looking through the bags.

He came out into the living room. “Catherine, what is this?” He held the bag of cocaine.

“I don't know. What does it look like? It's probably powdered sugar or something.”

“Okay, well, why don't you go ask your mom about it?”

“Why is it such a big deal?”

“I don't know. I just figured you would know what you're keeping your closet.”

“Why are you looking through my whole closet? Couldn't you find the umbrella?”

He sat down on the couch. “Catherine.” He put his head in his hands. In that moment I wished more than ever that I had told him long ago, that I had quit long ago.

“It's time for you to tell me the truth,” he said. “Maybe I'm a little sheltered, but I know this isn't powdered sugar.”

“I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I do cocaine sometimes. I'm not addicted or anything. I just have to do it sometimes.”

“Why didn't you tell me before?”

“Because I thought I was going to quit.”

“Well, obviously, I'm not helping you to quit.” We sat there a long time. I cried just guessing what he was about to say. “I want the best for you, Catherine. So, we've gotta end our relationship. I want you to be able to get clean. Don't you want that?”

“You talk like I'm addicted or something.”

“You can't stop. That means you're addicted.”

“You don't understand.”

“Maybe not, but I know the best thing I can do for you right now is to break up.”

He hugged me and then he let me go. My umbrella was by the door; I had forgotten I had taken it out the day before.

Today it's raining steadily. I wait within my house and drink iced chamomile tea. I remember so many rains that I used to sit through in my room through the summer after tenth grade, and then on into the fall. I was waiting then, too, but I didn't know what I was waiting for. I missed Rain. I missed the things we used to do together, the way he used touch my face and kiss me. When I felt really sad, which was almost every day, I did cocaine. I stopped going to church. Maybe they had found out about me now there. They couldn't understand; I just wasn't like them and I couldn't ever be. I passed Rain at school sometimes, but we didn't talk. I started hanging out with James, Kendall, Laura, and Parker again. They were all deep into smoking, drinking, and whatever else they could get their hands.

One night at Kendall's house, she was drunk, and I was getting there.

“I knew you and Rain weren't going to work out. Ya'll are so different. He just couldn't understand. You're one of us. You need beer to get you through life. He was just trying to change you. You don't want a guy that wants to change you.”

“I do want to change. I just can't. That's what he doesn't understand. I just can't.”

Day 30

Finally, I think I just passed everything, so I'm laying in the floor in the hallway. Hannah has been staying with me because the doctor said someone should be here. She's calling the doctor to tell him.

“He wants you to go in tomorrow so he can make sure it was complete,” she tells me.

I remember hearing that Rain's father was doing badly, about to die. It was the spring of my junior year in high school. I toyed with the idea of going to the hospital. I wanted to, but I didn't. Then I heard he had died and I knew Rain had to be taking it hard. He had never stopped praying for a miracle. No one asked me to attend the funeral, but I did go to Rain's house a few days later.

Rain opened the door. “Hi.”

I tried to hug him, but he backed away.

“I just wanted to tell you I'm sorry about your dad.”

“Thanks.”

We stood there in the doorway staring at each other for a moment. “Please don't do this to me right now,” he finally said.

“Do what?”

“I need you to go.” I saw a tear slip down his cheek. It was the first time I had ever seen him cry. I wanted so much to touch him. Instead, I turned around and left.

“I hate him,” I told myself, “him and all those people. They just don't understand. I can't be like them and it's not that I'm an evil person. It's just that I don't have the will power or something. I don't know what it is.”

Some days I got so frustrated with myself, and the fact that all those church people didn't understand and the fact that all those people like me didn't care, that I started cutting myself sometimes. It just relieved some of my stress. It hurt, but it felt good. I seemed to be loosing more and more control of my life and cutting was a way to gain control.

Day 35

Rain is coming home today. When I went to the doctor, he told me everything had passed and I was going to be fine. So I'm waiting for Rain to get home now. I'm going to tell him everything. Then we're going to name the baby, something gender neutral because I never found out whether the baby was a boy or girl. Rain will carve the name into wood and we will bury it in the backyard. Maybe I can bury much of my sorrow there, too. It will be easier with Rain here again.

But there was a time the peace I can have now would have been impossible. The beginning of the summer before my senior year, Parker was having a party at his house while his parents were out of town. It got late and we had already drunk a lot and danced a lot.

Kendall was talking to Laura. “Yeah, Rain was getting on to me the other day. He was like, 'You say you're a Christian and yet you get drunk?' And I was like, 'Yeah, I'm a Christian. Does that mean I can't have any fun?'”

Laura laughed. “You remember back when he came to school like three or four years ago? I thought he was alright then; weird, but alright. But I think he's gotten worse. All he talks about these days is God.”

I was listening carefully because I didn't know what he was talking about these days. I swallowed. I was sobering. “Ya'll should give Rain a break. I mean, his dad just died like two months ago.”

Kendall was still pretty drunk. “Aw, well, I've never even met my dad, and I don't go around damning people to hell.”

“Shut up. You don't know what you're saying.”

“Sounds like you still love him,” said Karly.

“I don't love him. I don't even like him. I just think he needs a break.”

“You know,” Kendall said, “ever since you started dating that guy, you haven't quite been your old self. You've either been Miss Perfect or down in the dumps. You don't know how to have fun anymore.”

“Well, maybe it's because all my friends have turned on me. Ya'll wouldn't let me be who I used to be. Ya'll wouldn't let me live down being the girlfriend of the most eccentric guy in school because, you know, you're all so very normal. Look, that's why I liked you guys to begin with, because you were different, because you just liked to have fun, and now you're all about pointing fingers.”

Kendall just laughed. “And we were supposed to be totally cool with you dating a guy who was damning us all to hell!”

I just turned around and left the party right then. Now I knew the whole truth, the destiny of my life. My friends hated me. Rain wouldn't have anything to do with me. And God didn't seem to care. I got back to my bedroom and took out my knife to cut myself. I had so much to release right now that I wasn't sure I could ever get through cutting. I cut a little for my friends, a little for Rain, a little for God, and it turned into one deep slit across my wrist. I saw the blood coming out fast and then all I could see was darkness.

I woke up to the white of a hospital room with tubes attached to me. My parents were there. Mallory and Kevin were there. Rain was there.

“What happened?” I said.

“You tried to commit suicide,” Mom said with tears in her eyes.

“If Mallory hadn't found you, you might not have made it,” Dad said.

I looked at Mallory. She smiled weakly. “You looked horrible.”

“Thanks.”

I looked at Rain. I couldn't stop looking at Rain. His eyes were still dark brown and steadily fixed on me.

“Well, maybe we all should clear out and let you get some rest,” Mom said, “except for Rain of course.”

My family filed out of the room and I looked up at Rain again.

“How do you feel?” he said.

“Like I just slit my wrist and got rushed to the emergency room and drugged.”

“Sounds about right now.” Rain played with his hands. “So, if it's okay to ask, why did you do it?”

“It's complicated. I hate my life.” We were silent for a while.

“I owe you an apology,” he said. “I don't think I explained salvation very well back when we were freshman. When we went to that revival that time, I encouraged you to do something and that speaker coerced you to do something that we shouldn't have pushed on you like that.”

I smiled. “What? I'm just a drunkard, a druggie, and now suicidal. Are you trying to tell me you don't think I'm really saved or something?”

He smiled. “Yeah. See, here all this time I've been telling you should live this certain way, but there's no way for you to just stop sinning. That's just what you do as a natural person. Adam sinned and now we all, the human race, we just sin. We love to sin. We're in bondage to sin. We'd like to think can stop if want, but we can't.”

“I can't, but you can.”

“No, no one can. See, that's what the Bible's talking about when it says, 'All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.' And God is full of wrath toward humanity because of all of our sin. That's why people go to hell. But when God sent Jesus to die on the cross, Jesus satisfied the wrath of God, so that those who would believe in him would be saved from the wrath to come. Jesus was sinless, so God accepted His sacrifice and glorified Him by raising Him from the dead, ascending Him to heaven, making sure the name of Jesus was spread everywhere, and one day having everyone, church-goers, druggies, Muslims, Hindus, atheists, even Satan himself, bow before Jesus. At that time Jesus will say who is His and who isn't and it won't be for anyone else to decide.

“But, Catherine, I have confidence before God that I am one of his because he has brought me to believe in the name of Jesus. This doesn't just mean believing what I want to believe about Jesus or just the things that seem nice. It means believing all that the Bible tells me about Jesus, and this includes his statements like, 'If you love me, keep my commandments.' Always having been a sinner, though, I'm not used to obeying Jesus, and sometimes I still mess up. But when I was saved, God gave me his Holy Spirit which works in me to do the will of God. That means when I do good things it's because of the Holy Spirit's good work in me. So, it's not at all my works that save me. It's the grace of God that saves me, but the good works that the Holy Spirit does through me are the signs I have been saved by him.”

I nodded. “Yeah, you know, Rain, I tried. I've been trying for such a long time and I can't change.”

“Yeah, I know. Look, I want to challenge you to do something. Start reading the Bible in the New Testament and try to figure out if it's telling you what I'm telling you.”

I nodded.

“Catherine, I'm praying for you.” He grabbed my healthy hand. It was so good to feel his touch after all that time, like the evening moisture of rain after a day full of parching heat.

After I got out of the hospital, I started reading the New Testament like Rain had suggested. I thought about his explanation and I understood. His words and the Bible worked in harmony. Sometimes he would call me. Sometimes he would come over to check on me. He would read scripture with me. “Okay,” I told him one day, “I've gotta get clean. I'm not doing cocaine as much as I have been, but still, I need to get clean.”

“Alright,” he said. “What can I do for you?”

“I just need you to take this cocaine I've got hidden here in my closet and get rid of it.”

“Catherine, are you sure it will be good for you to quit cold turkey like that?”

“I've tried everything else. I just know this isn't good for me. I don't want to live this way anymore. And the Bible says that nothing is impossible with God.”

“But this going to be hard. I don't want you to take this lightly.”

“I know it's going to be hard to get clean, stay clean, and I know it's impossible for me. I'm going to trust in God for this.”

“Okay.” He got up and opened my closet door. “You've gotta make sure I get it all.”

“I think I'm down to one bag.” I looked at the bag with the white powder he was pulling out of the closet. I wondered if I could really go my whole life without one more sniff. I got that old feeling that I needed it. I always knew where to get more. But, no, God was going to get me through. God was going to get me and keep me clean.

The first week was the hardest. It didn't feel natural for me to be without that stuff. When I felt like I really needed it, I said, “No, I need you, God. I need to be clean for your service.” I tried to do things so I didn't think about cocaine so much. I played games with Mallory and Kevin and had long theological discussions with Rain. Finally, it got easier, but I knew the longing would never totally go away.

“It's just like the way we as Christians still have our old sin nature,” Rain said, “but we also have the new nature of the Holy Spirit to keep us from giving into temptation.” These days, Rain related everything in life back to God in some way. My old friends hated it, but I liked it. It was so good to know him again, so good to know that he cared again.

After I quit drinking and cocaine, I quit smoking. Then when I felt like I needed something to lift my spirit or something to calm me down, I just prayed and read the Bible. I found comfort and hope there. “For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses,” I read in Hebrews, “but one who has been tempted in all ways as we are, yet without sin. Therefore, let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

I started loving Rain's church. Now I understood those people. I understood why they lived right and why they didn't need drugs to keep them going. Jesus was enough for them. When I got to know the people in that church and told them about the things God had done in my life, it made me even more grateful to God.

It was March of twelfth grade when Rain finally asked me to start going out with him again. We made plans to go to the same college two and a half hours from our hometown in Spiro, Oklahoma. He asked me to marry him right before the spring semester of our sophomore year started and we had a small wedding the following summer. That was a year ago now.

It still amazes me that God had everything in my life under His control and was working it out so that I would be saved back when I still hated Him. I don't know why I even worry. I don't know why I question God about my little baby.

The doorbell finally rings. Rain is looking into my eyes with his eyes still so dark and steady. He holds me for a while and then looks at me again. “What's wrong, baby? Did somebody die or something?” I bring him into the living room, we sit down, and the whole house sighs with his arrival.

A Visit to Gallaudet

2009-08-22T11:38:00.001-07:00

She showed me a little. Her hands moved as I tried to make sense of it.
I always heard my footsteps over the creaky wood floors and steep stairways.
I always heard my footsteps on the sidewalk.
Then, she abandoned me, and this place would still not look at me.
If only I could pretend I couldn’t hear, it would have paid attention.
The lump in my throat reminded me how long I had been dreaming of this,
And the ever-present silence tortured me with truths,
And, in the warm wind, even the ancient oaks rattled with disinterest.
Here they would stay in this wealth of weakness, distinction, community.
They could not know how it was for me to board the bus and move on
From the thing I thought I was born for.

A Dress for Generations

2009-08-22T11:36:00.002-07:00

The soft white plastic wrapper is long and rectangular. I can see through the plastic a little, as through a frosty window, to the work of lace, silk, and silver beads. The wrapper has no plastic smell anymore. Somewhere between all that time it spent under my great grandmother’s bed and all those moves it has followed us through, it must have collected so many other smells that now it has no smell at all. With my hands against the wrapper, I can feel the wonderful work inside. The top is thin and the bottom is massive, like a plush pillow for a giant. I can feel the circular wires of the hoop skirt also. Long ago, we got the plastic wrapper out of the attic. I thought about her being fresh in love and about me being fresh in love. I wanted to look at the dress, but Mom said we might get it dirty, and, besides, it was probably yellowed. Even so, I already wanted this to be my wedding dress, too, though I didn’t get to look at it. The last time my parents cleaned out the attic, I was eighteen, and I kept asking, “Have you found Mom’s wedding dress?” When they finally found it, the wrapper was smashed into a cardboard box. After all those years, the zipper on the wrapper still revealed the lace, silk, and silver beads. It was still so white. Mom helped me put it on. The sleeves of lace roses fit all the way down my arms and up to the perfect place on my chest, and the lace graced the carpet and extended into a magnificent train. “It fits perfect,” Mom said. Daddy said, “You look beautiful.” In that moment, I was my mother ready to step out bravely at age nineteen and commit to a life that had become my own life, and I was myself, ready and not ready, waiting still. “But do you think can we get those traces of soil out that are on the train?” If it’s been so well preserved through moves to town and moves to the country and move to apartments and moves to farms, who knows but that it might have been preserved all the while for me?

Just Like This

2009-08-22T11:36:00.001-07:00

We are in the parking lot wishing
The navy sky was a blanket to cover us,
But the rain puddles have soaked my jeans
And there is more to come.
You say you don’t know if it’s good to like someone this much
And someday we can be together much longer
Than we are now apart.
But for tonight I hold you just like this
Asphalt holds us here.

Oklahoma Weeds

2009-08-22T11:34:00.000-07:00

Mommy ties my tennis shoes on the front deck
With red paint peeling itself off the grey wood
That leads down to weeds almost my size.
“You're such a pretty girl,” she says.

Pretty is the smell of fingernail polish,
The glitter my sister showers on herself and gets stuck in the carpet,
The clenching of my teeth beneath the hairbrush,
The shuddering that hairspray sends up my spine,
The sweaty wait beneath the curling iron.

Beauty is the smell of three-leaved clovers,
Sparkling dew on spring grass,
Songs of sparrows in the morning,
Wolf howls riding on the wind,
White bursts of dandelions beneath my breath.

“You don't want to play princesses with your sister?”
Mommy says as she ties the last knot
And lets me go.

I am running down the red steps now.
I am going to be an Indian,
Wild as these Oklahoma weeds.

Falling in Love

2009-08-22T11:29:00.000-07:00

I'm going to post some poems from my Creative Writing class last semester. Bear with me.

Falling in Love

At first the job is tedious and awkward,

holding the pencil correctly,

the tips of my fingers tense against the wood,

copying letters and words,

scratching down shapes and lines that stay separate

or connected,

trying desperately to allow for proper space

between each word.

Is that enough, Mom? Is it too much?

I know how to make my letters now.

When can I make beauty and let those letters and words,

so distant,

blend into one whole body?

Learning

2009-01-04T14:26:00.000-08:00

I had intended to do some things today, like go to church and work the shift I had picked up, but I definitely wasn't looking forward to either since this sickness has started settling in. Three days of being sick and working through it has gotten to me. I was about to leave for church when I realized that I really didn't have to do it and I didn't have to go work either. After all, from the very start of this I've supposed that God let this come to bring me to trust Him more. And I knew I needed it. Even though I had a nine hour shift, a ten hour shift, and an eight hour shift lined up three days in a row, trusting God is more important than good health. And this is just when I had been asking God to help me enjoy work and have a good attitude; that's only harder when I'm sick. But at the same time, it's easier to recognize in sickness that I can't live by myself, I can't work by myself. I was refreshed this morning by a scripture passage that reminded me God doesn't intend for me to.

"For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him." --1 Thess. 5:9-10

What a sweet thing it is to be His. I wish I were a faster learner in this issue of trust, but still, it's good to rest here in His presence regardless of must happen to me to bring me here.

2008-11-12T11:00:00.000-08:00

"They are bleeding," she stated with eyes like blue-tinted windows and lips like wind-torn cliffs.
Autumn has changed things.

Are the seasons warring
And winning each in turn?

"That's why they say Winter is the cruelest month--"

Because it draws no blood
But leaves its victims: still, naked bones.

The Rebel Smile

2008-11-04T16:17:00.000-08:00

Magnetically her lips smile to her cheeks.
Bright, smooth and firm.
They say, "I'm fine, thank you,"
And, "Stay away please,"
All in one, in many words and no words.
Casually, she trumps past, heels banging,
Bright skirt swaying high.
I do not speak
Because she smiles, bangs, and sways that things are right.

Pathetically, he eyes her as though captured
In a single idle glance.
He takes her things, pays her bill,
Tries to listen, takes the blame,
Simply because she says to
And this is a two way deal.
He is silent to content her stiffened smile.
For a thing like her, what is a little crunching of his spine beneath her heels?

I understand
We must rebel against the weight of punishment,
Throw aside the sweetness of before,
Close our hands, close our hearts,
Laugh at our discomfort,
Mock at our own pain
If we want to find ourselves.
But then, how do we go back?

I have seen a girl with wildflowers in her hair,
She smiled into sunshine and when the wind touched her cheeks.
I have seen her dance and laugh through a field,
And call to a warrior from afar,
"My husband, my lord," so that all the fields could hear,
And she washed his feet of battle mud.
Maybe there were wings on her back.
It's hard to remember once I've opened my eyes.

Tonight is Not Forever

2008-11-03T10:53:00.000-08:00

Night envelopes you; bricks block you out of sight.
My cheeks, my hands, my mind is wet with you,
But the cold wind dries my skin tonight
Until only the marks in my mind remain.
You say we will see each other
And that tonight is not forever,
But in time to come I will remember
The many nights that blanketed you,
That separated you from my sight.
The drapes of age seem cold to us;
They sever us; they do not hesitate; they do not feel.
But Providence covers us with peace
That stands amidst the dark, guarding,
Guiding you away tonight.
And you are not dried from my mind.
Age, night, bricks, wind, covering, severing,
Sight, wheels, distance, feeling, forever--
They lie at the feet of God.

Where the Grass Takes Suck

2008-10-15T10:09:00.000-07:00

Light knock, tender smiles that would go unrecognized at other hours.
In the gradual appearance of color we understand the sun approaches.
The moon is soft still like the subtle smile of a mother,
As if she has not stood watchful through the night.

Come with me to enjoy the earth's early drink,
To graze with our ankles where the grass takes suck,
And slip our feet over the crimson leaves
'Til our heels grow numb in eager silence.

Natural Magic

2008-10-13T20:51:00.000-07:00

Heels crunch dry dragon skin
Beneath the branching arms;
And still a few scales linger above.

Soles
whistle:
crinkle, crackle, crinkle.

Fresh ancient dust coats ten toes
As natural magic igniting the face
In beams of wonder, pleasure, silence.

Elishama

2008-10-11T19:52:00.000-07:00

I have been long in my wanderings;
I have been deep in this love
Of emotionless stiffness that hears no prayers,
That calls for one more sacrifice,
But never smiles at burning fumes
Nor breaths in the fragrance to refresh.

I have been hard at my obeisance;
I have been bloody at my knees,
But the unchanging face does not see.
Though tears pour down my cheeks
And I lay my face against the rocks,
This god does not turn to love me.

I have been long in my slavery;
I have been cut deep with the lash.
And I remember the stories I've heard
Of the God who hears and delivers
And brings His own back to Him.
I cry out under the burdens I've chosen.

You are timely in Your deliverance;
You are furious in Your wrath.
The gods I have worshiped lie at Your feet.
I fall down ashamed at my wandering ways.
But forgiveness is running in blood not my own
As You renew again the covenant of peace.

Two Weeks of Learning and Changing

2008-09-21T15:34:00.000-07:00

Since I've come to Union, I haven't been back to Memphis. I like the trees (there are bigger ones than in my neighborhood at home) and the walking paths. World Lit. I and II are great so far. Somehow I find it so much easier to do my homework for those classes than others. But it has been a little more than two weeks and I don't plan on going home for almost two more weeks. I like how much simpler things are here. The inspiration is everywhere to me and makes me want to write; I wasn't really expecting that. I also wasn't expecting to spend so much time alone.

So, I spend a lot of time reading, walking, talking to Aaron on the phone, and, actually, some sweet prayer time as well. Old Testament is getting me to read three chapters in the Old Testament a day and it's great. When I'm left to myself, I tend not to read quite so much.

Today, I'm searching the shared libraries on iTunes. Someone's got a lot of James Taylor; I like it so far.

I could go on about how much I miss Aaron, but I won't put the readers through that except to say that God is using this in my life for as my Facebook says: "Of all feelings, perhaps pain is the most beneficial." And another quote that deals with Aaron: "Better than the ability to great things is the ability to rejoice with others when they do greater." I think he's the best actually.

A hundred empty faces

2008-08-26T11:17:00.000-07:00

I see you in a hundred faces every day,
But they don't look at me the way you do.
The strength of their forms beckons you to mind,
But turns without that gentleness you alone offer me.

In the picture on the mantle, we are still and unalive.
That was so long ago; so many mornings I have woken alone.
The mailbox is full again of advertisements.
I search for you and tears smear the empty ink.

Please come home to leave no more alone,
To quiet me with your love again.
Please come home and keep me by your side,
To hold me through the night and wake with me each morning.

Our Savior's Band

2008-07-23T10:47:00.000-07:00

(You'll forgive me, I hope, that this is a very old poem written on 1-30-06, and, though it is not so great anymore, was very good back then.)

Come astonish me with your tricks
And watch the sky, the clouds, the mix.
Skip a stone across for me
Until the day that we are free
To talk, to laugh, to change to one
Like clouds and sky melt in the sun.
Stroke my hair and hold my hand
And don't make light our Savior's band,
But listen closely as He guides your feet,
Though He guides you far from me.
For he knows loneliness and rage,
Hardship, dying, passion, pain.
But come alone to Him in rest
And He will give you what is best.
Maybe He will have us to band
And unite our calloused, searching hands
Or, like clouds and sky melt in the sun,
Unite our two hearts into one.

Feet Against this Floor

2008-07-15T09:18:00.000-07:00

Everyone is so silent tonight that no one can hear me.
He turns with shining, fiery eyes and send the fear shooting in.
Nothing appeases him.
The hot night is cold with the hardness of our feet against this floor.
When will I make my peace with you?
What must I do to show you?
My heart churns on. I want to hide away,
Far away from this hardness in my chest,
This fear of what you'll say.
What makes you so?
What has turned you off inside?
If you turned your eyes from dark, cold figures,
You would have so much more; you would know so much more.
But you cannot, I know. You love these things, these very things you hate,
So you lock us up in bars of hardness and fear.
But we will never be free by seeking your pleasure,
By seeking your hand at the lock.

I am a Ball, You are a Puzzle

2008-07-07T13:07:00.000-07:00

You asked me in not so many words, I thought;
So I pieced you together in my mind. How have I done?
I tried to discover you, but you turned from me
Like a night phantom. You appear and disappear;
You mingle interest with disinterest until I feel I'm like the rest,
A trinket on your shelf, shiny and fun to muse at sometimes,
But you don't see that I'm always here, searching into you,
Though I don't play your mind over in my fingers like some sparkling ball,
Fun to muse at sometimes, illuminating my eyes, my smile.
You hold the magic over me and are blind to my fear
That you will set me down again, toss me in the trash,
Or worse, never let me understand.

Ours for Freedom

2008-07-07T13:01:00.000-07:00

We feel the dirt beneath our feet, breathe in the country air;
Shoes pressed down against the concrete, hot dogs in the air.
We see the mighty heights of these His mountains,
The mighty depths of these His lakes.
We see His hand outstretched to us,
"This is yours for freedom."
May we ever rise to sing His praise,
Rejoicing in victory and beauty.
May we look to the skies and breathe in deep,
Enjoying the undeserved without complacency.

Things that Stay and Things that Change

2008-07-05T12:08:00.000-07:00

It's strange to think about sometimes, how you change with age and how you stay the same. Some of those things you hated when you were very little stay with you for the rest of your life and you learn to accept it like something good, and some of those things that you feel you are cursed with God helps you through and you'd never then imagine the sweet blessedness you now enjoy.
When I was five, I hated those baby hairs that curled around my face and since they go by such a name I figured that with age they would leave me... They haven't yet, but we've made peace. My lips were chapped back then all the time and I hated the taste of Carmex, but I had to keep using it. My lips are still chapped pretty much all the time, but I don't use Carmex anymore, and it means that at least I can fully enjoy the refreshing moisture of lip balm.
But I used to always feel very much alone as well and mostly set aside from the world. It's easy for people to befriend the little talkative kids, but the really quiet, thoughtful ones are rather intimidating I suppose, and I tended to be slow about making friends. It seemed some kind of curse--though I would simultaneously not have chosen to be anyone different--that no one really understood me outside of my family. It was my fault, of course, but as very little children we are our natural selves, not thinking, without a great deal of instruction, to be like the rest. But this has faded, by the grace of God, with much time, though I may perhaps always struggle. I know love and acceptance. I have friends that I care about and that care about me to the point that we fight to understand each other and minister to each other. It's a work of God.
Then there is legalism which controlled me thoroughly when I was young. It was horrible. I can not think of that time in my life without pain. I would never want to do it again. Some people don't see legalism as sin, but I do, because I know how it works. I think it's the enemy himself, or an angel under his command, endeavoring to enslave a person, to dictate their actions, to continue cracking his whip, reminding him how far he is from God's standard, telling him how much God expects, how disappointed God is with his life. When a person allows the enemy to enslave them this way, that is legalism. I feared I would always be it's slave, but by the grace of God, I have been saved from this as well! I pray I may never fall into it's trap again, for it is not at all a thing of God. He never intended His children to do His work without His power. It is, in fact, impossible.
So, praise God for baby hairs, for chapped lips, for friends, for freedom in Christ!

The Eyelined Heart

2008-05-27T11:08:00.000-07:00

Praise God for this story. Maybe He wants to do something great with it. This is the second draft. Please leave comments of any nature.

The Eyelined Heart

Chapter 1: The Girl in the Mirror

I’m exhausted socially after this seven hour struggle. And, now, where can I sit on the bus? At the front sit the nerds; at the back sit the emos and outcasts. The middle is the only acceptable place, occupied by the few normal people who ride the bus. I’m glad to see that the seat beside Megan is not taken. I thrust my back pack off my shoulders and up onto the overhead rack. I brush past her and sit by the window. Our eyes meet and then she looks away. I know she has somewhat of an affinity for me though I have not figured out why. This makes me feel uncomfortable with her because I think that to her I am but a cardboard poster and if I turn too much to show her another aspect of myself, she may be displeased and abandon me altogether.

“I guess football practice starts today?” I say, looking toward her again.

“Yes, I’ll be riding the bus much more now,” responds Megan, “and, soon, instead of Friday night dates, there will be Friday night games.”

“That’s disappointing?”

“No, I’m proud of Zack.”

I smile. Anyone with a boyfriend on the football team deserves to be proud, even if the guy is, like Zack, not a star player. But Zack’s popularity rests mainly in his personality rather than his looks or athletic abilities. He has a comical way about him and is mysteriously capable of making people feel comfortable around him. Just that he would choose Megan makes her popular. She’s pretty too, though, with a dashing white smile. Her brown eyes are ordinary but bright. Her brownish black hair is more ordinary, being unnaturally straight. She and I both fall into the lot of millions of high school girls who get up an hour early in the morning to perfect hair and makeup before school; this has paid off for her, but I still await its supposed reward of popularity.

“But anyway,” says Megan, “just three months of riding this bus and I can get my driver's license. I can't wait.”

“Augh, I don't turn sixteen until May,” I complain, but I don't tell her that even then I probably won't be getting my license due to the cost of insurance.

This is my stop. “See you tomorrow,” I tell Megan, brushing past her knees and taking my backpack. As I get off the bus and head toward my house in the warm, early fall weather, only one person follows in my direction. I know without looking that it is Betha, my next-door neighbor.

“Are you busy tonight?” she asks.

“Yes,” I answer, not looking back as she catches up to me.

“Because you know you're always welcome to come to church with me...”

“I know,” I say, still looking ahead. Betha makes me shiver when she comes near me. Her deliberate effort not to get caught up in the striving for popularity grates at me. I think she talks to me simply to keep me from becoming popular. At least her house comes before mine.

“Bye, Karalynn,” she says, turning at her driveway.

“Bye,” I mutter, looking straight ahead. As I turn into my driveway beside hers and take the key from my purse, the strain of the social world changes into a much more difficult period in which I must be alone. I hate meeting myself here in the afternoon and knowing what I am, what I do, and what I want but cannot attain. Yes, the afternoon has come for me again.

Inside, as I bolt lock the door, my mind still replays Betha's nagging, faithful voice. In an eerie way, she reminds me of my grandmother who I went to church with as a little girl. My grandmother was always telling me things like how special I was to God. As a little girl, I believed her, but I believed everything back then. My grandmother was a great friend to me in those days; I always loved it when my mom took me to spend the weekend with the old woman who lived some forty-five minutes away. But as I grew up, truth became more complex to me and to my grandmother it was always very defined. She always told me that I should save my body and keep myself pure for God until my wedding night. But no one else in my life held this view and I began to wonder if it really mattered as much as she thought it did. During my middle school years especially, my grandmother and I grew apart. It wasn't cool anymore to spend much time with her. Then, last year, while I was in ninth grade, she got cancer and died. I haven't yet forgiven myself for the way I treated her the last few years. I wonder if I ever can.

I enter the bathroom in my small house and gaze into the face in the mirror. I would like to think the girl there is someone beautiful, but I strongly doubt it. My grandmother used to marvel over me when I was young and beauty was a simple thing not striven for or doubted but just accepted. But beauty has changed to me. Beauty is something desirable to guys and I won't believe I'm beautiful until someone takes my hand, kisses me, tells me he loves me, holds me close. But this hasn't happened and my greatest fear is that it never will. Really, I see nothing to live for aside from love; my grandmother said she lived for God, but that thought sometimes appears to me as boring and other times as terrifying. I only have one life to live and I might as well make the most of it and live for what I care about. But now I go to the kitchen to get a snack and then I try to turn my attention to homework, but my mind keeps haunting me with questions: “Am I beautiful? Am I worthy of love?” Even in the middle of a geometry problem or a reading for history, my mind wanders off into these unanswerable questions.

When my mom comes home tonight, we'll eat dinner on the couch and watch television with our minds a million miles apart. I don't know whether she ever thinks beyond the surface, beyond her job, beyond the soup in our hands, beyond the people in the shows we watch. Everything that is not superficial is not real to her. Does she know how lonely I am? If she did, would she care or just laugh? Sometimes, though, when I'm laying in bed at night, I think maybe she's right, and only what I can see is real, but that is when I'm in a half-conscious state and I've forgotten who I am.

* * *

Now, is it my imagination or is Jay is starring at me? I can feel it, and even when I turn back to glance at him, he does not turn away. Think Spanish, Karalynn, before you make a fool of yourself. I can't stop thinking about Jay though. He's a junior and a quarterback on the football team. He's much better looking and has a better build than Zack. He's altogether too good for me. He takes a different girl out almost every week. I know he uses girls, but doesn't a guy like him have a right to? How could it be that his magnificent, dark, piercing eyes are focused on me?

The teacher calls on him: “Jay, how do you say: 'What's your name?'”

“Jay,” he responds in a careless tone, evoking laughter from the other students.

“No, translate the question,” says the teacher in an agitated tone.

“Que es su nombre?”

“Jay, for the last half hour we've been talking about the other way to ask the question. You're not paying attention. It's 'Como se llama?'”

When the attention is off him, I feel hi.m touch my arm. I feel it in the depths of my veins. It's awkward and weird. “Como se llama?” he whispers.

I look forward into the granules of my desk, excited but terrified. After a moment, I realize that my silence is speaking harsh words that I don't mean. But I don't know how to fix things since I feel like everyone is starring at me and my tongue seems suddenly glued to the roof of my mouth and locked within the cages of my teeth. But surely he doesn't feel rejected; guys like him are never rejected. The class seems everlasting and I can't think of Spanish. I can only think of Jay.

Oddly, when the class dismisses, Jay is the first one out the classroom door and he's instantly down the hall, packed in the surging crowd and exerting much effort to keep on his way. I fight hard through the crowd to catch up. “Jay,” I say when I'm near him. He looks my way, surprised. “It's Karalynn,” I tell him. He stares at me again, but I can't tell what he's thinking.

“Oh, okay,” he says, and he finally looks away and makes his way off somewhere. I stop, stare after him, and then stare out everywhere and nowhere with my heart in a muddle and my mind confused and overwhelmed.

At lunch, I sit with Megan and Zack. Jays sits down the table with several guys and girls around him. He glances at me from time to time. It's unsettling but exciting. I can't even think about eating.

Through the rest of the school day, my mind cannot stray from him. His name appears everywhere to me. I hear it in every sound. When I close my mind, his face is there and his eyes are piercing me still. Yet, somehow, simultaneously, I fear him.

And now I see him on my way out of school. It feels like he sees me more. “Karalynn,” he says; my name sounds beautiful coming from his lips, different than it sounds on anyone else's lips. His glance is hesitant, but he says, “Are you doing anything... tomorrow night?”

Our eyes lock momentarily and then I look away without meaning to. “No.” Even if I did have something to do before, I don't anymore.

When I return my gaze to him, despite the difficulty, he looks a little disconcerted as if my looking away may foreshadow rejection. I try to look deep into his eyes in an effort to restore his courage, but they are too powerful and overwhelming for me to concentrate on without losing myself to everything else. I have no idea what I'm doing.

“Well, would you... want to go out with me?”

“Yeah...”

“Okay, cool. Look, I've got to get to practice.”

“I'm about to miss the bus.”

“Alright, well, can I call you? What's your number?”

I write it down in shaky handwriting and present to him. As he takes it, his hand touches mine, and I still feel his touch in the depths of my veins, in the marrow of my bones as our eyes meet in a deep, nearly intimate way. I still feel it, though he's gone and I'm gone; I'm out the door, boarding the bus just in time. I'm ecstatic, exhilarated. I haven't been this happy in a long time, maybe ever. All that has been weighing down on me for so long is seemingly lifted under Jay's gaze.

The seat next to Megan is taken by Haley so I sit behind them, trying to hold everything in. They're talking about absolutely nothing... a class that's boring, a teacher that's mean. I'm so glad when the bus stops and Haley gets off. I put my head forward and say, “Megan, Jay asked me out!”

“Are you serious?” she whispers. “I thought he had a thing for you. Zack wouldn't believe me. But the way he was looking you at lunch today, I think every girl at the table was jealous.”

“No way.”

“Karalynn, do you have any idea what this means?”

“Honestly, I'm still trying to figure it out.”

“You're going to be the envy of every girl at school. You're life will never be the same.”

“Stop it, Megan. This happens to girls all the time. You've told me so yourself.”

“But you're different. He's going to see and he's going to keep you.”

“Whatever. I'm no one.”

“You're about to be someone. But you'll need something to wear on this date. Come home with me and we'll figure something out.”

“I have clothes,” I say, feeling insulted by her suggestion.

“Not the kinds that will really impress him. I know what I'm doing, okay?”

She does know how these things work, I guess. I know nothing. I have no idea what to expect or how to act toward Jay. “Alright,” I tell her.

“Aren't you excited?” she asks.

“Yeah.” I'm terrified. My stomach feels like it's in knots, maybe because I haven't eaten all day. I wonder if I'll ever be able to eat again. All I can think of is Jay. All I can see are his piercing dark eyes starring into me.

* * *

In Megan's room, I look at the girl in the mirror before me. Something deep and childish in me says that too much of me is showing. What would my grandmother think? But maybe that doesn't matter anymore.

“You look hot in that,” Megan asserts.

“I... don't know.” It seems, in these clothes, I'm boasting of a body that is still so undeveloped.

“Well, if you want change to happen, you've got to be willing to change a little,” Megan says. “If you really want to be Jay's girl, you've got to let him know it. I mean, do you really just want things to be the way they've always been? This is a once in a lifetime opportunity.

“Yeah,” I sigh. I sit down against her bed. “I just don't get it. I don't see why he would go for me. And I really don't see why he would be timid about it. He seemed to fear I would reject him. Was that some kind of show? How could any girl ever consider turning him down, anyway?”

“Well, like I told you, you are different. You seem kind of pure and innocent. I guess that sort of appeals to him, but maybe it kind of makes him hesitant, too.”

“But if he likes me the way I am, why should I wear these clothes?”

“He likes you the way you are, but he wants to know more of you. And this is the way you can show him you want that, too.”

Do I want that?

“Trust me, Karalynn,” she says at length.

I look at the girl in the mirror again, still uncomfortable with all I see of her. “Okay, whatever.”

* * *

Jay never called me yesterday. That confused me. But as he apologizes in Spanish today, I readily forgive him. I'm overjoyed that he remembers that he had said he would call. I feel wonderful, like the richest girl in the world, though I have only five dollars in my purse.

At lunch, Jay wants me to sit with him. So I do, and Megan and Zack are further down the table. I don't know the people at this part of the table. The girls all flirt, particularly with Jay. But I am so taken back by my present situation that I don't compete with them. I'm utterly silent. The other girls pretend I'm not there as if they resent my very presence.

Jays looks aside to me and speaks gently. “Aren't you going to eat?”

I am hungry, I guess. I haven't eaten in a day in a half, but the girls all around make me feel nervous and I don't feel like eating. But I tell Jay, “Yeah,” and I take a few bites.

Jay seems very busy talking to other guys and girls, but when he does turn back to me, he says softly, “Are you okay?”

“I'm fine.” What else can I say?

I don't see Jay for the rest of the school day, but I see no shortage of “his girls.” I can't bear the way they look at me or avoid looking at me. I feel a ting of pride in it, but I mostly dislike the feeling. How costly it is to be popular with a single person. But through it all, I can hold to Jay's promise of “tonight at six.”

At the end of the school day, when I get off the bus to go home, Betha is near me, as if she still likes me, as if she's oblivious to my evolution. How could she have ever liked me? What have I ever done for her? Will she never leave me alone?

“How do you feel about the geometry test tomorrow?” she asks me.

“I don't know. I don't care. I should get at least a B.” I think for a moment. Maybe I will tell her. Maybe that will drive her to the edge and she will become so disgusted with me that she will finally leave me alone. “I'm not studying tonight,” I say; “I've got a date with Jay Robins.” I look directly in her face for the first time in a while, trying to catch a reaction.

“Oh,” she says with a look of pity, like I am a prisoner and she is free and she wishes she could break me out. I hate that look. It makes me think she will never give up on me, that she will forever cherish the hope of me coming to her religion. Doesn't she see that she's the one in bondage? I'm free... free from her rules and her childish ways. She turns at her driveway now. That's right, Betha, go play with your numbers and shapes and get a perfect score on the math test tomorrow. “Bye, Karalynn,” she smiles like a prisoner insane, unaware of her chains.

* * *

My hands are shaky as I attempt to perfect my make-up, my hair, my body, everything. What if Jay isn't pleased? This becomes my all-consuming desire—to please Jay. And if that is done, there is nothing too great to have sacrificed. I still can't believe he would choose me.

When my mom comes home, she tells me I look nice. This sets me at ease with myself somewhat. “This Jay,” she says, “is he somebody special?”

“Yeah,” I say. My mom is totally in the dark. This is my first date; if it were anyone, he would be special. But this is Jay Robins.

“He's lucky,” my mom says.

Whatever. If only she knew...

The doorbell rings eight minutes after six. I open it to a perfect-looking man. He probably spent two minutes getting ready, but that doesn't matter. His dark eyes are piercing me through. Though I've just opened the door, I feel he has studied me entirely and seen more of me than I've exposed.

“Mom, this is Jay,” I say with my mind a million miles away from the formality of the statement.

“It's good to meet you, Jay,” my mom responds. I can tell she's taken back by him. “You two have fun.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Evans. It's good to meet you.” He looks at me anxiously.

“Bye, Mom,” I say, and we're outside.

Jay opens the car door for me. This totally overwhelms me. I'm trying to remember if anyone has ever done that for me before. When he comes around the other side and turns the key in the ignition, I try to act natural, as if I've done this hundreds of times before. Does he sense how frightened I am?

We go to a fairly nice restaurant nearby.

“They've got everything here,” Jay tells me as we look at the menu. “You're sure to like it more than the cafeteria food.”

“I'll eating anything, really,” I say, knowing he's referring to how little I ate at lunch. I'm afraid that I won't be able to eat much and I hope this doesn't offend him. I look up at him. He seems so mature compared to me. His brown hair is combed to the side a little and his eyes are steady before him. I wonder how I compare to the other girls he takes out.

I end up ordering something small and I force myself to eat almost all of it, but my stomach feels sick when he looks at me. I don't think I'm doing a good job at carrying the conversation either.

“What kind of movies do you like?” he asks.

“I like pretty much everything.”

“Everything?”

“I mean most things.”

“Horror movies? War movies? Or just the typical chick-flick?”

“I... I don't know.”

“So, you'll eat anything, watch anything... Come on, who are you? What do you like? What do you care about?”

Suddenly, I have no idea. I guess I'm an extremely boring person and a pathetic date.

“You're quiet,” he says. Now he has said it. That's what everyone says about me. Why does no one tell me what to say?

“I'm sorry...,” I say feeling helplessly unfit to be going out with Jay.

“It's okay,” he smiles. “It makes you different.”

I look up at him. I guess he just gave me a compliment. “What do you like?” I ask.

“I like football a lot. I like steak and war movies and blood and gore. But I don't know. I'm beginning to think... I really like you.”

I look away. He doesn't know me. How could he know he likes me? “I like you, too,” I say.

After dinner, we go to the movie theater. Jay says that tonight is not about him but about me, so we watch a chick-flick. I never actually told him I like them, but I do. I don't like horror or war movies.

Now Jay touches my arm, but I don't flinch, though I am intensely aware of it. He moves down my arm to my hand. I open it. His hand fills it. Now he brings my hand to him and I see and feel his lips on it. He looks at me, his eyes asking whether I want my hand back out of his grasp. But I just look back to the screen. I'm not sure what I want.

In the car he tells me, “You know, you're not like other girls, Karalynn. And I don't really want this to end.”

What does he mean? What could he possibly see in me? How could he possibly have a more boring date than I have been?

“I don't want this to end,” I say. And I think I'm being honest. I'm scared for this to end and I'm scared for this to continue, too.

We get to my house and he walks me to my door. He looks at me and I'm lost in his gaze. He takes my hand and I feel powerless. His lips are on mine. It's like I can feel him inside of me. Maybe I am flinching. I don't know because I'm so scared. He releases, looks away, and bites his lip.

“Let's do it again sometime,” he says.

“I'd like that,” I tell him.

He lets go of my hand.

“Thanks for everything,” I say.

He just smiles and says, “Goodnight.”

Chapter 2: Beauty for Sale

I lay in bed half awake. I feel better about who I am than I have in a long time. Maybe I am beautiful after all. Maybe I really mean something to Jay. Maybe I'm worth something. I can still feel his lips on mine even as I lay here debating whether I should get up. It's Saturday.

In the kitchen, my mom asks if I had a good time last night.

“I had an incredible time,” I answer, pouring a bowl of cereal.

“Did he?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Did he kiss you?”

“Mom...”

She laughs and sits down at the table with her pop-tarts in her hands.

“Did my dad kiss you on your first date?” I ask, sitting down beside her, knowing the question is almost cruel.

“Karalynn, don't...,” she responds coldly.

“Alright, well I'm not telling either.”

We sit there silently eating in a harsh sort of truce, with half-smiles, half-scowls across our faces. I guess this is what is to be a woman. But for now I'll just focus on last night and replay it over and over in my mind.

Later, Megan calls and she wants to know how last night went. Suddenly, I guess my whole identity is who I am in Jay. Nothing else matters. By myself I am no one. I tell Megan everything, how he told me I was different and that he liked me, how he touched me in the theater and kissed me at the door, and how he said we should do it again. Replaying the night, it seems much better than how it had actually felt as it happened. I was terrified as it played out, fearing I would make some horrible mistake, but it ended well with a sweet promise of a continuing relationship. I feel pride in this. Megan seems pleased with the outcome, too.

In the late afternoon, I get a call from Jay. He says he's on his way home from football practice and he wanted to hear my voice. I swallow hard at this. I don't have much to say, of course. My life is dreadfully boring. But he finds all kinds of things to say about school and football... and us. He has a way of talking that makes me feel like the most important person in the world. It's like magic. A group of people (Jay's kind of people) are going bowling tonight and Jay asks if I want to come with him. Tonight? That seems so soon. My heart beats hard. What will I wear? And what if all the other people make me feel awkward? And what if I make a fool of myself because I don't really know how to bowl? “I'd love to,” I say, and that settles it. It's 4:30 now and he's going to pick me up at 6:30.

I shuffle through my closet anxiously and come out with something that seems almost suitable. It's not a good brand and it doesn't reveal as much as what I borrowed from Megan, but it's the best I have. It's 6:25 and I'm ready. I curled my hair and I think it looks alright. “He must really like you,” my mom says, watching television.

When he comes and we're in the car on the way to the bowling alley he tells me, “You're so pretty, you know?”

“Really?” I say, and look away, thrilled and also embarrassed.

“Yeah,” he laughs, “hasn't anyone ever told you that?”

“Um, I guess it's not the kind of thing people say everyday, you know?”

“I don't see how they can help it.”

“Thanks...” After a while I ask, “Are Megan and Zack coming?”

“No, there are other people in the world, you know.”

“Well, yeah, but...”

“You can meet some new people, okay?”

I don't like the idea of it. I don't like the idea of people who hate me simply because I'm with Jay.

“It'll be okay,” he tells me as we get out of the car. But when we go inside and meet his friends I see that they are the same people or at least the same kind of people that always sit with him at lunch. I close up involuntarily. I wish I wasn't here.

“They're not going to bite you, Karalynn,” Jay whispers to me as we put on bowling shoes. “At least try to be nice for me, okay?”

I'm trying, but they're making it impossible. They don't look at me; they don't talk to me; they don't include me. Doesn't Jay see? Doesn't Jay care? I'm not like him and I can't handle this. I'm the girl they've always looked down on, one of the normal people, and they can't stand that I've risen beyond them and won the attention of Jay Robins.

Jay bowls better than anyone else. The guys compete and have fun. The girls are simply cruel. They're not competing for bowling points; they're competing for Jay. He helps me with my positioning in the game and he puts his arm around me a lot when we're both sitting down. This is getting to be too much for the other girls.

“So, where did you get that shirt?” Kimberly asks me. “Let me guess: Wal-Mart in the clearance section?”

I look away. I don't know how to respond. This isn't fair.

Jay hesitates, but then says to Kimberly, “What does it matter? She looks better than you in your hundred dollar outfits.”

“You jerk,” she responds defiantly. “Why don't you start shopping at Wal-Mart if it doesn't matter?”

“Why don't you shut up and let me make my own decisions?” Jay bites his lip. Everyone grows rather quiet at this. We watch Peyton bowl like it is the most entertaining thing we had seen in years, but I don't think anyone except me notices his gutter ball.

Jay leans over to me when Kimberly goes to bowl. “Yeah, I went out with her a few times a couple months ago...”

“Yeah, I remember... Everyone seems to think they're you're girl.”

“But they're not. You're the only one I care about anymore.” He gets up and bowls a strike.

On the way home, I tell Jay, “At least understand, this is hard on me.”

“Yeah, I know. I'm really sorry. I didn't realize it would be that way. Those girls... they're really stupid, you know? You're totally different than them.”

I sigh. What does this mean? Are these just words?

“I don't even know why I hang out with them anymore,” he says.

“Because they're like your fan club; they're all in love with you.”

“Yeah, but... I'm not going to do this to you anymore. I promise, okay?”

“Okay...”

We arrive at my house. “Do you mind,” Jays says, “if I call you my girlfriend?”

Do I mind? What kind of a question is that? “I'd love that,” I tell him.

“That's worth it all,then,” he says.

He kisses me by the door again, but this time it's longer and I feel even more caught up in him. I don't think I will ever get loose of this, but why would I want to?

* * *

On Monday, I have a new life. I am not the girl in the shadows. I am Jay Robin's girl—his only girl, and everyone knows. Those girls like Kimberly, Lauren, Jennifer all fall back now like phantoms. If they hate me, what does it matter? I am not like them; I am beyond them. I am supreme. They are dirt beneath my feet and merely representations of past days or shells of long-gone locusts. They are nothing.

At lunch Jay and I sit with Megan and Zack, Haley and Damian. The guys make fools of themselves simply because they can, I suppose, and no one thinks anything of it. They act like little boys, carrying on about stupid things, playing with their food. Zack leads in this as he is the chief of clowns. It's alright because Jay, Zack, and Damian set the rules. Megan laughs a little; Haley seems annoyed; I'm just trying to figure out what's going on and I suppose it comes across as indifference.

The events and overarching feelings of Tuesday and Wednesday follow the same pattern. I'm beginning to get used to this, to feed on this, to so deeply associate myself with Megan and Haley that I'm not even sure who I was a week ago. All I know is that I am now in the thrill of this high life. Even though I'm uneasy with Jay, I'm getting good at pretending I'm at ease. I'm getting good at playing this new role.

“See,” Jay tells me on the phone Wednesday night, “I told you we would work out.”

“Yeah, of course, you make everything work out.”

He laughs. “So, you want to go to the party Friday night at Damian's house?”

I hesitate. “Um, I've never been to anything quite like... you know.”

“There has to be a first for everything.”

“Yeah, but... I've heard stories.”

“Just stay with me and everything will be alright. I promise.”

* * *

On Friday, Megan comes over. She helps me decide what to wear and we do our hair and nails together.

“Jay is so crazy about you,” Megan says. “I can tell by the way he looks at you. I mean, I've never seen him quite this way over a girl.”

I just smile and spread the second coat over my nails. I don't talk about how nervous I am about tonight, how scared I am that everyone will get drunk and do things they wouldn't consider in their right minds. Jay's promise has not helped me because, deep down, I fear him more than anyone. I'm scared of what I would do for him. But even at the height to which I have risen, I cannot tell Megan these things. I am still a cardboard poster to her, though this becomes harder the more time we spend together.

I guess that's what scares me about this whole rising to popularity. I don't think it can last long. When people see who I really am, how could they accept me? Even Jay—he thinks he knows me, but there's so much he hasn't discovered, so much that no one knows, that even I try to forget.

So we change our clothes, we paint our nails thick, we make our hair unnaturally straight, we conceal our faces with thick makeup, we cloak our eyes with eyeliner. No one must know what I am.

“So, tonight, don't be scared to drink a little,” Megan tells me. “I'm not saying you need to get drunk or anything, but everyone will have a better time if you're loosened up a little.” I clam up inside and I'm not sure how to respond.

Jay and Zack both come to my house for us. I get that sickening feeling again that I'm revealing too much of my body. Jay drives us. Everyone else seems excited, but I am quiet. What am I getting into?

Damian's house is crowded with people. A lot of them I don't know; some of them go to Damian's old school. I stay with Jay simply because everyone else is moving around in unpredictable fashions and I need a constant to stay sane. I cling to his hand. As Jay moves around talking to different people and introducing me, I forget most of their names.

At last Jay says to me, “Is something wrong?”

“I don't know.”

“You're tense.”

I hate that that shows.

“Why don't we get something to drink?” he asks.

I look at him, earnestly searching his eyes.

“You've never had a drink, have you?” he says.

I don't answer. I just look around.

“Well, come on. Try a little bit and it'll make you have a better time. If it's too much, you can stop, alright? Does that sound good?”

I nod.

He puts his arm around me and leads me to the drinks. “Beer is gross. What you need is some wine.” He pours a little for me and for himself. I take a sip; the stuff is strong and distasteful to me, but I finish what he poured. “What do you think?” he asks.

“I like Dr. Pepper better,” I say.

“Alright, have it your way,” he laughs. “I better stop, too, if I'm going to drive home later.”

At this, I feel relieved. Everything is going to be alright tonight, after all. Jay is not even pressuring me or mocking my innocence. Slowly, I can tell I'm more relaxed. I'm more talkative and I can have conversations with people I don't know well. I think Jay likes this.

Later, when most everyone is inside, the music is loud, and the people are shouting over each other, Jay and I go out front. We sit against the pillar. His arms are both around me; I'm leaning against his chest. I feel somehow ignited. My body is going crazy. But I'm not sure exactly what this means.

Much later, as I lie in bed, I think over the night's occurrences. I see Jay's eyes in my mind and feel beautiful and desired. What if he wants all of me? What if I'm not ready for that?

* * *

The next week is like a long, slow march toward the weekend. There is the monotony of papers and tests, seeing Jay at Spanish and lunch, the normal people with which I used to associate becoming more and more distant. It is alright though; it is part of the plan; it is worth it. We are approaching the weekend and I long to spend time with Jay. During the week, between school and practice, he does not have time, except to call. I'm almost scaring myself with how much I desire to be with him. I'm scared of what I'll do.

All the while, Betha acts as if nothing has changed. She trails me home from the bus stop like a pet dog I can't get rid of. And I know I'll never change into what she is. Why would I want to? I have everything right now. I am what every girl wants to be... every girl, I guess, except for Betha.

Friday night, Jay and I go to Megan's house and watched a movie with her and Zack. On the coach, Jay's arm is around me and I'm leaning securely into him. When he takes me home, he kisses me several lengthy times until I feel I'm losing all control.

“I better go in,” I say.

“Yeah,” he says, biting his lip and looking down in the darkness. Then, “Karalynn,” he says slowly. I meet his deep, consuming eyes as he says, “I think I'm in love with you.”

“I know I'm in love with you.” This must be love—this being caught up in someone and feeling beautiful just by looking into his eyes. This must be love.

“Let's do something tomorrow after football practice. You want to?”

“Yeah, I'd like that.”

As I lay in bed, I cannot sleep tonight. I'm replaying his words in my mind, his strong, defined voice, saying, “I think I'm in love with you.” I keep imagining unintentionally that the blankets are his arms wrapped around me.

* * *

So, late on Saturday night, we go to a park. The weather is still nice as it has not quite lost summer's warmth and yet experiments with indulging in colder temperatures. We walk in the park's seemingly enchanted forest, our fingers interlocked, as the sun sets on us.

“I think it's going to be a great football season;” he says, “the new coach is so much better and some of the freshmen seem really promising... and I've got you to cheer me on.”

I laugh, “And that makes a lot of difference.”

“That makes all the difference,” he says, looking down at me, seriously.

“This place is kind of empty now,” I note, looking around.

“Is that bad?”

I don't answer.

“Come on; let's go back to the car,” he decides, and we make our way through the quickly dimming forest.

In the car, he pulls out a bottle of wine. “We should celebrate,” he says.

“Celebrate what?”

“You know... us.” So I drink with him even though I still don't like the taste. I kind of like the way it makes me feel. But my heart is beating quickly, anyway, for fear of what the drink is doing to me, for fear of what it's doing to him.

“If we both love each other and we always want to be together, then what are we waiting on?” he asks after awhile. “I mean, I know I could never love another girl the way I love you.”

I swallow hard. I don't know whether I'm ready for this, but to refuse him would be to say I don't really love him, wouldn't it? To refuse him would be to say that all he has done for me means nothing.

“Trust me,” he says, touching me—my neck, my lips, and everything that once was only mine. I relax beneath his touch. I don't know what else to do. As he overtakes me, I begin to lose focus. I don't know what is happening anymore. Everything turns soft and gray and hard and black.

Chapter 3: Beyond Hope

I'm awake as from a nightmare. I'm in my room, in my bed. It's still dark and my clock says 5:53. These images in my mind, these feelings inside of me... are they real? Was I was with Jay last night, intimately? I cringe. Surely that was a dream; surely he dropped me off after our date at ten or so. But I don't remember that. I just begin to remember what he was telling me in the car, how I started drinking, how he began to touch me.

But I'm a sensible girl and I knew before I wasn't ready for that, didn't I? I'm just fifteen and Jay has only acted like he cares about me. Why would he force me to do something I'm not ready for? As the nightmare becomes a reality in my mind, I remember how easily I folded to him.

I want to go back to sleep and have a good dream, letting that become my reality, but now that I remember what happened, I know I can't go back. It's all too late. A tear drips down my face, my cheek, my chin, my neck. It's followed by another and another. They drip slowly down my body, which has turned meaningless. Fifteen days ago, I had never been kissed. Now I am thoroughly defiled.

And all those things he said to me, that I was different, that I was beautiful, that he loved me... those were just lies to coerce me. He must have said those exact things to each girl he used to find for every weekend. He told me I wasn't like them, but now I think I'm just as stupid and shallow. All of that time, Jay must have cared nothing for me, only for himself. Now he can boast to his friends of his newest feat. He can pin all that was precious to me on the bulletin board of his mind next to Kimberly, Jennifer, Lauren, Leah, Jessica, Renee.

And Megan used me, too. She encouraged me in the relationship, helped me change my appearance, and sent me out to him looking like a whore so that he could treat me like one. My mom didn't even care. She told me I looked nice and watched me walk out the door time after time with that self-obsessed user.

Fifteen days ago I had something wonderful and beautiful and I didn't even know. I had my body and it was mine. It was my own, untouched, unknown, sacred. I had my heart locked up in my chest. And I sold it all to him for some cheap words that I throw away now like the receipts for my purchase of death. What am I now? What good am I? I feel these tears will never cease.

I'm quiet this weekend. I stay in my room most of the time with my door locked. Jay calls me three times, but I don't answer, and he doesn't leave any messages. I tell my mom I'm doing homework and she inquires no further. That's how much she cares.

* * *

At school on Monday, a lot of girls are staring at me. Some of them say things to me about Saturday night, but I turn cold at the subject. If I went through with the conversation, it would increase my popularity I guess, but I can't make myself do it. They laugh at how uncomfortable I am with the subject.

With increasing intensity, I hate Jay. I hate him like I've never hated anyone. He has told everyone what we did. I'm certain now that he cares nothing about me. I'm less than human to him. I'm at his disposal. Tears are slipping past the cages of my eyes, escaping down my cheeks, blackening my face with eyeliner and mascara. I thought I would be stronger than this; I guess I forgot who I am.

I can't go to Spanish today. I can't face Jay. I go into the bathroom, lock myself in the stall and let those tears dirty my whole face with the message of truth they carry. Everyone I held onto has turned on me. I am utterly alone. But now, I no longer care about popularity. Everything is a lie. I've gotten my sample of popularity and it is utterly bitter. Who am I trying to impress, anyway? The popular crowd, I guess, but they're not at all what I imagined. They're disappointingly like everyone else except even more self-absorbed. I skip lunch, too.

Before leaving the bathroom, I wash my face. I take off all the make-up, everything. Of course people won't like what they see, but what does it matter? They know who I am, what I've done. All that dark stuff falls through drain, but the darkness, the uncleanness I feel inside, it cannot be washed away.

After school, on my way out, Jay, with his terrifying, unsatisfiable, piercing, dark eyes, stops me. “Karalynn,” he says smoothly.

Fury ceases me. “Please leave me alone,” I tell him, looking away at the ground.

“What is it, baby? We can work things out.”

My eyes are fogged over with tears again by now. “No,” I tell him, crossing my arms tightly and walking away. Maybe I've hurt him; maybe I've made our relationship unrepairable, but I don't care. He is like a vicious beast, incapable of repentance and unworthy of forgiveness. The school door slams shut behind me.

On the bus, I sit by in the middle by the window, simply out of habit. For a companion, my backpack sits beside me. Megan sits by herself in the seat behind me.

“So, things are going well with you and Jay?” she says.

I guess she hasn't looked me in the face today. “Stay out of my life,” I mumble.

“What are you talking about? What are you throwing me of for? I'm the one who helped you get where you are.”

“Just shut up.”

“You're the one who agreed to go out with him. If you weren't ready for it, if you were already enjoying your previous state of unpopularity, you should have turned him down at the beginning.”

Everyone on the bus is listening now. Why won't she be quiet?

“You knew what he would do before you ever went out with him,” she reminds me.

The left side of my face is now pressed against the vibrating window and the right side is covered by my hair. I am cut off from Megan. I am cut off from the world. I am forevermore an outcast.

* * *

The rain streaks down the kitchen window remind me of this ongoing life—or death, which ever it is. I cannot escape it. It is my existence. Surely the skies are tired of raining by now. They've been at it for three days.

I'm tired of that dull face in the mirror. It is lifeless and desperate but sees no hope. No one knows me anymore. In fact, though I used to talk to people and they used to talk to me, I don't think anyone ever really knew me. I've always said the things I was supposed to say and done the things I was supposed to do, but no more. I am a rebel of the system. I have graced the highest social sphere and slammed the door in its face. It was all a lie anyway. There was no joy there.

No one wants to know me. I don't straighten my hair anymore; I just brush it and let it do its thing. When I do wear make-up, I just put on heavy, black eyeliner; that's it. I wear clothes that don't draw attention to me but allow me to be just another face in the crowd. I have become like someone I would have avoided a month ago. I feel like a widow, but the one who died was never real, just an imaginary person all along. Now I've come to terms with the fact that the man I dreamed of since I was a little girl could not really exist. Guys are users. Guys are liars. They don't love or cherish. A gentleman is a mirage of the female heart. And I am the widow of my dream.

I wonder what my grandmother would think of me now. After all she tried to convince me of, surely she would be ashamed. She was always telling me that I could be accepted and loved of God. But I don't think it matters. I guess it was all a lie, anyway, like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.

My mom knows that something has changed in me, that Jay and I aren't together anymore. But I can't think of telling her what is going on inside of me. I can't think of asking her why she never warned me against this, why she only encouraged me, when surely she's experienced the pain that comes with this kind of intimacy. She wouldn't understand if I talked to her about it, though. Day by day, we just talk about meaningless things. What's the point of talking at all?

I'm making soup and corn bread for dinner. I'm stirring, stirring monotonously like the dripping of the rain today. I don't cry anymore. It's like I've used up all my tears. Now I face the facts and realize that life has nothing for me. All I really want is to end this. Is there an end, though? Or is that, too, eternal punishment for all the sins I carry? Is there rest in death for one so defiled? Maybe I should find out. Suicide becomes more appealing with each passing day. I open the knife drawer and stare bleakly in, debating and figuring in my mind. But I'm scaring myself. Death looks painful. I close the drawer and stir the soup again.

* * *

Getting off the bus, I breathe deeply and say, “Betha.” The girl turns to me, surprised at my addressing her. “I missed English class last week,” I say slowly, “when the teacher gave out the word list that we have a test on tomorrow...”

“We have a copy machine at my house. Do you want me to make you a copy?” she asks, as if she knows no resentment.

“Yeah, that would be great.”

I probably haven't been in Betha's house since second grade. But I go in now. The air inside is warm and welcoming. Betha's mother comes to greet us. “Karalynn, I've just made cookies. Would you like to come in and have some?”

“No thank you, Mrs. Russell,” I say without thinking. Honestly, I do want to sit down and enjoy the company of these two. I just don't deserve it after ignoring Betha for all of these years. I don't deserve the friendship she still seems to offer. And I know I never will. But as Betha makes the copies and I stand here in the entryway smelling the cookies in the kitchen, I have to wonder how my life might have been different if I had been friends with Betha all these years instead of going through my long and torturous struggle for popularity. It's painful to wonder how much hurt I might have avoided, how I might have hope even now.

“Thank you,” I tell Betha as she hands me the paper still warm from the copier.

“Anytime,” she says, smiling. She even touches me near my shoulder to show that she means it.

I smile like I wish it could be so. But it can't, not after all I've put her through.

* * *

I feel strange. I'm sick at my stomach at certain times of the day, but otherwise I'm well. And I've missed my monthly cycle. What does this mean? I fear the worst. My mom won't be home for a couple more hours and a trip to the convenience store might set my mind at ease... or alert me to my deep fear.

So I set out from my house in a panic. This won't seem real until I know, so why am I doing this again? Because this isn't going to be real. I'm going to find out that everything is normal and my cycle is just late.

As I set the pregnancy tester on the checkout stand with the money, the elderly clerk looks into my face, probably trying to guess my age. I look down inescapable embarrassment and try to act as if I'm oblivious as to what I'm purchasing. He hands me the plastic shopping bag and tells me to have a good day. Does he really mean it or is he inwardly asking God to bring a curse on me for my many sins?

At home, I follow the instructions on the box. It must be lying. This can't be real. I'm only fifteen; this is impossible. But it's message is still: positive. Now I can cry again. There is no going back, no changing the past. Whatever has begun inside of me has begun. It cannot be reversed. What am I going to do?

I bring my hand against my stomach in awe of the activity beneath the skin. How could God do this to me? I didn't even know what I was doing that night. No one told me it would mean all of this. But, even though I want to keep blaming everyone else, I knew what Jay was like; I knew what could happen. This is my fault. I guess God is just, and that's what makes me most afraid of Him.

I don't want anyone to know about this. So I make dinner like usual even though I don't feel like it. I try to act normal and my mom doesn't ask questions. But for some reason, she wants to watch a reality show about babies while we eat. Why would she want to do that? We usually don't watch reality television. I'm scared that if we watch this, I'm going to break.

“No, Mom,” I say, “let's watch something else.”

“Oh, come on, Karalynn. We haven't seen this show in a while. You like it; you've just forgotten.”

“If you watch this, I'm going to my room.”

“Why?”

I feel a tear slipping down my cheek, blowing my cover.

“Is something wrong?” my mom asks.

“Mom... I'm pregnant,” I say, though I can't believe I'm telling her this, even as the words leave my mouth.

“Oh, Sweety,” she says. She hugs me and my tears soak her blouse. She holds me for a long time. I don't care if she never lets go. I just want to fall asleep and never wake up because no dream could be worse than reality. “It will be okay,” my mom tells me as she releases her grasp. How can she say that? How could this be described as okay? “I'll get off work early tomorrow and we can go up the abortion clinic. In a couple days, this won't matter anymore.”

I stare into her confident-seeming eyes with my own doubts. “Have you had an abortion before?” The question has spilled out of my mouth before I had time to think it over.

“No, no. My only pregnancy was with you.”

I look away, staring into the pattern of the carpet. I've always thought my mom loved my father once. I wish I knew more about him. I wish she would tell me.

Now I think of what she has said. If she has never had an abortion, though, how does she know it won't matter in a couple days? “If we go to the abortion clinic,” I say, “what will they do to me?”

“I don't know exactly, but it will be quick and easy. It won't hurt.”

“You mean, they would perform the operation tomorrow?”

“It's only a minor operation. Trust me, Karalynn. You're going to be alright.” Megan told me to trust her. Jay told me to trust him. What if my mom is just saying this to keep life easy? The fact that I was with Jay will matter for the rest of my life, even though others acted as if it was no big deal. What if this is the same? What if I can never forget the events of tomorrow? What if it will bring more death to my existence? Tomorrow seems so close and I need more time to think.

* * *

Here I sit with this helpless infant in my arms. He is safe, comfortable, and happy here with his eyes closed in a deep sleep. But I begin to dislike this, his dependence on me. I'm not ready for this and I grow angry with him. I take a knife out of a drawer nearby and, in a fit of self-absorption, without thinking, I plunge the knife into the child's heart. His eyes open instantly and he shrieks.

Suddenly, I wake up, sweaty with my heart beating hard, to a shrieking siren in the distance. It was just a dream. I haven't killed him. I breathe a sigh of relief, staring into the darkness of night.

If I go through with this abortion, will I be killing a person who is already alive? How could I be so cold-hearted? But on the other hand, how can I explain to my mom that I feel I need to have the baby? And what would it be like when I get really big? How will it feel? Will it hurt to give birth? What will people think?

This is terrifying—that I have but these two options: abortion or pregnancy and labor. I am unprepared for either.

* * *

I cannot concentrate at school today, knowing what I have scheduled for this afternoon, knowing what I have going on inside of me. What if I'm getting worked up over nothing? What if it's no big deal, like my mom told me? What if this inside of me is not yet a life? But I can't know that. And if I can't know that and I go through with this, it will torture me forever.

Of all the people I could see in my distress as I gather things from my locker, here comes Jay on his way to practice. Maybe he will not notice me or maybe he will ignore me.

But, no. “Karalynn.” I hate the way my name sounds on his lips. I cringe inside as an invisible shield suddenly grows over me. “Are you coming to the game tonight?” he asks. He touches me.

I pull back from his hand in a sudden fearful emotion. “Please don't touch me.”

He folds his arms. “Calm down, now; we got off to a bad start, but there's still hope. Come tonight.”

I fold my arms as a tear slips down my cheek. “Don't mock me, Jay.” I'm not who I used to be. I don't dress the way I used to dress. I don't act like I used to act or associate with the people I used to associate with. How does he not see how much everything has changed? How does he dare still speak to me?

“Why would you think I'm mocking you?” he asks.

“Because you only care about yourself.” I'm not thinking now, just talking. “You're a liar. And you do whatever you want and don't have to accept any of the consequences.” I pause, but not to think. He is still here, so I say, “I'm pregnant.”

“What?” he responds. “Oh. Wow. I'm... I'm sorry.”

I shake my head. “Never mind. I'm getting an abortion.” My eyes are filled with tears by now.

“How can you do that?” he asks. “Wouldn't you feel guilty? I mean, what if what's inside of you is really... alive and human?”

“Shut up, Jay, okay? Just stay out of my life from now on. You don't understand.
You're not the one going through this.” He is silent now. I have what I need from my locker. I walk past him and reach where the bus would be. But the bus is already gone. My mom's going to be mad.

I sit down on the curb, my face in my arms, red with tears. I am so alone.

“Karalynn.” I hear my name spoken again, this time by a soft, familiar voice.

I look up, disclosing my tear-stained face. Betha looks back at me, her blue eyes seemingly filled with compassion. “What can I do for you?” she asks.

I speak in a low tone, like someone on death row. “I don't think anyone can do anything for me now, Betha.”

“I can listen.”

Now I study her eyes. She did not condemn me for struggling for popularity. She did not condemn me for going out with Jay. She has never given up on me. Chills go up my spine as I come to the decision that, if I can trust anyone, it is her.

“You're too innocent to listen to this story,” I tell her.

“Go ahead,” she reassures.

“You know, I started going out with Jay a month or so ago. And, looking back, I don't know what I was thinking. Surely you've heard the stories about his way with girls. He robs you of everything and then he's on to the next girl. I totally played into it. I guess I thought I was different somehow. I guess I thought he could change. But after a couple weeks, he just...” I'm struggling, crying again now, “he just used me up.” Betha is perfectly silent in her attentiveness, but she is starting to cry, too. How is it that she, spotless as she is, would shed tears for someone as terrible as myself?

“That would have been enough,” I say. “That would have been enough for me to go on in agony forever. But then, I just found out yesterday, I'm pregnant.” Now we're really crying. I don't think anyone has ever wept over me before. My speech is mostly sobs by now and probably difficult to understand. “My mom wants me to get an abortion. And I'm so terrified. I don't know what to do.”

Betha looks away and she keeps crying. She can't seem to talk for a while, but when she can, she fixes her eyes to mine again. “Karalynn, my birth mother was fourteen when she had me. I don't know a lot about her. I'm sure she thought about abortion. I probably won't ever meet her, but if I do, I will thank her because even though she must have made some bad decisions, she had the courage and the compassion to give birth to me, despite what she must have gone through physically and socially. And she had the love to let me be adopted by the best parents I can imagine.”

“I... I never knew,” I say, completely taken back. But then, after a while I say, “You really forgive her?”

Betha nods.

“But you forgive everyone,” I say, casually.

“Just because I've been forgiven for so much by God.”

I almost laugh. “What have you been forgiven for? You've never done anything wrong in your life.”

“I'm human. I've made mistakes.”

I smile, almost bitterly. “Still, you forgive what even God does not forgive.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, me, for example. You're always forgiving me. It doesn't make sense.”

“Karalynn, God would forgive you, too.”

I laugh. “No, that's impossible. I'm going to hell for what I've done.”

“You would,” she says. “You would have to go to hell, just like I would have to go to hell for my sins. But when the perfect Son of God died on the cross, He was taking our sins on Himself. He even prayed to God for the people that had crucified Him. He said, 'Father, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing.' And even when the criminal dying beside him asked Jesus to remember him when he entered His kingdom, Jesus told him, 'Today you will be with me in paradise.'”

I look into her crystal-like eyes and I know she's really sincere. She really thinks God would forgive me.

“If you just ask him, if you just put your trust in Him, He will save you from hell and from guilt and from all these things. He will change you. And you will never, ever be alone again. Believe me, I know.”

A car drives up near us. It's Betha's mom's. “Come home with me,” says Betha.

“No thanks. I don't want to go home. I'll walk when I'm ready.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, mom's going to be mad anyway.”

“I'll see you around, Karalynn.” Her eyes are begging me to remember all her words.

As she turns to leave, I say, “Hey, Betha.” When she looks back, I still have to gather the courage to tell her what I intended. “Thank you.”

“I'm praying for you,” are her last words before she gets in the car and soon disappears from the parking lot.

Alone again, I stare out into nowhere, the wind against my burning eyes, my face marred with black eyeliner from the shedding of so many tears.

Highways are Not for Living On But for Getting Somewhere

2008-05-23T08:55:00.000-07:00

Driving down the highway, gulping in the air
Which is surging through the windows.
Spring has spread its savor through each breath
Full of purpose and sweet hope
As I look left and right for a place of rest.

I left because that place was cold and confused,
And here on the highway, You're feeding me on You.
But I'm still looking for Your hands and Your feet,
A place to connect Your body to me.
I am here waiting; I am here moving.
I don't need the colors; I don't need the lights.
I just need a place to belong.

You were in My Dream Last Night,

2008-05-23T08:48:00.000-07:00

Standing alone in the dark,
Rain pelting around you, against you,
Lightening flashing behind you.
You were staring, self-composed and almost hopeful,
Silent and almost accessible,
But I said nothing; I did nothing.

Chosen one, hear my call through starless night:

2008-05-11T11:40:00.000-07:00

Why do cling to a life that defeats you?
Why do you run after dreams that forget you?
Why do you approach the hands that abuse you?
Come to me tonight.
Why do you sell yourself to a gruesome, twisted touch?
Are you too sick of who you've become to face a night alone?
Are you frightened by the shadows of your figure on the wall?
Just come to me tonight.

I know you've forgotten what love was made to be,
But I made it and I know that you were made for me.
I'm craving you; I'm missing you; don't walk away again.
Just rest your head against my chest tonight.

Wow

2008-05-10T20:44:00.000-07:00

This must be one of the greatest days of my life. Seriously. It's like God keeps showing me His love and mercy in so many ways. This thing with graduation and opening cards afterward. Who is this person anyway and why do they care enough to send me this check? Wow. And I'm up there graduating and I look out across the audience. Look at all the faces who are there primarily to see me. Wow. And Aaron gives me a purple rose and we suck honeysuckles and walk in the rain. Wow. Why does God show me such compassion, such tender mercies? How can I just pass this by? I sure didn't graduate because I deserved it anyway. I graduated because God is merciful and He chose to bless me with a reasoning mind and concentration and discipline. When I was born with the umbilical chord wrapped around my throat three times, that easily could have damaged my brain and made all of this impossible. God is so great; He has never owed me anything and yet He gives all of this. Oh, let the cycle not end with me! That my life would be a blessing to others! That salvation, forgiveness, freedom, security, provision would flow through me to others from the Giver of all good things!

Mutant of Mainstream

2008-05-01T10:18:00.000-07:00

Yes, thank God! I'm finally finished with the whatever-draft-this-is of the story. I would love for you to read it and please post comments and suggestions.

Chapter 1: The Workmanship

I was searching, as a vagabond in the wilderness, but unsure exactly what I was searching for. Everyday, I was back and forth between trust and doubt, not knowing that God was working through all the pain to bring me to the place where I had no option but to rest in Him completely and where I would want nothing but His good and perfect purpose for my life. I had no idea what I was in for the spring of my senior year in high school, the trail that God had predestined for me to follow in order to bring me slowly, ever into his likeness.
Near the beginning of the semester, a meeting with the principal of the school loomed over my head. With everything in my being, I dreaded it, praying the meeting would be canceled or that I would get sick, but as the time neared and neither of my prayers were answered, I just asked God for wisdom that I might know how to respond to the principal, Mr. Rummers. His office was dark with a single dim lamp casting shadows across his face. In fact, the shadow of his glasses left his eyes hard to see and his lips hard to read. He complained about my recent decline in grades. Having known this was coming, I was prepared with my defense. I wrote down on a piece of paper that I was only doing so poorly because I had stopped speaking. Since then, I had begun flunking oral exams and presentations, although I should have been flunking them all along because no one could understand me when I spoke. Mr. Rummers then tormented me with his dim lips and concealed eyes, urging me to keep trying to speak, and reminding me how far I had come with lip-reading (so that I didn’t even need an interpreter for my classes), and assuring me that just such a thing could happen with my speech. However, Mr. Rummers, sitting back in his desk chair, with an immovable expression plastered across his face like a fortress which separated his world from mine, had no way of imagining what a monster speech could be. He had never known the feeling of doing away with it to be like chaining a vicious monster to a stake and setting it on fire. It was wonderful. But Mr. Rummers let me know that if I did not learn to speak, my life would be basically useless. Against these harsh ideas, I tried to copy his expression, to set my face like flint with no emotion, but the pain boiling inside of me was torture to mask. I feared the principal could see right through me.
When I was dismissed, the January wind of the outside world greeted my face, cooling all that had boiled inside of me. My father had been waiting for me in the lone car in the parking lot. I used my natural means of communication—American Sign Language—to convey to him what Mr. Rummers had told me. But my father seemed to think little of Mr. Rummers’s concerns, signing to me that, as the Bible says, I was God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God had before ordained that I should walk in them. In comparison with God’s viewpoint, the speculations of my school principal were unimportant.
So, with my hope battling on against despair and my faith against doubt, I rested my head against the vibrating car window as my father drove us home. The feeling of uselessness was always chasing and taunting me and it was only further fueled by Mr. Rummers remarks. I cried out to God in the constant silence of my mind, pleading that He might take me and what little I had to offer and use me for His glory in order to accomplish His purpose.
Home was a small, ordinary-looking place, crammed into a neighborhood with miniscule yards. No flowers adorned the bushy garden outside—no flowers dancing like little, bright fairies in the wind to signify individuality or profess to passers-by of a feminine heart within the home’s brick walls. Yet this place welcomed us through the garage and into the kitchen. Once inside, the aroma of wood greeted me warmly; it was the scent of peace, work, and stability. Though the house held little furniture and few luxuries, there was no place I would have preferred to return to after that painstaking meeting with Mr. Rummers than this simple place.
Walking through the sawdust which covered the floor, I got a glass of water and sat down at the kitchen table, while my father turned on some music, sat down on the couch in the living room, and fashioned guitar parts. In my own silent world, I endeavored to focus my freshly wounded mind on American History, forcing myself to think in terms of questions, blanks, and complete sentence answers.
In the course of an hour, however, I had moved from a world of words to a world of wood, sitting on the opposite side of the couch from my father, gluing guitar parts together. My father and I worked intently without much signing—for our hands and eyes were preoccupied with the wood. This was the tranquil community we shared, sanctified from the clamor of the world outside. Though the world cut at us and abandoned us, this was our haven of healing.
At six o’clock, we washed the sawdust and wood glue from our hands and began making a dinner characteristic of us—one which combined rice, chili, and which ever spices appeared most tasteful to us at the time. Above the steaming pans on the oven, we signed leisurely about making guitar deliveries, things going on at our church, and interesting facts I had learned at school that day.
I told my father that I was invited to James’s house the following night along with Elizabeth. The three of us—James, Elizabeth, and I—were the only deaf students at our school, and we had been close friends since the deaf school we had begun in, with the focus and the end thereof being public, mainstream education. Still, as we were high school seniors, we stuck together through the currents, all of us inefficient communicators. James, who had lost his hearing at the age of five, could talk decently, but was not a lip-reader; I, having lost my hearing at three, could read lips, but had given up on speech; and Elizabeth, who was born deaf, could neither speak nor read lips. These “flaws” were evident to everyone, leading to our general ostracism by the hearing students. To befriend one of us was to deface oneself, and it had been this way since grade school. We, the few, the deaf, though tragically unconformable, were still lost in the mad rush of the mainstream. Only, we all knew we could not end where everyone else was ending. We were different.
After dinner, my father and I pulled out two of our handcrafted guitars. My father began strumming some chords in the key of F. Noting this, my fingers drifted into picking solo notes up and down the frets and strings. The feeling of the wood, smooth beneath my finger, and the steel strings, pliable to my touch, indulged me. I lost myself in the vibrations. After a while, with my fingers still moving, I looked up into my father’s deep, brown eyes. Perhaps the darkness of his eyes drove many people away from him, but it welcomed me in. His hair was dark brown also and curly. A short, unkempt beard surrounded his face providing him with a rustic appearance. My eyes dropped down to his moving fingers, which were also rustic with work and practice so that looking at them caused respect and pride to grow in my heart. Certainly, we were not a typical family, but we loved what we had—what we had been given of God.

As one fighting the ocean current, I struggled through the crowded hall at school the next morning, toward my locker. It was 6:55. If I did not get to homeroom by 7:00, I knew the teacher would take pleasure in mocking me before the entire class. She did it to everyone who was late, but she always found more to ridicule me about.
When I was near my locker, I saw Elizabeth surrounded by a group of students. The students’ mouths were moving rapidly and Elizabeth, unable to read lips, was simply trying to find a way past them. Because I knew exactly what the students were saying, my urgency to get to class instantly evaporated as my emotions suddenly boiled in anger. I pushed through the group of students which enclosed Elizabeth, conscious that this action had thrown at least one person to the ground. Putting my arm around Elizabeth, I broke through the other side of the group. Without looking back to see the damage I had caused, I walked with Elizabeth to her homeroom, my arm around her securely, until she sat down at her desk.
When she thanked me, respect revealed itself through her eyes. And as I turned to find myself lost again in the ocean of the hallway, working my way back to my locker, I could still see Elizabeth’s relieved face in my mind, her weak smile, her sparkling eyes, her blonde, wavy hair. She was a sort of angelic princess, always there in the corner of my mind, and it was my duty and privilege to protect her. The look she had given me which said that she needed and trusted me was well-worth what I knew was coming when I entered homeroom at 7:05.
As I took my seat at the front of the class, the teacher put on a sarcastic smile and, through it, asked me what had happened. She started with questioning about the little things, remarking that perhaps I had forgotten to set my alarm, or enjoyed my shower to much. But eventually she came to sharper ideas, saying perhaps my girlfriend had broken up with me, and that was what made me late, as pleasure in her own wittiness lit her face. Even when I started to write something down, she stopped me, telling me this was not writing class and that she wanted an answer. With a smile still plastered across her face, she said she sensed a lack of respect at my not answering her. It was utterly mortifying. Though I could not hear the laughter, I could sense it, which was probably worse. I forced myself to faze out completely and asked God to give me patience and a sound mind, to be “slow to anger and abounding in love,” as Paul puts it, as anything else would end me in detention.

When I arrived at the Kirkpatricks’ house that night, James greeted me with his three-year-old sister, Jessica, held against his chest. We signed in the living for a while with the strong smell of dinner calling out from the kitchen. His siblings were running around the house playing hide-and-seek or some such game, knocking into him occasionally. We discussed the school setting as usual and he expressed anger toward the principal, as he had recently had a meeting with him also. James signed that Mr. Rummers was a communist and that is why he wanted us to conform. But I reasoned that if Mr. Rummers was a communist he would want us to die. Despite my own inward struggles with bitterness toward the principal, I told James that Mr. Rummers truly wanted the best for us, but that he was simply mistaken about what was best for us. James could not agree. He just held out his hand to stop his six-year-old sister, Jenna, and signed to her with his other hand to slow down so she would not hurt herself.
Then Elizabeth arrived. I watched James kiss her on the cheek at the door as he instantly took her hand and drew her into the house where Jenna and Jessica crowded around her. I licked my lips against the intensity of their relationship, which had recently felt to be the conclusion of so many years of our mutual companionship. But I never discussed it with them.
The aroma of lasagna is the aroma of big family. When I arrived at James’s house that night, everything was warm and perfect. In the Kirkpatrick house, the sense of unity was so prevalent and so intrinsic that the members seemed woven together and Elizabeth with them. I was beckoned into this tapestry, but I could not really enter because it was already perfect and beautiful. I could only be an admirer. The Kirkpatricks spoke and signed simultaneously, although James was the only deaf member of the family. Tonight, the mood around the table was light and refreshing after the tedious week of school, with the bright prospects of the weekend before them. I was intrigued by Jessica’s determined efforts to cut her own lasagna despite the offers of everyone at the table, not knowing she had already received offers, volunteering to cut it for her. James, who worked for his father’s company, was discussing a work situation with his father, as Elizabeth watched with interest. Julie, James’s fourteen-year-old sister, was telling her mom about being offered drugs at school that day. The four youngest children were too caught up in eating for making much conversation, although at intervals they would burst out with some nugget of information. I sat slowly taking in the food, looking from person to person in the warmth of the atmosphere, as if I was but gazing in at them through a window.
After dinner, we played an aggressive game of “Spoons.” The game is not solely about skill; it has much to do with one’s degree of viciousness as well. So, it was not surprising that James and Joseph were the ones to make it to the last round. At that point, the game is only luck. Joseph won, by chance.
When James, Elizabeth and I were in James’s room later that evening, James made a point to ridicule my poor skills at the game of “Spoons.” But Elizabeth stood up for me, reminding James that I was probably a wonderful guitar player, though the two of them couldn’t know, and that I at least looked cool when I played. Elizabeth and I looked at each other, smiling like two siblings might when they find themselves on the same side of a conflict. James reminded me of how Elizabeth’s grandmother thought I was weird when we were little kids I was always playing guitar, despite my being deaf. I did not remember that. When I thought of Elizabeth’s grandmother, Mrs. Anderson, I could think of nothing but raking her yard for her in the fall and her repaying us with chocolate chip cookies and telling us stories about child-eating monsters. We asked Elizabeth how her grandmother was doing and she told us her grandmother was doing very poorly, almost to the point of having to go into a nursing home. I, who had had no idea that things were so bad, looked away, ashamed I had not asked about Mrs. Anderson more recently.
If Mrs. Anderson went into a nursing home before graduation, James told me that Elizabeth would move in with his family for the remainder of the school year. After that, we all knew what was going to happen—James and Elizabeth were going to get married, get their own house, and start their own family. Though their anticipation seemed to grow as the time drew closer, that night the idea remained like the moon seen through the window, neither spoken of nor reached for, but present, still, in its resplendence.
I, on the other hand, faced the future without direction. Perhaps, after I graduated, I would go to college or perhaps I would simply become a luthier like my father and put in more hours in the workshop at home. Honestly, I would be content with anything, as long as God would place me in His will.

Chapter 2: A World of Weapons

I lay in bed, staring at the tiny, white protrusions which covered the ceiling, and praying, until I drifted off again into a light sleep. I asked God why I should get up. Hardly anyone at school would care whether I was there or not. Memphis would only try to tear me in pieces today, even as I went about not knowing what I was made for, not getting into anything. The world did not want me. I could just stay in bed. But as I kept praying, I remembered that it was not about what the world wanted or needed. It was about the plans that God had for me. And, though I did not know what I should do in a year, I could be sure that at that moment God wanted me to get out of bed and be His witness at my school. At last I forced myself out of the bed, and, walking over to the window, lifted one blind slightly in order to peek out into the new day.
At 6:30 on that weekday morning, I left the enclosure of my own small room and made my way into the kitchen where my father sat with a glass of water and his Bible. He looked up from the book as I entered and signed to me, telling me that I could take the car to school that day, as long as I made a guitar delivery to the Johnsons. This was the third delivery for them. Although it was odd that anyone would want so many expensive guitars of the same brand, we did not complain; we would make them as many guitars as they would buy. When I got home, we would balance our budget. I had been included in this practice for as long as I could remember. Instead of my father paying me for the work that I did, everything was ours. Together we saved and gave and strove to keep our spending as little as possible.
That morning, I poured myself a glass of orange juice. When I drank it, it seemed as if I was drinking of the morning sun in all its richness. Over such a beverage, I sat down with my father at the table to see what he was reading. It was Deuteronomy still. He had been reading in that book of the Bible for a long time, and seemed peculiarly passionate about the monotonous, law-filled book. But he pointed out the verse in the first chapter that read, “And in the wilderness, where thou hast seen how the LORD thy God doth bare thee, as a man doth bare his son, in all the way that ye went, until ye came unto this place.” My father explained that, in the midst of the Israelite’s weakness and rebellion, God still showed Himself faithful and gave them more than they deserved. He brought them through hardships with the purpose of causing them to love Him and seek Him more so that He might accomplish His ultimate purpose with them—to be close to them and reveal Himself among them.
My father never used my sign name—a couple taps of the L-shaped hand against the chest—like other people did when they signed to me. Instead he signed the word “Song,” which was my middle name. This gave me a sense of identity, a sense of what my father must have seen in me.

Later, as I sat in Algebra and waited for the teacher to arrive, I got bored with doodling odd designs across the top of my notebook paper and looked up at the new girl seated across the classroom. She was glancing around anxiously. I watched as she leaned over to the girl beside her and I read her lips as she questioned her as to the “hot guy over there.” The girl questioned responded that she must mean Lancen. As the second girl’s red lips articulated my name, I suddenly felt a tinge of interest somewhere so deep in me that I could not seem to draw my eyes away from their conversation. The red lips then went on to say that I was deaf and I never talked and they summed me up as “creepy.” Though the description almost caused me to turn away, I had to see what the new girl would think about this. But all that came from her lips was a question as to why I was starring at them. The other girl told her I was probably reading their lips. How creepy was that? Then I did turn away.
It was then that the fullness of their words settled on me. But I had learned long ago not to keep this kind of thing trapped inside me. I could go insane. Instead, I prayed, begging God to help me forgive those cruel red lips, and that He would forgive them. After all, when the Israelites had sinned against God again and again, He had forgiven them. And when I had still been in my sins, He had died to forgive me. He still was forgiving me everyday for the ways that I hurt Him. I wanted to be like Christ and share His love with others at my school, but at the same time, it was difficult when they treated me like I wasn’t quite human, like the fact that I couldn’t talk meant that I could not feel. So, I prayed in the harsh atmosphere of the classroom, with an urging still to meditate the outpouring of the girls’ lips, that God would be my strength and that He would give me an opportunity that day to show His kindness.

At lunch, I sat across from James and watched Elizabeth from afar as she went through the cafeteria line. A dismal aura seemed to surround her as she barely noticed what went on about her. James signed to me that her father had stopped by her grandmother’s house the night before, asking for money from his mother, but had barely even noticed Elizabeth. As James signed, a hardness seemed to go over his visage, almost like a knight’s helmet against the battle. His eyes conveyed the agony he felt due to seeing her this way, met with his inability to immediately make everything right for her—to make her completely his, to show her the love that she desperately needed.
As Elizabeth sat down beside James, her presence was that of one not truly in our presence. It was as if she was locked in a dark dungeon somewhere too far away for us to reach to her. Though we would both boast of our strength, it was beyond our power to save her. Even when James’s hand slipped beneath the table (to find hers, I assumed), Elizabeth’s expression remained unchanged.
At length, a little way down the long table, Eric Skelton, shoved his cup toward me and his lips mumbled my name along with a command to get him some more Dr. Pepper. Though his words brought instant agitation to my ego, I did not dismiss his request. Instead, I signed to James that I would be right back after I got Eric some Dr. Pepper. James told me not to do, that that was selling out. Then I looked over at Elizabeth. She gave me no advice.
So, I took Eric’s cup and went to the drinking fountain, with my feet uncertain beneath me. I felt as if everyone in the cafeteria was thinking that I, Lancen Hamilton, had become Eric Skelton’s slave. But I forced my mind to scroll over the Bible’s words: “If your enemy is thirsty, feed him. If he is hungry, give him something to drink. In doing so you will heap burning coals on his head.”
When I set the refilled cup in front of Eric, he looked at me skeptically and asked if it was poisoned. Someone sitting near said that he wouldn’t drink it and someone else said he would give Eric a dollar to drink it. Without watching further, I sat back down in my own little group. James called me a suck up, but I just laughed to myself at this, knowing that my mute and “creepy” self could never make it into the popular crowd.

When I got in the car after school, I jotted down a note with usual civilities on it to hand to the Johnsons. I did this because people generally did not feel comfortable or appreciated when I made no communication and I did not want the Johnsons to have to wait on me to etch out a note after I arrived. When I thought I had written something suitable, I scanned over the note, set it in the passenger’s seat, and started the car’s ignition. I thanked God that I had made it through another day at school, that I had been able to show God’s kindness that day, even if it was not understood or appreciated.
I followed a windy road which led me up and down small hills until I found myself in a part of town that felt like the country, especially since I had the windows rolled down and I could breathe in the air of a singularly warm January day and hear the tree branches rustling all around in their excitement, as their old leaves had long been severed and new leaves now contemplated taking their places. I felt free that day with the wind surging through my hair. But freedom is not all that the human heart longs for. More than to be free, it desires to be needed and to be purposeful and those things seemed distant that day. There were houses hidden behind the trees in this country-like place—large, uniquely beautiful houses. I began trying to remember which belonged to the Johnsons. Only when I saw it, did the familiarity strike me and I pulled into the driveway, which was practically a road of its own. By following this, I finally reached their enormous house.
I got the guitar out of the trunk and climbed the numerous steps to the front porch and passed tall pillars. “Welcome,” the doormat read in large, bold letters. I conclude the message on the mat was meant to give the visitors, previously overwhelmed by looking at the house, just enough courage to ring the doorbell. So, I rang it.
The door was opened by Mrs. Johnson, a bubbly lady with bouncy, short, blonde hair. My eyes had difficulty keeping up with her mouth. Taking the guitar, she told me that they would want another soon guitar soon, but that would be a miniature and she would talk to my father about that later. Without giving me time to produce the note from my pocket, she, smiling unnaturally, bid me good-bye and shut the door in my face. So, with a sigh, I went back toward my car, toward the long, windy road, toward my own practical, compact neighborhood.

Music—not the sound, but rather the intensity—was flowing through my fingers, into the strings and wood, and then back again. Music was the feeling that I was doing what my father did. It felt right. It was an experience of vibrations mixed with the idea that other people could hear something wonderful.
After my father and I had been playing guitar for an hour and we found ourselves at the kitchen table drinking milk, my father signed to me that I had a great sense of rhythm. He assured me that I was a wonderful guitar player, not just for a deaf player, but for anyone. He told me I could be famous. I licked my lips of the white liquid lingering there as he told me not to let him talk me into anything. He encouraged me to seek only God’s will for my life. When I had consumed the last bit of milk from the cup, I asked my father, somewhat anxiously, whether he was going to bed. When he responded in the negative, I knew it meant. He often sat there near the door at nights “waiting” for my mother to come home. She had been gone now for fourteen years and yet, somehow, my father’s desire for her continued, unfaltering.
Lingering in the kitchen after I had rinsed out my cup, I signed to my father that James and Elizabeth had told me that if they had the option of hearing, they would still want to be deaf. But if I had the option, I would want to hear, if that meant that Mom would come back and my father and she could be together again.
My father starred at me a moment, and then responded slowly that it was not my fault she had left. She had had problems of her own and that had been the reason for her leaving. He signed this like he was weary of signing it. It was a sensitive subject for both of us, and though we did not discuss it very often, the discussions we did have were so memorable that we practically bore the marks of them.
Again, I told my father that if it had not been for that sickness which had left me deaf, my mother would not have gone away. I had been too much to handle. Maybe she had had problems, but if it had not been for my deafness, she would have stayed and gotten through them. Because my father made no response, I continued to tell him that it would have been better if I had not been born. At least she would have stayed.
But then a harsh expression covered my father’s face as he signed to me never to say what I had just told him again and that I should not even think it again. He told me God hade made me because God found pleasure in me. He had let me go deaf for a reason and He had a purpose for my life. I should never let anyone tell me that that was not true.
To this I gave no response. I only grabbed the back of the chair I had been sitting in and starred into the granules of wood in the kitchen table. Then my father signed very gravely that he would not trade me for anything. My gaze shifted to his deep, dark eyes as I searched for relief in their sincerity. When at last I felt I had attained all the relief he offered, I told him goodnight.

James told me he was sick of this. He was ready to get through this year of school and on to the rest of life. We were sitting in his room against his bed and he was glancing at the football game on his television from time to time. Really, James had no hopes for the present. His life was centered on graduation, getting a full time position at his father’s job, and getting out from under the misunderstanding eyes of his peers. I told him that this was life though. We would always be the rejects, the mutants. But that’s what he thought was so wonderful about the deaf community. We could fit in there. I told him that I feared to live out my life impacting only a few people who were like in my tiny comfort zone. To him, such an impact would be sufficient. He would mind spending his whole life with people who were like him. At least, he reasoned, there was understanding and acceptance there, as the world neither wanted nor needed us. But I was not so sure that it didn’t need us. James and I both might have gone to some private deaf school a few hours from home if it was not for that issue of family. James may have regretted going to a mainstream school, but only because (at least it seemed to me) he took his family for granted. He was so used to belonging. Through out my life and increasingly each day, the only person I felt like I belonged with was my father. I could not imagine leaving the one secure relationship I have for the sake of education and acceptance among peers. And in the end, I felt that my public education had in some ways done me good. It had showed me what the world really was and what I was up against. Somehow, after being exposed to the same things, when James and I looked at the world, we saw two different things. The world before his eyes was dark and cruel; the world before mine was dark and needy.
After our argument about life, the hearing world and the deaf community, we started wrestling as if we were striving against our own frustrations, stress, and pain. I was also trying to wrestle away the guilt which marred me deep inside due to my mother’s leaving. Tragically, I knew I could never wrestle this away.

Chapter 3: Anything to Feel

On a dark Thursday night, I sat at the kitchen table, starring into the last bit of milk in the cup and swishing it from side to side. I had been taking a great deal of time to consume this milk with the hope that my father would be home by the time I finished. He had gone to deliver the miniature guitar to the Johnsons. They had been adamant about getting it that night because the next day was their youngest child’s birthday. Judging by the way Mrs. Johnson had shut the door in my face when I had made a delivery, it was hard to imagine that the Johnsons had invited my father in and indulged him in a lengthy conversation, particularly because my father—thought neither deaf nor mute—was not a conversationalist. The Johnsons lived about fifteen minutes away from us, yet my father had been gone for almost two hours.
As I starred toward the front door, I got the sudden and horrible sensation that I was doing the exact same thing my father had been doing for the fourteen years my mother had been away—waiting, as if at any moment the door handle would being turning and that much desired companion would return. I felt lost without him. Finally though, I drank the last bit of milk, which by now was room temperature, and washed the cup out slowly in the sink.
Then suddenly, lights flashed—my signal that someone was ringing the doorbell. I knew it was not my father because he had a key. Curiously, I walked toward the door and looked through the peephole. Two police officers stood outside. In a muddle of terror and confusion, I opened the door to the officers. They starred at my awkwardly, which seemed odd for police officers. The white officer introduced both of them and asked if I was the son of Ronald Hamilton. I nodded. At this he seemed troubled and he told me that they needed to talk to me. I let them come in and they did so hesitantly and sullenly, which lead me to fear the worst.
When we had sat down in the living room, the officer who had spoken before did so again, his lips dragging each word out of his mind. He told me that my father had been in a car accident about ten minutes away. He had died. I looked into the speaker’s green, almost transparent eyes for an affirmation of his words. Had he really said the words I had gathered from his lips? I looked over at the other officer who seemed as mute as myself and nodded his assertion. The first officer told me he was hit by a car and that the other driver had also died.
I buried my head in my hands and my mind went completely blank, but for this new, bizarre information which suddenly overwhelmed it. He could not be dead. It wasn’t right; it didn’t feel right. He would come as he always had. It wasn’t possible for him to be gone so suddenly. I prayed that it might all be a misunderstanding. After a length of time inexpressible, I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was the white officer standing before me. He asked if there was someone he could call, maybe an adult I trusted, who could be with me. Surely he did not understand, surely no one could really understand, that my father was all that I had. I nodded to the officer but did nothing more until he asked for the person’s number. I looked around a little and then down toward the floor effortlessly. The black officer, who was still sitting on the coach, asked for my name. I starred into his eyes for a moment and then down at the floor as before. Once again, my head slipped down into my arms and my mind into its muddled thoughts. But at length, I felt that hand on my shoulder again. This time it held a notepad and a pen. The officer told me to write down my friend’s number.
Taking the writing implements, I jotted down the Kirkpatrick’s last name and phone number with a shaky hand. The officer took out a cell phone and dialed. I closed myself off again, not caring enough to read his lips anymore.
When the James and his parents arrived, James looked at me with uncertainty for a moment. Then he walked slowly toward me and hugged me for a long time. We had never done that before, but neither had we ever needed to. His arms seemed to hold me tighter and tighter until he pulled back and looked at me with the same awkwardness he had originally. Mr. and Mrs. Kirkpatrick also hugged me and Mrs. Kirkpatrick wiped tears from my cheeks were her soft motherly hands, but this did not good since the tears were constantly being replaced. The police officers spoke with Mr. and Mrs. Kirkpatrick for a long time. It was not long before I lost the ability to focus on their lips and sat down on the floor against the wall, picking up a handful of sawdust which lay there and staring into it.
James sat down beside me and signed to me that he wished he knew what to tell me and what do, but he had no idea. Opening my fingers, I allowed the sawdust to drop softly to the ground until my hand was empty for signing. I told him all that I wanted was for him not to leave me. He signed that that would not happen and that I was going home with them that night.
There in the sawdust, I felt like such a child. It would seem that a seventeen-year-old could understand the concept of death, but though I told myself over and over that he was gone and nothing was ever going to be the same, I could not grasp the fact.
At least I knew he was heaven… That’s what Mr. Kirkpatrick told me in the kitchen of their home. He told me that my father was so full of God that it seemed everything he said or signed revolved around his God. I starred into Mr. Kirkpatrick’s eyes, remembering how often my dad had been on the subject of heaven. He had told me that was the reason we lived in a small house with only our basic needs covered—because earthly comforts would not matter in eternity. He had thought that the present was a pitiful thing to live for. After a while, Mr. Kirkpatrick turned away, perhaps feeling uncomfortable with being starred at for so long without any explanation.

After a dark and sleepless night, I got out of James’s bed into a rainy morning. James was still asleep on the floor in his room. I opened his door and went into the living room. After opening the window blinds, I sat down on the coach to watch the rain. It was only five o’clock and the house was still and dark. When I remembered that I had gone to bed at two, the long, painstaking night turned short with reality. I had known about my father’s death for seven hours. How was I going to live the rest of my life in this reality?
I told God that I needed my father, and I asked God why He had done this. How was I supposed to keep living without him? The raindrops drizzled gently down the window pane and I was left without answers in this eternal silence. Would I now have an eternal numbness as well? There, in that full house, I felt more alone than ever before.
Wanting to feel something, anything, any kind of touch or communication, I took my shirt off and went through the Kirkpatricks’ back door and out into their yard. The rain fell down on my face, arms, chest, and jeans. My feet sank down into the mud. My tears blended with the rain so that I did not have to be conscious of them. I told God that I needed Him. I didn’t even know what was going on. I just knew that He was all that I had. It seemed that the rain beating against me was God’s way of telling me that He with me. It was His response to my desperate pleas. I was like Mary, Lazarus’s sister, and God was crying over my pain. He was comforting me and assuring me that He had a plan even while I felt utterly numb. Raising my hands and closing my eyes, I surrendered myself to Him.
At length, I felt a hand on my shoulder. When I opened my eyes, I saw that James stood before me in pajama pants and a T-shirt, hold an umbrella. He asked me with hurried exaggerated signs what I was doing and if I wanted to get sick. I told him I didn’t care. But I followed him inside and stood on the rug by the backdoor with water dripping from me. He threw me a towel. He signed to me that he had looked all over the house for me until he thought I had gone gotten run over by a car. I told him I was seventeen years old and not about to go jump in front of a car. His response was that I was not mentally stable; it was six o’clock in the morning and I had just been standing out in the pouring rain. I looked down at my bare chest and Julie, James’s fifteen-year-old sister who was fixing cereal in the kitchen. I dried off and put my shirt back on. James asked me if I had brought another pair of pants. Of course I had. Why would I have gone out into the middle of a rainstorm if I had not brought another pair of pants? I wasn’t mentally unstable, I told him.
Mechanically, I went and changed into my other pair of jeans. When I went back into the kitchen where the entire Kirkpatrick family was scrambling through the refrigerator and cabinets for breakfast, I leaned against the wall and became like a statue. Mrs. Kirkpatrick asked me if I wanted something to eat or drink. I didn’t. Mr. Kirkpatrick asked me what they could do for me. Without hesitation, I told him I wanted to see the scene of the accident.

It was a horrifyingly ordinary place—a sharp bend in the road at the top of a hill. I had driven past it several times before. We pulled over at the place and Mr. Kirkpatrick explained to me what the police officers had told him. My father had been going one way while the other driver, who was probably drunk, had been going in the opposite direction. It seemed the other driver had been going much too fast and made no attempt to turn at the bend. My father had come around at the wrong moment.
I walked down the hill as my wound seemed fresh like the moment I had first heard the news of his death. As I came to the place where my father’s car was on its side against a tree, I peered over into the driver’s seat as in a hope to find my father there, though I knew his body had been removed long ago. I touched the steering wheel where he had touched it and took off the paper with the Bible verse he had most recently stuck to it. “Blessed are the pure in heart,” it read, “for they shall see God.” Then I touched some of the blood which was splattered on the driver’s seat. With the eerie feeling that he was truly gone slowly pouring into me, I stood there for a long moment. When at last everything had settled, I collapsed on my knees and sobbed.
On the drive back to the Kirkpatricks’ house, I leaned my face against the cool window pain and starred down at the road so that the rest of the world was a complete blur around me.
When the car stopped and I looked up, I saw Elizabeth’s car parked in front of the Kirkpatrick’s house. I glanced over at James who sat beside me in the backseat. He signed that he had told her. On entering the house I was greeted by a soft, soothing hug from Elizabeth. It felt so good that I did not let go for a while. But when I remembered James, I forced my arms to return to me and my eyes captured in Elizabeth’s eyes of sympathy. They were almost of empathy. Against the hideousness of the moment, Elizabeth looked more beautiful than ever. I told her I needed to talk to her and when I looked at James he left the room. I slid down onto the coach and, with a reluctance which conveyed no hurry to pull to pull reflections out of me, she sat down also.
I told Elizabeth that the night before I had felt a compulsion to deliver the guitar for my dad or at least to offer, but, for some reason, I hadn’t. And now it made all the difference. I wished that I had gone instead of him, that I had been thrust down that hill at eighty miles an hour and hurled into a tree to die on impact. It should have been me. It must have been the Holy Spirit prompting me to go. Surely I was the one who had been intended to die.
Elizabeth told me that what I was saying didn’t make any sense; that God wanted me to live; that God was incredibly power and that I was not capable of messing up His predetermined will; that He had a purpose for me.
When at last I responded I told Elizabeth that if I had been the one to die, my mom would have come back and my father could have been happy.
But Elizabeth signed that my father had loved me, and that now that he was in heaven he could not be doing any better. I was the one who felt the sting of this; he was in peace.
I though that what Elizabeth had told me was something close to what my father would have said, and when I thanked her, it seemed that my thanks could never make up for the things she had just told me. She could never know how much she meant to me.

The funeral came and went. In some ways, I was absent from it because I was surrounded by a strange numbness. I kept thinking that my mother would show up, that she would at least return after his death to the man who had earnestly desired her all his days. But if she had come, I would not have known what to do. In the end, there was no point in wondering. She probably did not even know that he was dead and that she missed forever the chance of earthly reconciliation.

Chapter 4: And Now to Live

In his will, my father had given everything over to me, which was plenty as we had been diligent savers and investors. In his will he had encouraged me to sell the house. I struggled over this request. Even though I did not want to live in the house by myself, to part with the house I had always lived in—the house that bore the aroma of everything that had been dear to me and that had been consistent for so long—seemed too much for me to handle. But at the same time, when I entered it, the memories were also too much for me and it made me crave even more strongly the things that I could never have again.
At school, nothing much changed. I was certain that some people knew what had happened as the rumor ran from certain lips to other lips about the “creepy,” silent guy whose father had died as if my story was part of a gothic work that no one could enter. However, the new girl in my Algebra class did tell me that she was sorry about my father. I responded with a smile and a nod before being separated from her by a mass of bodies sweeping us away in their currents in opposite directions.
I knew James and Elizabeth were not trying to push me out. It was just the natural flow of events as they inevitably blended more and more and I became more and more unlike them. After all these years of the three of us, now when we tried to do things together it became awkward. I suppose I finally came to admit to that deep part of me which had long been screaming out into the silence that Elizabeth was, after all, James’s girl. For a while that had been okay. She had been James and my girl, but when life and reality and growing up sets in, everything changes. When she was around James, she was radiant. She simply didn’t need me anymore.
While the Kirkpatrick family was kind and welcoming, there was something essential missing in my relationship with the family. In any healthy relationship, each party must have a need for the other and I had always sensed that, while I could be squeezed in to their family, it was only to the discomfort of all the other members. I could not be a beneficial part of their house for the Kirkpatricks, like all families I suppose, were bound together tightly like a living, breathing organism to which a member of a foreign unit could not graft itself into allowing the health of the organism as a whole to persist.
People looking on from the outside (for example, people from my church) may have thought I was getting along fine though because I was still in school, I still had the same friends, and I had found myself in a new family. I guess that is why no one else did anything about me. And there was nothing that they really could have done. But still, I felt that I was, whether intentionally or unintentionally, breaking away as a leaf does from a branch in season. The place to which I had become attached was not a place in which I fit. Here, nothing had need of me.
But, in all of this desperation, I began a determined search. All of my life I had been so accustomed to seeing my father feasting over his Bible. He hadn’t just read it; he had lived it and breathed it. The back porch at the Kirkpatricks’ house had become “my room” more than the room that I stayed in with James. There were so many things I needed to figure out and I could not do it alone, for when I tried, I felt all together directionless. So, I would often be out there on the porch playing guitar or staring into nowhere, seeking God, for it seemed He alone would always be there for me and He alone could make my life purposeful. For the first time in my life, I began reading my Bible like a starving man eats food, but it seemed the more I read, the more I had to keep reading. Also, for the first time, I began to truly love to spend time alone with God. My life before had been dull in comparison, marked by a few short-lived spiritual highs. Now, I finally understood the way my father had always felt toward God. Only with God did I fit and find meaning and purpose, and He was not connected to a particular person or family or school or city. With Him, I was free to do the things that He had lovingly purposed for my life.
The last time I walked into the house before it was no longer mine, the sawdust no longer covered the floor. There were new carpets and the walls were freshly painted. The table where I had often sat with my father was no longer there. The coach where we had played guitar had been given away. But still, I could smell the aroma of wood which had so long hung through out the place. I kept asking God where to go from here. I felt a peace, but no clear answer. This peace, this promise that He would direct me in His time, was enough for now.
Graduation came and our hats flew up in the air like our old lives. We were different now, all of us; we could not go on in the way which we always had. Three weeks later, James and Elizabeth were joined in a sacred, overwhelming matrimony. Mr. Kirkpatrick walked Elizabeth up the aisle to give her away to his own son. I was the best man. As I watched that beautiful girl be united to James, and as I watched their faces ignite with new hopes and adventures, I was torn inside. I licked my lips until they were horribly chapped. I knew God was telling me I had to leave this place soon; it was the only way that, through His help, I could hope to cease loving my best friend’s wife. I hated myself for my own jealousy on the happiest day of their lives.
As I continued to pray and seek God out, He began revealing Himself and His will. As this happened, I felt near to God in a way I had never known was possible before. Indeed, I felt I could go anywhere or do anything and His presence would be more than enough to get me through. I often rested in the silence of His presence for the sheer pleasure of it. And, sensing the direction of God, I purchased a bus ticket.
One day, though James had moved out, I thanked the rest of the Kirkpatricks for their kindness, for their compassion, for going out of their way to welcome me in. I went to James and Elizabeth’s apartment to look at them, laugh with them, and be with them. I went to the bank to draw out twenty dollars from my account and to the grocery store to buy a loaf of bread. That night, I played my guitar in James’s old room, staring out the window into the dark, unknown world. Then I laid the guitar down in its case with my Bible, the cash, and the loaf of bread. When I woke up the next morning, it was still like night. I left a note in the room which read: “Dear Kirkpatricks, I’ve gone to New York City to follow God’s lead. Love and best wishes to you all. Song Hamilton.”
It was a long walk to the bus station. With my guitar on my back, I felt lost and yet found, enslaved to Christ and, in this way, free. There was no way to imagine what lay ahead—the struggles, the heartache, the simple pleasures, the victories. But I knew this would be adventure on adventure and with God I knew I could do it. The night was still and expectant all about me. As I handed in my one-way-ticket and boarded the bus, I just begged that God might use me as He had promised. I put my guitar in the overhead compartment and sat down. I glanced at the characters around me—they looked like they were hurting beyond the hope of hope, like I had been, like I knew I would have been even now without the presence of God in my life. I asked that God might reveal His mercy to them, even through a mute man on a long bus ride. I looked out the window into the beautiful, mysterious darkness as the bus started off in to the unmistakable power and unknown mercies of the will of God.

Everything But This

2008-04-15T09:58:00.000-07:00

(This seems all to real and horrible to write about which is why I have hesitated a few weeks before displaying it, but it is with utmost respect that I do so, thanking God for those who are willing to give their all for freedom.)

Against this blazing, piercing sun, I cannot open up my eyes.
Against this deep resounding pain, I cannot open up my fists.
I have lost myself to everything but this.

I thought of my country as I aimed at foreign hearts;
I thought of freedom and courage and pride.
But now as I lay in grass and blood, all my eyes can see is home:
My brothers and sisters playing carelessly on an ordinary childhood day,
My father looking deep into my eyes and telling me I've made him proud,
My mother frying bacon like the morning before I left,
And that tender girl--I'm the only one she's ever kissed--
Who would be mine when I return from this sun and pain and blood.

And I'm grasping for a breath despite the bullet in my chest,
But I think I have run out at last.
Everyone has turned from me; everyone has gone.
I hear faintly sounds of choppers buzzing safely on...
Or is that the sound of death ringing in my ears?
My breath is gone; my friends have gone, my family, my girl...

Oneness

2008-03-19T21:35:00.000-07:00

Hands of vengeance turn to love my fragile heart.
With blood-stained arms You hold me through moon-dark night.
With fiercest strength You keep me as death-spears fly.
You speak my name and I know I am for You.
I speak Your Name through the night and cling for life.
Beneath these groans, we unite; we die and live.

Queenly on the Sidewalk

2008-02-28T09:07:00.000-08:00

This is poem about my great-grandmother written on December sixth. On the first of February, she went to heaven.

When we saw you last, my dad said
You should live to be a hundred
And I imprinted your picture on my mind
As you stood queenly on the sidewalk
And watched us drive on,
Your blood surging through my own veins,
Your legacy reaching into me
And out into pictures, words, and characters.
But as this monster now overtakes your mind,
I see you fade,
Your image growing dimmer in my mind,
As pictures, words, and characters grow more defined.
And I would plead to God for mercy,
But what if it is a monster of mercy in your mind,
And you grow dim here, but there you are defined--
In peace with Him, in love with Him,
Free from torments of the mind?

On Turning Eighteen

2008-02-23T19:53:00.000-08:00

Being eighteen does feel different. On past birthdays, people have asked, "So, how does it feel to be ___ years old?" But it didn't feel like anything. Being eighteen, however, bears consequences: I can vote, I can get my regular license, and, most significantly, I can work more than eight hours a day. I feel like it's time for me, by the power of God, to forget about myself and focus on others, to see people the way God sees people. I feel that if He has brought me all this way through childhood and kept me from many eminent dangers, He must have a plan and purpose for me. That blows me away. To think that through out the ages and places so many people have died in the womb or while they were but infants or toddlers, and to think that I have been preserved and trained thus far, just blows me away. Why me?

The motto for seventeen was : "We are seventeen; we are invincible." I don't know about this eighteen thing yet.

I've realized today that there are people who really care about me. Sometimes I forget that, but I couldn't today. My friends threw me a party and I was utterly shocked. The best part about it was not that we had fun, though we did, but just that they cared enough to take the time to do that for me. I was, as I said before, shocked. Then I checked facebook tonight and saw that sixteen people had wished me a happy birthday on my wall. I suppose it doesn't take a whole lot of effort to write on someone's wall, but it meant a great deal to me.

Thank you so much, God, for eighteen years! You have done for me inconceivably more than I can comprehend, and yet I am still so far from Your perfect image. Please draw me near to You and use me for "righteous purposes."

Mulatto Child

2008-02-19T09:27:00.000-08:00

When your tiny eyelids seperate, they make the way for dark, enchanting worlds,
Like the worlds that I gazed into when I fell in love.
In bundles I robe your cream-colored skin; in bundles I hold you in my white hands.
In you I see us blend, my light and simple life into his dark mystery.

Mighty Love (for 2-5-08)

2008-02-08T15:12:00.000-08:00

Do not be afraid, child, of the power in His hands.
Do not run away to be alone,
To sob in the back, trembling out your moments into days.
He gives you moments to gaze on Him; He gives days to praise.
He breaks that He might heal again
And grind your broken heart into Him.
He will make you strong, child; do not be afraid
To walk with a limp or to graze the grave
For his mighty hands reveal His mighty love.
Tonight, in this storm, as the roof pours down on your head,
He will gaurd you with His zealous mighty love.
He will guide you with His hands from the terror crashing in,
Out into the awesome depths and mighty hights of His love.

Unending Road For an Unanswered Question

2008-01-23T14:24:00.000-08:00

Gentle Savior, grant me passage down this long and narrow road.
I intend no turning back but to see how far it goes.
I dedicate my life to proving the length of Your love
And to loosing myself in the journey, myself in Your touch.
The question goes unanswered: How great is Your love?
I travel onward to discover with my belongings in the dust.
With every mile I desire another; this is the fullness of life.
With every mile, my spirit cries that on this road I want to die.
They may mark my grave a simple place along a simple bend,
But even so, I will travel down the road that never ends.

Raindrop Kisses

2008-01-14T12:16:00.000-08:00

When I listen close, when I remember who I am,
The world turns beautiful circles like a show of love.
Today, when I let go, everything starts to blend;
Sparrows are but leaves with wings that continue into spring.
Now I beg You hold me close; show me who You are
For others boast in one another and I must boast in who You are.
Here my Lover sends me feathers; He paints the sunset pink.
Here my Lover speaks my name in the voice of boisterous wind.
And here I am: I'm sick today and I must go to work.
And here my lover comes again; He gives me strength to work.
He plants kisses on my cheeks with raindrops, kisses on my lips.
He spreads joy across my face in this, His dark and perfect day.

This January Wind

2008-01-14T12:10:00.001-08:00

This January wind breathes a gap into my chest--
This searing pain of emptiness feeding on my bones.
I fumble through the crowd of faces and fumble on for breath
And to the ignition to feel the heat, but I am still alone.
Please breathe in me deeper than this January wind.
Please touch me past the warmth coming through these vents.
Take my hand in Your hand; hold me close tonight.
And when the sun returns, do not leave my side.
Let this peircing January be like
The zeal I long to have inside.
And let the warmth from these vents
Be like the comfort when we blend.

Feeding the Flame

2008-01-14T12:04:00.000-08:00

"What are these among so many?"
What is this life in the raging crowd?
All the clamour slamming 'round me
Would snuff this sacred silence out.
As miracles drip from Your fingertips
I place my life into Your hands
For good intentions melt to nothing
When I am found without Your plan.
Lift up my sacrifice and bless it
For this is all I have to give.
Spread the fire of Your Spirit
Through the desert where I live.
Don't let me live and die for nothing;
Don't let this body go whole to the ground,
But in Your mighty hands please break me
And spread Your flaming word around.

Darkness Breathes

2007-12-28T09:18:00.000-08:00

Darkness breathes the coming of a new and different day
In which we know we will not be the same.
So we knock down our army men by battles rows
And lay aside our baby dolls and our dress up clothes.
We study like Trojans, like it's all we have,
And when we stop to socialize, the fun turns us mad.
We learn how to get by from fix to fix
As we work the game of Pick-Up-Shifts.
For this we were not born it seems,
But oddly in these molds we feel free.
And in order to get to tomorrow's light,
We must be diligent through the night.
And we may as well lift our hands in praise
To the God who brings us through the change.

2007-12-25T12:54:00.000-08:00

I feel a great peace. It seems everything I do can be done directly unto God, and if I find that it cannot, I can quit doing it. The things I have to do I was made to do. For instance, it seems I cannot but write, as if I was created to create. It's a joyous thing to rest in. At times in my life I have felt to do what I loved was contrary to God's will, but I think that is usually legalism. Currently, when I read God's Word, I feel like I'm sitting in His lap, listening to Him speak. It's amazing. And in my relationships, I feel utter excitement right now, as if I am the most blessed person in all the world. I must be.

The New Identity

2007-12-17T07:39:00.000-08:00

(Here at last is the final poem in the series that began with "Observations of a Little Girl" and continued with "For Fear of Beauty," "The Mirror Tells It All," and "Glimpses.")

All my life I have chased a dream of who I want to be,
But the dream turns to wind and I'm left with only me.
All my life I've lost myself in the mirror's weary face--
The tear-streaked eyes, the hardened mouth, the unpenetrated glaze.
I have tried to be rustic; I have tried to be strong.
My life has been a masquerade, and unfelt, dreary song.
Despite the closets where I live with the secrets that I hide,
I was never meant to live alone: I was made to be a bride.
And somehow in my dark domains, I feel this in my bones,
But I have not yet opened up, for fear that I'll still be alone.
From my closet, from my cell, I hear a voice ring through:
"You are mine, chosen long ago; and now I've come for you."
A gentle voice met with gentle hands and eyes that see my heart,
Come rescue me from empty dreams; come rip this mask apart.
Now I unchain this beauty; now I set her free.
Oh God, let me loose myself in Your identity.

2007-12-10T16:40:00.000-08:00

Man of passion, take my hand; lead me to your hidden land.
Man of wisdom, here I wait; it grows harder with each day.
Man of valor, show your might; I am ever on your side.
Man of worship, fall in line; He's your Lord like you are mine.
Man of courage, praise His Name, through all failures, through all gain.
Man of scripture, listen close; lead me closer to our Hope.
Man of kindness, don't let go; hold me close until we're old.

Healing Hands

2007-11-09T13:19:00.000-08:00

When I realized that it was still the middle of the night, I knew something must be wrong with me. But You don't sleep. So, walking across the cold floor in three rediculous layers of socks, I crawled up into Your lap. "Daddy, I'm sick. Will you heal me, please?" You ran Your fingers through my long hair, placed kisses on my forehead, and touched my stumache, from whence came the pain. I rested my head against Your chest for a long, long time in agonizing bliss 'til at long last I fell asleep. You healed me in a better way.

I Met Her in the Forest

2007-11-04T09:26:00.001-08:00

I met her in the forest and found her blood was green,
Her eyes always speaking, her voice seldom heard.
I crowned her like a tree and made her my queen.

I met her in the forest, her hair a golden vine,
Her smile rays of light, her laugh rustling leaves,
We blended like the dirt and she told me she was mine.

Between

2007-11-04T09:19:00.000-08:00

This is something; pink clouds greet me all down the sidewalk.
I know this place--up that way is the high school,
Down the hill is the elementary. In between is
The steady roar of traffic, the steady moving of feet.

At the top of my street, I used to look down
To imagine myself in London. But trees have grown up
Between the houses now, sprinkled with squirrels.

I know this place--the pencil tight in my hand,
My heart going crazy with emotion, my mind with words.
I am everywhere and anywhere, even away from the sidewalk
On the road between two schools. Adventure on adventure.
Pink clouds in Africa. How is it that I feel so close to God
When I walk, when I write, when I dream?

Midnight Lullaby

2007-10-23T15:32:00.000-07:00

Lights are cast across the far wall, starting at one side and racing across to the other to dissapear into the corner; distant sirens shriek; cars rage; horns clamour. These are the background sights and sounds set off by the steady rain tonight.

The raindrops hit the window pain like hundreds of spills which are either rejoiced over or mulled over, but never rebuked. And if the Rainsender brought an end to the tiny spills, even the mullers would cry out for rain. These spills are not the kinds which need not cleansing. Rather, they are cleansing. They are healing, replenishing, creating. The sound of their spattering against the window pane is the sound of so many proclamations of the Rainsender's longsuffering. But this, too, becomes background noise, like the pleas of sirens, the roaring of motors, the yelling of horns, which once meant something to me. The raindrops become the fourth part, the harmony of this midnight lullaby.

I think I am asleep, resting in the palm of the Rainsender's hand, which has become to me so consistent that I think nothing of His stroking my hair in the night, and planting kisses on my kneck. I just rest, as lights races across my visage to display the peaceful expression there.

Only Grace

2007-10-11T14:29:00.000-07:00

I have no rights, only priveledges.

Sleep cannot be lost, only gained.

God is not unreasonable for sending people to hell, only unfathomably merciful for allowing to be into His heaven.

The Battle of Night

2007-09-29T08:07:00.000-07:00

So close I hold him that I feel his warmth
And I feel his receiving from me
Until his tiny eyes give way to dreams.
I lay him down and wrap him tightly in the arms of night.
Are you warm tonight, my love?

The dishes are all put away; the spotless floor is shining
Lonsomely in the firelight; nothing calls for mending.
Glancing over at the bed, I think I may half fill it,
But the emptiness of the one side does not lure me to it.
Where are you tonight, my love?

The window seal is my rest for now,
Though it's cold as the snow drifts slowly down,
Unseen in the emptiness of night.
As my eyes beging to close, black night turns to crimson.
Are you well tonight, my love?

You said you would go for our rustic, sweet domain,
For your love, for our child, for all the world to come,
And as courage filled your eyes, mingling with tears,
You said that you would go for our Lord.
Are you in the arms of earth tonight or with our Lord, my love?

The Undeciphered Seals

2007-09-26T07:22:00.000-07:00

Here in Harappa, words are kindled like fires and then they die
Like undeciphered seals on the grave stones of time.
And if this is only the beginning, then what will be the end?
If we never join the fight, then how can we hope to win?
For we wake up and we work and we try not to think
For fear that we might start to put together the links
And remember that our lives are as fleeting as rainshowers,
As wayfaring men, as coinage, as fires, as flowers.
Though they're here and now they're gone, forever they'll be
Engrained on the the earth as long as earth stands eternitiy.
But here in Harappa, we will try not to think of all this,
But remain in our labor, our order, our agonizing bliss.

First Fall Breath

2007-09-12T12:50:00.000-07:00

In this morning light, the ground glistens bold like chrystal
With dew so thick and air so cold and clean.
If you were here we might make angels in the dew,
Resting in the grass, hair mingled in the blades, soaking up the sun,
With the turquois sky above, empty and yet full.
All the storms have left behind this kind and care-free aura,
This long awaited gift--to dance in the first chill of fall!

My mind replays those childhood days,
Running through dew up to my knees--
It all returns in the moment's crisp domain.
If you were here, this morning might cast its spell over us,
But I know those days can never be again.

So I breathe in this first fall breath
And then exhale in praise
For the fall days of yesteryear,
This blanket of memory,
This blanket of dew in the morning light.

2007-09-10T17:17:00.000-07:00

"For the LORD spake thus to me with a strong hand, and instructed me that I should not walk in the way of this people, saying,
Say ye not, A confederacy, to all them to whom this people shall say, A confederacy; neither fear ye their fear, nor be afraid.
Sanctify the LORD of hosts himself; and let him be your fear, and let him be your dread."

--Isaiah 8:11-13

Glimpses

2007-09-01T07:47:00.000-07:00

(A sequel to "The Mirror Tells It All")

I've been watching you for some time,
Glimpsing at the beauty hidden in your eyes,
Tortured until she cannot be recognized,
And then seized with ease and buried alive.

You were not meant to live this way,
With your flowing hair locked away,
Your heart encaged and enslaved,
Monotonously pounding out its days.

But I promise you that beauty is truely kind,
And if you'll dig her up, you can come back to life.
See, God, in His wisdom, has made you a girl
And has plans for you to change the world,
Not in the ways of guns and knives,
But with your beauty deep inside,
With the gentle power in your veins,
Your tender courage, your quiet ways.

But as you open up your life completely to Him,
You must open the casket which your beauty lies within.

In the Image of God

2007-08-29T14:46:00.000-07:00

It's sickening--the things people say about humankind, to the point that I must pity every speaker for, from their twisted, horrifying viewpoint, I don't understand how they keep living. It's gross to conceive that we are forms of animals, that we have slowly evolved into what we are. Is this idea not a high price to pay in order to claim that there is no God and that we owe ourselves and our lives to no one? Perhaps, from the standpoint of evolution, we "have ourselves" and we can do "whatever we want," but there is no point in life at all. In dismissing God, everything is dismissed--joy, peace, fullfillment, art, beauty. It is as if we close our eyes and imagine that we have altered ourselves to fit life, when really we have been created with God's purpose in mind. He made us like we are so that we might carry out His will, and apart from this there is no real joy.

"In the image of God created He him: male and female, created he them." That makes me so excited to be alive!

Sorry, I'm just frustrated with that bit of stuff at the beginning of World Civ. marked as "Prehistory."

Mutant of Maintstream Chapter 1 (A Revision)

2007-08-25T14:47:00.000-07:00

This is a revision of the first chapter I posted a while ago. I would love to get your feedback. Never fear; there truely is a second chapter.

Chapter 1: The Workmanship

I was searching, as a snake wandering through the wilderness, but unsure exactly what I was searching for. Everyday, I received just what I needed from the hands of God in order to keep going, learning, and trusting. I had no idea what I was in for the spring of my junior year in high school, the trail that God had predestined for me to follow in order to bring me slowly, ever into his likeness.
Near the beginning of the semester, a meeting with the principal of the school loomed over my head. With everything in my being, I dreaded it, praying the meeting would be canceled or that I would get sick, but as the time neared and neither of my prayers were answered, I just asked God for wisdom that I might know how to respond to the principal, Mr. Rummers. His office was dark with a single dim lamp casting shadows across his face. In fact, the shadow of his glasses left his eyes hard to see and his lips hard to read. He complained about my recent decline in grades. Having known this was coming, I was prepared with my defense. I wrote down on a piece of paper that I was only doing so poorly because I had stopped speaking. Since then, I had begun flunking oral exams and presentations, although I should have been flunking them all along because no one could understand me when I spoke. Mr. Rummers then tormented me with his dim lips and concealed eyes, urging me to keep trying to speak, and reminding me how far I had come with lip-reading (so that I didn’t even need an interpreter for my classes), and assuring me that just such a thing could happen with my speech. However, Mr. Rummers, sitting back in his desk chair, with an immovable expression plastered across his face like a fortress which separated his world from mine, had no way of imagining what a monster speech could be. He had never known the feeling of doing away with it, as if chaining a vicious monster to a stake and setting it on fire. It was wonderful. But Mr. Rummers let me know that if I did not learn to speak, my life would be basically useless. Against these harsh ideas, I tried to copy his expression, to set my face like flint with no emotion, but the pain boiling inside of me was torture to mask. I feared the principal could see right through me.
When I was dismissed, the soft wind of the outside world greeted my face, cooling all that had boiled inside of me. My father had been waiting for me in the lone car in the parking lot. I used my natural means of communication—American Sign Language—to convey to him what Mr. Rummers had told me. But my father seemed to think little of Mr. Rummers’s concerns, signing to me that, as the Bible says, I was God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God had before ordained that I should walk in them. In comparison with God’s viewpoint, the speculations of my school principal were unimportant.
So, with my hope battled on against despair and my faith against doubt, I rested my head against the vibrating car window as my father drove us home. The feeling of uselessness was always chasing and taunting me and it was only further fueled by Mr. Rummers remarks. I cried out to God in the constant silence of my mind, pleading that He might take me and what little I had to offer and use me for His glory in order to accomplish His purpose.
Home was a small, ordinary-looking place, crammed into a neighborhood with miniscule yards. No flowers adorned the bushy garden outside—no flowers dancing like little, bright fairies in the wind to signify individuality or profess to passers-by of a feminine heart within the home’s brick walls. Yet this place welcomed us through the garage and into the kitchen. Once inside, the aroma of wood greeted me and I welcomed it gladly, for to me it was the scent of peace, work, and stability. Though the house held little furniture and few luxuries, there was no place I would have preferred to return to after that painstaking meeting with Mr. Rummers than this simple place.
Walking through the sawdust which covered the floor, I got a glass of water and sat down at the kitchen table, while my father turned on some music, sat down on the couch in the living room, and fashioned guitar parts. In my own silent world, I endeavored to focus my freshly wounded mind on American History, forcing myself to think in terms of questions, blanks, and complete sentence answers.
In the course of an hour, however, I had moved from a world of words to a world of wood, sitting on the opposite side of the couch from my father, gluing guitar parts together. My father and I worked intently without much signing—for our hands and eyes were preoccupied with the wood. This was the tranquil community we shared, sanctified from the clamor of the world outside. Though the world cut at us and abandoned us, this was our haven of healing.
At six o’clock, we washed the sawdust and wood glue from our hands and began making a dinner characteristic of us—one which combined rice, chilly, and which ever spices appeared most tasteful to us at the time. Above the steaming pans on the oven, we signed leisurely about making guitar deliveries, things going on at our church, and interesting facts I had learned at school that day.
I told my father that I was invited to James’s house the following night along with Elizabeth. The three of us—James, Elizabeth, and I—were the only deaf students at our school, and we had been close friends since the deaf school we had begun in, with the focus and the end thereof being public, mainstream education. Still, as high school students, and James about to graduate, we stuck together through the currents, all of us inefficient communicators. James, who had lost his hearing at the age of five, could talk decently, but was not a lip-reader; I, having lost my hearing at three, could read lips, but had given up on speech; and Elizabeth, who was born deaf, could neither speak nor read lips. These “flaws” were evident to everyone, leading to our ostracism by the hearing students. To befriend one of us was to deface oneself, and it had been this way since grade school. We, the few, the deaf, though tragically unconformable, were still lost in the mad rush of the mainstream. Only, we all knew we could not end were everyone else was ending. We were different.
After dinner, my father and I pulled out two of our handcrafted guitars. My father began strumming some chords in the key of F. Noting this, my fingers drifted into picking solo notes up and down the frets and strings. The feeling of the wood, smooth beneath my finger, and the steel strings, pliable to my touch, indulged me. I lost myself in the vibrations. After a while, with my fingers still moving, I looked up into my father’s deep, brown eyes. Perhaps the darkness of his eyes drove many people away from him, but it welcomed me in. His hair was dark brown also and curly. A short, unkempt beard surrounded his face providing him with a rustic appearance. My eyes dropped down to his moving fingers, which were also rustic with work and practice so that looking at them caused respect and pride to grow in my heart. Certainly, we were not a typical family, but we loved what we had—what we had been given of God.

As one fighting the ocean current, I struggled through the crowded hall at school the next morning, toward my locker. It was 6:55. If I did not get to homeroom by 7:00, I knew the teacher would take pleasure in mocking me before the entire class. She did it to everyone who was late, but she always found more to ridicule me about.
When I was near my locker, I saw Elizabeth surrounded by a group of students. The students’ mouths were moving rapidly and Elizabeth, unable to read lips, was simply trying to find a way past them. Because I knew exactly what the students were saying, my urgency to get to class instantly evaporated as my emotions suddenly boiled in anger. I pushed through the group of students which enclosed Elizabeth, conscious that this action had thrown at least one person to the ground. Putting my arm around Elizabeth, I broke through the other side of the group. Without looking back to see the damage I had caused, I walked with Elizabeth to her homeroom, my arm around her securely, until she sat down at her desk.
When she thanked me, respect revealed itself through her eyes. And as I turned to find myself lost again in the ocean of the hallway, working my way back to my locker, I could still see Elizabeth’s relieved face in my mind, her weak smile, her sparkling eyes, her blonde, wavy hair. She was a sort of angelic princess, always there in the corner of my mind, and it was my duty and privilege to protect her. The look she had given me which said that she needed and trusted me was well-worth what I knew was coming when I entered homeroom at 7:05.
As I took my seat at the front of the class, the teacher put on a sarcastic smile and, through it, asked me what had happened. She started with questioning about the little things, remarking that perhaps I had forgotten to set my alarm, or enjoyed my shower to much. But eventually she came to sharper ideas, saying perhaps my girlfriend had broken up with me, and that was what made me late, as pleasure in her own wittiness lit her face. Even when I started to write something down, she stopped me, telling me this was not writing class and that she wanted an answer. With a smile still plastered across her face, she said she sensed a lack of respect at my not answering her. It was utterly mortifying. Though I could not hear the laughter, I could sense it, which was probably worse. I forced myself to faze out completely and asking God to give me patience and a sound mind, to be “slow to anger and abounding in love,” as Paul puts it, as anything else would end me in detention.

When I arrived at James’s house that night, I was greeted first by his two youngest sisters, Jessica and Jenna, who swarmed me with hugs and then skipped hastily away into the kitchen. The aroma of lasagna coming from the place of their retreat made me want to follow them, but I forced myself momentarily ignore the smell and look for James.
As I neared the den of their house, it seemed to nearly vibrate as James’s two brothers, lay on top of him, wrestling with him. When James saw me enter the room, he flung his brothers off onto the ground. He then signed to me, thanking God I had come to save him from Joseph and Jared. After looking over at the twelve-year-old and eleven-year-old, I responded by signing that I did not think us a good match for them. Joseph and I against James and Jared looked fairer. But James let me know he did not think that was an even match either, reminding me of his being four inches taller and thirty pounds heavier than me. I assured him, however, the odds were in my team’s favor, though I did not explain how. The younger boys were eager to begin. So, without a signal or the establishment of any rules, we slammed into each other, shoving, pulling, twisting, struggling, persevering, drawing back, then slamming again.
When Elizabeth walked into the room, everyone saw her, but no one stopped. James clearly became more desperate to get the upper hand after her entrance, but I also became more resistant to his taking it.
Suddenly, Joseph and Jared drew back. We signed to them, asking what had happened, and they replied that it was time for dinner. Though we were all panting from striving and sweat was dripping down our faces, all of our former efforts were instantly of no importance. We greeted Elizabeth as if we had just noticed her entrance. James kissed her cheek and placed his sweaty arm around her as we went into the dining room.
At the Kirkpatrick house, each person spoke and signed simultaneously, although James was the only deaf member of the family. Tonight, the mood around the table was light and refreshing after the tedious week of school, with the bright prospects of the weekend before us. I was intrigued by Jessica’s determined efforts to cut her own lasagna despite the offers of everyone at the table, not knowing she had already received offers, volunteering to cut it for her. James, who worked for his father’s company, was discussing a work situation with his father, as Elizabeth watched with interest. Julie, James’s fourteen-year-old sister, was telling her mom about being offered drugs at school that day. The four youngest children were too caught up in eating for making much conversation, although at intervals they would burst out with some nugget of information. I sat slowly taking in the food, looking from person to person in the warmth of the atmosphere, enjoying my feeling of invisibility for as long as it might last.
After dinner, we played an aggressive game of “Spoons.” The game is not solely about skill; it has much to do with one’s degree of viciousness as well. So, it was not surprising that James and Joseph were the ones to make it to the last round. At that point, the game is only luck. Joseph won, by chance.
When James, Elizabeth and I were in James’s room later that evening, James made a point to ridicule my poor skills at the game of “Spoons.” But Elizabeth stood up for me, reminding James that I was probably a wonderful guitar player, though the two of them couldn’t know, and that I at least looked cool when I played. Elizabeth and I looked at each other, smiling like two siblings might when they find themselves on the same side of a conflict. James reminded me of how weird Elizabeth’s grandmother thought I was when we were little kids and all I ever did was play guitar, despite my being deaf. I did not remember that. When I thought of Elizabeth’s grandmother, Mrs. Anderson, I could think of nothing but raking her yard for her in the fall and her repaying us with chocolate chip cookies and telling us stories about child-eating monsters. We asked Elizabeth how her grandmother was doing and she told her grandmother was doing very poorly, almost to the point of having to go into a nursing home. I, who had had no idea that things were so bad, looked away, ashamed I had not asked about Mrs. Anderson more recently.
If Mrs. Anderson went into a nursing home before Elizabeth graduated, James told me that Elizabeth would move in with his family for her senior year. At that time, James would have a full time position with his father’s company. After that, we all knew what was going to happen—James and Elizabeth were going to get married, get their own house, and start their own family. Though their anticipation seemed to grow as the time drew closer, that night the idea remained like the moon seen through the window, neither spoken of nor reached for, but present, still, in its resplendence.
I, on the other hand, faced the future without direction. Perhaps, after I graduated, I would go to college or perhaps I would simply become a luthier like my father and put in more hours in the workshop at home. Honestly, I would be content with anything, as long as God would place me in His will.

The Mirror Tells It All

2007-08-25T14:34:00.000-07:00

(A sequel to "For Fear of Beauty")

When I look in the mirror, I'm met with sagging lips and swollen eyes.
Nothing fascinates me long; nothing brings me back to life.

I've become so tired of this:
The river surges past, beckoning me, but I cling like a branch to its tree.
The river wants to set me free, but I'm stuck in individuality.

I know I was not made for this:
To be a ghost, chained and controlled, untended and ungrown.
To be a figure still and cold, untouched and unknown.

I hate who I've become:
The hesitant, unreachable girl, without a smile, without a twirl,
With empty dreams to change the world, locked away in a dresser drawer.

When I look in the mirror, it's like looking through a window
Into a deep and dead place in the shadows of my soul.

For Fear of Beauty

2007-08-22T08:33:00.000-07:00

(A sequel to "Observations of a Little Girl")

What is this yearning deep inside of me?
What is this beauty begging to be set free,
Continually screaming out my name,
But seldom heard from her prison chains?

She says if I will loose her bonds, take her hand, lead her out,
She will show me happiness, love, and what I'm all about.
She tells me the two of us will be the best of friends,
That she will secure a place for me in the world I'm in.

What is this yearning deep inside of me?
What is this beauty begging to be set free,
Combating with that familiar tone
Which urges me to be my own.

It tells me beauty will buy from me everything I love,
And then stock me with amusing, but unfullfilling stuff.
It tells me beauty will enslave me just like all of them,
Make me pleasing on the outside, but rotting from within.

What is this yearning deep inside of me?
What is this beauty begging to be set free?

I'll leave her barred in the prison where I will not often see her face,
For fear that she will grab me there and crush me in her embrace.

Observations of a Little Girl

2007-08-21T10:04:00.000-07:00

My sisters play with barbie dolls
Clothed in latest trends from latest malls.
They play with plastic crowns and heels,
With made-over faces and lofty ideals.

My brothers play with army men,
With sweat and blood to beat their friends.
They play with fake guns and swords
To slay the dragons and save the world.

My mother's friends sit and talk
To see if they can amuse and shock.
They speak about their little girls,
Sweet and small with proper rules.
And they laugh about their little boys,
Always finding new and dangerous toys.
Then they redicule their husbands' lives,
Since they are like boys with real guns and knives,
Since they are always holding back their wives
From treating money like paper just to dress nice.

But here I sit in the middle of the house,
Pondering inside and looking about,
Not caring at all for girls' plastic heels,
Their barbie dolls and lofty ideals.
I don't want to grow up like my mother's friends
Sitting and gossiping about their men.
I want to change the world, and then,
As I stare in wonder at the men,
I know I cannot be like them
Because I'm not like that deep within.

Oh God, how can I change the world,
Since You've made me a little girl?

Lament of Leaves

2007-08-13T12:22:00.000-07:00

We came to life with the spring;
It gave us hope, it gave us rain,
And we danced in it's breeze,
Contented servants in our chains.

We desire drink now, but the skies have become iron,
Leaving us without music, without tears to cry,
Like prisoners to the branches,
Yearning, burning for an end of summertime.

Come, Autumn, come to cut and set us free,
To entrap us in your wind and guide us with your breeze.
Come, Autumn, come, that we may kiss the ground,
To be there forever lost and there forever found.

Mutant of Maintstream Chapter 1: The Workmanship

2007-08-07T14:05:00.000-07:00

A Note About ASL

Because ASL (American Sign Language) has its own grammar rules and sentence structure and is dependent on facial expressions and body language, it is impossible to write it in English just as it is signed. When reading the signed communication in this story, imagine it as a translation from ASL into English—and not a translation of words, but of concepts. The characters are communicating to each other what is printed, but they are doing it in a different way.

Chapter 1: The Workmanship

“I know you can do better than this, Lance,” were Mr. Rummer’s stony words. “You’ve gone from Bs to Fs. Could you please give an explanation for the change in your performance?”
My hearted thudded like the ground when it is bombed over and over again, as I stared into the man’s bleak, grey eyes overlaid with large, thick glasses. Taking a notepad and a pen from my pocket, I wrote: “I was not doing any better when I was making Bs. The teachers probably pitied me then. But ever since I quit trying to talk, I’ve been flunking oral exams and presentations. The truth is, I should have been flunked before because no could understand me.”
After looking at the note I had written, Mr. Rummer responded, “So basically, you’re failing because you’ve given up.”
“I’ve become realistic,” I wrote.
“If you wanted to enough, you could speak. Just stop worrying about what other people think. If you want your life to count for something, you can’t go on in fear.”
“I’ve been trying my entire life. I just can’t talk well.”
“When you were younger, you probably never imagined being able to read lips as well as you can now. You don’t even need an interpreter in your classes. If you keep trying, you could get just as good at speaking. The only way to fail is to give up.”
“I’m finished trying, Mr. Rummer.”
“Don’t you want to go to college, Lancen?”
“Maybe.”
“Well, don’t you at least want to make a difference? I mean, what’s the point of living and breathing, if you’re not contributing anything to the world?”
I looked away instinctively with my body shuddering against the bombs constantly landing in my chest. Though I had amunition of my own, begging to be used, I kept it tucked tightly inside me.
“Is there anything else we need to discuss?” Mr. Rummers questioned.
“No sir,” I jotted down hurriedly.
“Then you’re free to go.”
As I left the room, a refreshing breeze greeted my burning face. I walked down the hall, through the door, and into the majestic sunshine. Breathing deeply, I went the short distance from the school building to the lone car in the parking lot. I got in on the passenger’s side and sat down.
“How was it?” my father signed to me from the driver’s seat.
I shuddered again upon the remembrance of the dark office from which I had come. “The principal said I’m never going to amount to anything or do the world any good if I can’t talk,” I signed back. “And I can’t talk. So basically…”
“But he’s wrong of course,” my father’s hands responded, “God has an incredible plan for you, Song. He sees so much in you. You are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works which God hath before ordained that you should walk in them. It doesn’t really matter what the principle of the school thinks you’re capable of doing!”
“Yes, I know.”
My father started the ignition. Leaning my head against the car window, I prayed, God, I trust You. I don’t have anything else to rely on. Please take my life and let it count for something. Let it bring You glory.
When at last we came to a neighborhood with all of the houses packed tightly together and separated by miniscule yards, we pulled into the driveway of a house with no flowers adorning the outside. It may have seemed a bit uncared for by visitors, perhaps the kind of house one would ring the doorbell, expecting a man to answer dressed only in a bath towel, with a half shaven face. But this same place beckoned us through the garage door and into the kitchen. Upon entering, the fragrance of wood entered my nostrils. I welcomed it heartily, for to me it was the very fragrance of passion, labor, and stability. Though our house held few luxuries when compared with most American homes, there was nowhere I would have preferred to come back to after the painstaking meeting with Mr. Rummers than this place.
Walking through the sawdust which covered the floor, I got a glass of water and sat down at the kitchen table, while my father turned on some music, sat down on the couch in the living room, and fashioned guitar parts. In my own silent world, I endeavored to focus my freshly wounded mind on American History, forcing myself to think in terms of questions, blanks, and complete sentence answers.
In the course of an hour, however, I had moved from a world of words to a world of wood, sitting on the opposite side of the couch from my father, gluing guitar parts together. My father and I worked intently without much signing—for our hand and eyes were preoccupied with the wood. This was the tranquil community we shared, sanctified from the clamor of the world outside. Though the world cut at us and abandoned us, this was our haven of healing.
At six o’clock, we washed the sawdust and wood glue from our hands and began making dinner. “Dad,” I signed, “can I go hang out at James’s house tomorrow night?”
“Sure. Do you want to take the car?”
“If it’s alright.”
“That will be fine. I don’t have any deliveries to make tomorrow. How is that rice coming?”
“It’s getting there.”
“Will it just be you and James tomorrow night?”
“His family will be there… and Elizabeth.”
“You’re going to make sure James and Elizabeth behave, I guess?”
“Yeah, basically.”
“Alright, you can add the rice to the chilly now.”
After eating a meal characteristic of us, we pulled out two of our hand crafted guitars. My father began strumming some chords in the key of F. Noting this, my fingers drifted into picking solo notes up and down the frets and strings. The feeling of the wood, smooth beneath my finger, and the steel strings, pliable to my touch, indulged me. I lost myself in the vibrations. After a while, with my fingers still moving, I looked up into my father’s deep brown eyes. Perhaps the darkness of his eyes drove many people away from him, but it welcomed me in. His hair was dark brown also and curly and a short, unkempt beard surrounded his face providing him with a rustic appearance. My eyes dropped down to his moving fingers, which were also rustic with work and practice so that looking at them caused respect and pride to grow in my heart. Certainly, we were not a typical family, but we loved what we had—what we had been given of God.

As one fighting the ocean current, I struggled through the crowded hall at school the next morning, toward my locker. It was 6:55. If I did not get to homeroom by 7:00, I knew the teacher would take pleasure in mocking before the entire class—She did this to everyone who came late, bust she always found more to ridicule me about.
When I was near my locker, I saw Elizabeth surrounded by a group of students. Though the students’ mouths were moving rapidly and I knew exactly what they were saying, Elizabeth could not read lips. My urgency to get to class instantly evaporated as my emotions suddenly boiled in anger. I pushed through the group of students which enclosed Elizabeth, conscious that this action had thrown at least one person to the ground. Putting my arm around Elizabeth, I broke through the other side of the group. With out looking back to see the damage I had caused, I walked with Elizabeth to her homeroom, my arm around her securely.
“Are you okay?” I signed to her, after she had sat down at her desk.
“Yes. Thank you, Lance,” she signed back, as appreciation and respect revealed themselves through her eyes.
“Anytime,” I responded, turning swiftly and finding myself lost again in the ocean of the hallway. But as I worked my way back to my locker, I could still see Elizabeth’s relieved face in my mind, her weak smile, her sparkling eyes, her blonde, wavy hair. She was a sort of angelic princess, always there in the corner of my mind, and it was my duty and privilege to protect her. The look she had given me which said that she needed and trusted me was well-worth what I knew was coming when I entered homeroom at 7:05.
“What happened, Lancen?” the teacher’s lips read as I took my seat at the front of the class. “Let me guess: You forgot to set your alarm. No? You really enjoyed your shower this morning? I suppose it’s worth it to get a tardy for something that important. Oh, no, I know: Your girlfriend broke up with you?”
I started to write something down, but she stopped me.
“This is not writing class, Lancen. I want an answer.”
God, I can’t even answer for myself. She might as well just shoot me on the spot and save me this mortification, I prayed. But thank you that at least I don’t have to hear everyone laughing right now.
“I sense a lack of respect,” the teacher said.
I knew I could close my eyes and block out all that was happening around me, but that would do no good. So, I waited eagerly until the subject changed.

“So, I said, ‘Man, I don’t know what you’re saying. I’m deaf,’” James signed on Friday night. “And then, he just kept talking. So, I went and got my dad who told me the guy was asking me how I could talk if I couldn’t read lips. I was thinking, ‘Maybe it’s because I live in Memphis with people like you who don’t open their mouth when they speak.’”
“But he didn’t say that,” signed James’s father, Mr. Kirkpatrick.
“No, I didn’t say that.”
“Customer service isn’t your calling, is it James?” I signed.
“He’s great at stocking though,” Mrs. Kirkpatrick immediately responded in defense.
“He’s our companies best,” added Mr. Kirkpatrick.
At this, the younger members of the dinner party instantly joined in the admiration of their oldest brother. “It’s because he’s so strong,” spoke the seven-year-old, Jenna, as she signed.
“Yeah, he’s strong,” copied Jessica, the five-year-old.
If I had remembered that James’s huge fan club sat before me, perhaps I never would have commented on his customer service skills. Even James laughed at his family’s avid admiration.
But Elizabeth, with her blue eyes glowing, smiled and signed, “They’re right.” Then her hand disappeared beneath the table, no doubt to be caught up in James’s hand.
Mrs. Kirkpatrick got up from her seat, gathering plates from around the table. Julie, the fourteen-year-old, helped her mother. They both vanished into the kitchen and when they emerged again, Mrs. Kirkpatrick spoke and signed, “So, let’s get this party started. What do ya’ll want to play?”
“‘Spoons!’” said Jared, the eleven-year-old, signing with large, repetitive movements.
“Yes, ‘Spoons,’” the twelve-year-old, Joseph, agreed with slower lips and more passive hands.
“No, no,” pouted Jessica, “I hate that game. I’m always the first one out.”
“Alright, calm down,” Mrs. Kirkpatrick interfered. “Let’s find out what our guests want to play.”
Elizabeth and I looked at each other and shrugged.
“I want to play ‘Go Fish,’” Jessica announced.
“But it’s not your decision,” Mrs. Kirkpatrick reminded her. “What do you think, James?” she asked Mr. Kirkpatrick.
“I think most everyone here is too old to enjoy ‘Go Fish.’ And we haven’t played spoons in at least two months. So, who’s up for spoons?”
Though the uproar was not loud enough for me to hear, I sensed a sudden rising of tension and commotion. It was settled. We began a long, aggressive game of ‘Spoons.’ Gradually, the table of ten dwindled down until the final two, James and Joseph competed in the championship. We all watched as Joseph got four of kind first and grabbed the one remaining spoon.
“You may be good at playing guitar, but you really suck at spoons,” James told me when he, Elizabeth, and I were in his room later that evening.
I laughed. “Yeah, too bad you and Elizabeth can’t even tell whether I’m a good guitar player or not.”
“Well, you look cool when you play,” Elizabeth commented.
“Thanks…”
“Do you remember when we were little, how Elizabeth’s grandmother used to make fun of you when you played guitar, Lance? She thought it was just weird that a deaf kid would play guitar.”
“I guess I was too focused on playing to look up and notice criticism back then. I just remember that we would rake her yard and she would pay us in chocolate chip cookies afterward and she would tell us those weird stories about child-eating monsters.”
“Oh, yeah, I could never forget that. How is your grandmother doing, Elizabeth?”
“She’s hanging in there,” Elizabeth responded hesitantly.
“Is she taking care of you?” I signed.
“I guess you haven’t been over in a while, Lance. I’m taking care of her.”
“It’s that bad?”
“She might have to go into a nursing home soon.”
I looked away, ashamed that I had not inquired of her grandmother more recently. “But where will you go then?”
James answered for her. “If it happens before Elizabeth graduates, she’s going to come live here.” We all knew what would happen after Elizabeth’s graduation. She and James had been planning it for as long as I could remember. This year, James was a senior. After he graduated, he was going to a get steady position with his father’s company. Then, a year later, when Elizabeth would be out of high school, they would get married, buy a little house, and start a family. Though their anticipation grew as the time drew closer every day, that night the idea remained like the moon seen through the window, neither spoken of nor reached for, but present, still, in its resplendence.

A Story on the Way

2007-08-02T11:44:00.000-07:00

At last, I have finished the first draft of "Mutant of Mainstream." I'm very excited about that story. In fact, I think I like it better than any first draft of a story I have ever written. There is a lot of passion in it, a lot of personality, a lot of feeling. But I am really going to need feedback on this one since I am writing it from the perspective of a deaf guy and I am neither a guy nor am I deaf. The story is split up into four chapters, so I may post one chapter at a time as I complete them. The first draft isn't terribly long--about twenty-six handwritten pages--and I imagine that the second draft will be about the same length. I would like to have as many readers as possible. Thank you, everyone.

On Thrill

2007-07-18T09:34:00.000-07:00

So, I'm going to New York on Friday. Don't tell anyone (obviously, I desire secrecy since I am sharing this post with the entire world), but I'm terrified and excited all at once. And, though it makes no sense, I am much more terrified than excited. That's the wierd thing about my feelings--they never seem to make sense. As often as I've had my own Birthday party, I've dreaded it's coming. And I always get that sensation when getting up on a knee board that I could seriously injure myself--or maybe die. I try to avoid amusement parks, since peaceful talks and afternoons spent on writing or reading seem so much more intrigueing... and safe. Shopping, rather than gratifying, as it is to most girls, is usually depressing to me.

Perhaps, I'm just not much of a thrill-seeker. But I do crave experiences and situations, perhaps mostly because they give me something to write about. So, of course I want to go to New York. It's going to be great, and after I come back, I will probably agree with myself.

God is good to allow all kinds of experiences, to put them in our reach, to make us, if not thrill-seeking, generally adventurous. I guess God is a God of adventure. He is mighty and valiant, and, according to the Bible, "a Man of War." And when He indwells us and surrounds us, we are left with nothing to fear, because He is all-powerful and His will is always done.

The Journal of My Mind

2007-06-25T10:08:00.000-07:00

Words are such small things that they cannot be measured,
Falling like bricks from our lips with simple pound to the ground,
Forgotten in the blankness of our minds.

But I was there when you gave me those words you forgot,
Which fell like bricks from your lips and grew roots in my heart,
Jotted eagerly down in the journal of my mind.

Oh, words are such large things that they cannot be measured,
They can be rewound and replayed, but never erased, long after they've been
Forgotten in the blankness of our minds.

Images

2007-06-25T09:58:00.000-07:00

Faces--black, white, and beige,
Some youthful, some aged,
Bierded faces, calloused faces,
Sweaty faces, tender faces.

The brush strokes thick,
And then it is thin,
Heavy, watery,
Steady, faltering,

In blue like saphire skies,
Black like moonless nights,
Red like concrete cuts,
Green like ball parks,
White like perfect cloudes,
Yellow like the sun they conceal,
Pink like the twilight,
Purple like this child's shirt...

In countless varietes of shapes:
Turtles for our one-day pets,
Frogs for wive'stales of warts,
Smiley faces for random thoughts,
Rainbows for dreams we've failed to attain,
Hearts for what we still desire,
Balloons for parties at which we closed off,
Crosses for the commitment we've sealed ourselves to.

But it all wipes away at the end of the day,
With a few drops of water against these cheeks.

Yesterday in flames

2007-06-25T09:43:00.000-07:00

Craving is a fire that has burned these holes in my heart,
Muddled my vision and my purpose for being here at all,
And left me to trust with everything inside me
That you have a plan and you will stay beside me.
I have no understanding of my own to lean on anymore--
It's burning in that fire locked behind the door.
And I have no sufficiency of my own at last
Because the flames are shriveling all the pride of my past.

So I'm laying alone on the floor in this room,
Thinking and breathing and crying to you.
You're all I have to lean on today.
The hopes of last night are burning away
By the minute,
By the ticking of the clock.
That fire just won't stop.

And I am waiting for You to guide my paths.
I've got nothing now to hold me back.
I will follow. I will run in Your ways
From the fragments of the shriveled yesterday.

The Death of Israel's First Priest

2007-06-25T09:32:00.000-07:00

It's a long, long way up the mountain.
My heart beats harder with each step,
Trying and tripping, climbing and slipping.
It feels like I'm dying with each step.
Everyone is watching and waiting
With my brother and my son at my sides.
Still I'm trying and tripping, slidding and gripping,
Knowing soon there will be none left at my side.

It's a short, short way up the mountain,
But my throat is still parched with these thoughts--
The promise of death is nearing me,
And I know it's there to greet me at the top.
Yes, death is here to greet me.
They both turn around and leave,
Trying and tripping down the slope.
No more climbing, no more slipping,
No more sliding, no more gripping,
No more trying and tripping for me.

A Bird Unbound

2007-06-25T09:23:00.000-07:00

With feathers white and free and light, you dance along the bars.
With joyful heart and care-free art, you sing the highest part.
And I see the sky reflected in your eyes as you brighten the bars,
Skipping, preening, breathing, gleaming, taunting my captured heart.

With feet let loose, you're in the air, bound up by cheerful wings,
Higher, higher, 'til you're out of sight, clothed in white, a king.
The sky is yours for, like the clouds, you float on tender wings,
And from my small, barred domain, I hear my angel sing.

I Must Die

2007-06-25T09:17:00.000-07:00

Everything is ready;
I have only to run up the hill, embracing this wooden fixture
Without fear of splinters,
Casting down this life which was once so dear to me.
I know that I must die.

And I lay my shaking hands down on the wood,
Knowing soon I will feel that piercing pain I have always avoided.
And there will be no going back.
But this is all that I can do--
I know that I must die,

Like a seed falling to the ground
To rise and truely live.
I am being crucified, so nothing will hurt me,
But I will be alive in a whole new way
As, everyday, I die.

These Days

2007-06-22T18:33:00.000-07:00

I don’t know what’s going on these days:

I’m in some kind of struggle in the valley’s dark

And I see just enough to know how bad this hurts-

To be in somewhere in the middle, but to be so alone,

To talk to you without any suitable words.

I’m on the verge of a song, a run, a cry

Because the pain that I feel is so deep inside

That it cannot help but hide.

She’s wailing and weeping, but shedding no tears.

She’s dying and lonely, but still partly alive.

He’s broken, confused, but still fumbling around,

With half a heart here to be with us

And half a heart lying back there on the ground.

They’re on the verge of a song, a run, a cry

Because the pain that they feel is so deep inside

That it cannot help but hide.

We’re on the verge of a song, a run, a cry

Because the pain that we feel is so deep inside

That it cannot help but hide.

She’s loving, but hating, and worn out with feelings.

He’s torn apart over his misunderstandings.

I’m falling down with the weights that I carry.

Let’s all fall in the dark and lay on the ground

And know the Light that never wearies.

Let’s help up each other stand up in the Light.

Gasoline

2007-06-22T18:22:00.000-07:00

I feel like I've been injected with a hundred pounds of caffeine

And I lay sleepless through the night.

My thoughts are overwhelming this tired, one-track mind

On the edge of the bed, clinging tight.

I feel like I've been injected with a hundred pounds of gasoline,

But I have no engine to run it off.

It eats me through the night; this morning I am gone,

Entangled in the weight of every thought.

Oh Father, I am not a car and I am not a coffee pot

And I don't know what to do when my mind gets this hot.

So hold me in Your arms, though I'm sweating gasoline,

And please just lift these thoughts that keep haunting me.

I know that You're still holding on to me, too,

So I'm on the edge of the bed, clinging tight to You.

The Dust of Life

2007-06-22T18:20:00.000-07:00

A quick fix with chic flicks every half hour,
A new do for a true you every five minutes,
And everything impossible is coming out of your microwave.
I've tried over and over, but I guess I'm just not as brave.
Because it seems that the best things
I always have to wait for.
And I practice and practice, strumming these strings,
While you take center stage of the world.

Your pop tarts and breakfast bars and abrvs.,
Your five easy steps to success,
Your five easy days, your five easy ways
To get made, to get paid, to get saved.
I'm back here in the dust of life,
In the lonely moments where I wait,
And I work and I sweat and I bleed;
It seems I've lost track of you, world.

Life seems to take so long to live
And it's high school, day after day after year,
And it's practice, note after note after song,
And it's night time, fighting and fighting these fears,
And this is the life God came to make full.
And it's high school, day after day after year,
And it's practice, note after note after song,
And it's night time, fighting and fighting these fears.

A Strange Kind of Weakness

2007-06-22T18:17:00.002-07:00

I have a strange kind of weakness when I rest in Your arms,

A vulnerability, a freedom, I have alone with You.

There I admit exactly what I am

And You listen to the gore of the truth.

I have a strange kind of peace when I rest in Your arms

Which grabs me from before, behind, inside.

It is the peace of forgiveness, the peace of the clean,

That at long last there is nothing more to hide!

I have a strange kind of beauty when I rest in Your arms,

As a pure spotless child through Your grace.

And You see Your Son in my radiance,

Your Son in my heart, veins, feet, hands, and face.

I have a strange kind of strength when I rest in Your arms,

Your power manifested through my flesh

To love what You love, to do what You do,

To join in Your work, Your love, Your rest.

Picture in Our Minds

2007-06-22T18:17:00.001-07:00

But we all still have that old picture in our minds,

A reminder of how our affections change with time,

And leave us with new crises and harsher bolder thoughts,

And how we will make it through again if we trust again in God.

Yes, that emptiness and searchingness that flooded us last year,

Is filled with smiles and matches now, which do not calm the fears.

And still there are those of us who are free from that game,

But then I think in bed at night how we're all about the same

And how it's all a trick to get us agonizing deep inside

And trying like baby birds who are a little young to fly,

And starving ourselves for something that feels like a greater thing,

But not realizing our mistake until someone breaks a wing.

So, I have the couple picture ingrafted in my mind,

But then comes the cold remark "Affections change with time."

I want to work in that hospital for birds with damaged thoughts

And remember I will make it through if I put my trust my God.

The Shrieking Hearts of All

2007-06-22T18:16:00.001-07:00

There are those sometimes when I feel unlike the rest.

And that's not so bad until I come up dehydrated

From a frozen over river, a spring stopped in its cycle,

And I shut my eyes to those round me who have fainted.

How can I desire wealth and the winning of this race?

They say that loosing is victory in Your freeing chains.

How can I climb this wall when You tell me to fall,

Into my weakness, Your strength, and the shrieking of all?

Somedays I ask for freedom and for sliding into that,

And turn my back on sweet incarceration and the pain.

And I unplug my nervous system to all those around

Who are slaving and dying in the light of Your Name.

Did You give me life, just so I could live?

Did You give me freedom, just so I could give?

Did You call my name, just so I could call?

Or is this the greatest calling of all?

Adherent Walls

2007-06-22T18:11:00.000-07:00

Would you please allow me turn off your music?

These thoughts are piercing me straight through the bones.

Why must we be on opposite sides of the room,

Opposite sides of our minds all the time?

Why won't you look me in the eyes and listen?

Why won't you spill your mind to me?

Why must we adhere to adherent walls, that drive us away?

They always force me to the opposite side of the room.

I'm lost for words in all of these thoughts.

I'm a freak. You're a freak. What does that mean?

If God is speaking, when will we hear-

When we break through these walls to which we adhere?

Bouquets and Thunderbolts

2007-06-22T18:10:00.000-07:00

Every day with You is like a dance

Where I'm caught up in Your wooing romance.

Your love songs sound like thunderbolts

And the rusteling of trees,

And all the flowers are bouquets

You have made just for me.

Though I'm going through the land of darkness

I am surrounded by Your strength and goodness,

Talking in knowing, seducing kinds of tones,

Walking with the Light in the valley of bones.

Wipe now the tear that is slipping down my cheek

Of hostility and passions which prove that I am weak.

The warm winds of summer are like your breath on me-

Tell me, reassure me Your love will never cease.

Every day with You is like a dance.

Question of a Mortal (from the Perspective of a Searching Man)

2007-06-22T18:05:00.000-07:00

Good is never good enough; better is never best.

I could sleep the whole day through and never get a rest.

What haunts me is the fear, the guilt, from messing up last time.

What drives me is what lies ahead- to win this mile to shake this hand, to be one of the best.

I walked down the medical aisle late last night: the products read "happiness", "peace", "panacea"...

I picked up the bottle to fix loneliness, the one I take every other day.

I still have that mad craving inside to be someone or have someone or really just know someone.

And it doesn't go away every other day.

Good is a term they twist with theology and psycology to mean whatever they want.

They have played this game so long that I always loose.

They make their own truths...

What is truth?

So I ask yet again:

In the end, do we all die like mortals?

Frets and Strings

2007-06-22T18:01:00.000-07:00

Another part of me comes alive,

Moving up and down the frets and strings,

Hammering on and hammering off the things,

And a sharp bend and a smooth slide.

It slips through my fingers and into my veins.

Give it, share it, love it- I feel it in my fingers.

I feel it in my fingers, deeper than sound-

A person deaf and blind could know it still,

A silent running, a vibrant feel,

Making quiet minds wonder and full hearts pound.

It slips through my fingers and into my veins.

Give it, share it, love it- I feel it in my fingers.

Don't Let Go

2007-06-22T17:59:00.000-07:00

Caffeine highs and desperate lows,

Questions mount and feelings blow

To foreign lands where they are killed

Like leaves blown into enemies fields.

It's the doubts that tell this weary hand

To let go and fall into enemy lands.

The doubts say You will let me fall;

The doubts say You will watch me crawl

In deserted lands where I will call,

And You won't care- You'll watch me fall.

But faith says I'm at desperate lows

And I should hold tight when feelings go,

And not because of caffeine highs,

And not because of pretty lies,

And even though the feelings die:

I know You when You hold me tight.

And there is peace that questions can't trace

And there is joy that doubts don't faze.

And there is love that won't let me fall-

My Father hears me when I call.

The Wanting of More

2007-06-22T17:57:00.000-07:00

Silence and thinking,

Silence and starring,

Silence and the wanting of more.

Music and distance,

Music and nearness,

Music and the pulling at the floor.

Passion and apathy,

Passion and purity,

Passion and the waiting by her door.

Beauty and shadows,

Beauty and stillness,

Beauty and the way you look at her.

Passion and apathy,

Passion and purity,

Passion and the waiting by her door.

Music and distance,

Music and nearness,

Music and the pulling at the floor.

Silence and thinking,

Silence and starring,

Silence and the wanting of more.

The Journey Home

2007-06-22T17:52:00.000-07:00

Riding across the horizon

As the sun comes out

To fill the Texas sky

And illuminate our minds

And bring them to lands

They don't often go,

Across the massive sky

To a place we now call home,

Through the enchanted grass

Of that old Oklahoma

That I played in some years past

And danced through the mist

Like a native indian

Who traveled off to Arkansas-

Here we come, sweet Arkansas,

Where the last of my childhood lay

In the backyard in a grave.

And all that was left of me

Settled where life begins, in Tennessee.

The edge of the river ended our roam,

And end, for now, in a place called home.

To Burn

2007-06-22T17:50:00.000-07:00

To die is to live

Like a brand new thing,

To be buried in the fire

And come up and start to sing.

To worship is to live

With a fire in your heart

That burns up the old

And sets the new apart.

To serve is to live,

To set another soul ablaze

And watch and help

Until their heart is like a flame.

To give is to live-

To sing with all your heart,

To dance with all your heart,

To die, worship, serve with all your heart-

To burn is to live.

Our Shells

2007-06-22T17:49:00.000-07:00

He is somewhere beneath his shell of pride,

But no one knows who he is inside,

And everytime that someone tries

He cringes behind his shell and hides.

She says she love the man he is

But tells him to change that or this

And he tapes together the broken shell of his

And hides again and pretends to live.

And when I look at you again

You hide behind a shell like him

And whitewash the sickness of your sin

And fall in line with all of them.

The only thing to change is me

Because I close the door when you shouldn't see

And I think I'm better than they could be,

But now I scream, "Oh Father, set me free

From my whitewashed shell of pride,

From the tape all over my insides,

From what I show and what I hide-

Crack my shell open to life."

Loving and Leaving

2007-06-22T17:44:00.000-07:00

I've seen women turn to girls over men they love so deep.

And I've seen girls turn to puddles on the ground.

And I've seen men be so gentle as to stroke their hair

And I wonder and I fanticize- what is it to be loved?

I've seen two turn to one with this thing

And I've seen two break away from this thing

As if it were a mystery to throw you in a trance

And two smile together and say "Let's take a chance."

Some see that to love is to commit,

But some think to love might mean to leave.

And some will leave and some will cleave

And some will die and some will cry.

They will blame it all on love.

I may leave this place and never really return.

I think it better to never love than to love and leave.

I may never completely return.

The voice that greets me every morning

And rocks me to sleep at night

Is the one that always cherishes

But never breaks away into the night.