Adoring Dust

Piece by piece,
Brick by Brick,
You have taken me apart
Until all that remains
Is dust and broken bricks.
All is futile.
My strength is in the dust.
Yet my Master, all of me
Scattered in this dust
Cries out in longing for You still!
Even the rocks, You said,
Would praise Your Glory.
Even the dust, my Lord.
Even the dust.

Into this, You said, we would return.
I am here, my Lord, returned.
I am here, my Lord, still begging
To love You as You desire,
Even though my temple is in ruins.

Take this dust, You whom I adore,
And breathe Your Life into me.
I am only what You desire
To make of me.
Stir Your Spirit in this dust
That moistened with my tears
And Your waters of forgiveness
Becomes Your clay.
Recreate me, my Lord, as You desire.
Make this temple for You
That You may dwell in it.

Though only Your dust,
I am at Your feet
Beneath Your Burning Bush,
Adoring Your Presence.
Though only Your dust,
I am at the foot of Your Cross
Catching the drops
Of Your Precious Blood
In my heart
To treasure and adore.
Thought only Your dust.
I await with longing
The stirring of Your Spirit of Love
In my soul.

As I cling to Your feet, Beloved,
Like the dust of the roads You walked,
Will You wash me away
Before Your Great Feast
As You did at Your Great Supper?
Or will You make this dust Your clay
And form me into the chalice of Your Love
To become Your Blessing Cup
And to hold Your Sacrifice of Love?
I am here, Beloved,
Your adoring dust,
Awaiting Your hand.

7-21-2001

My Poverty, Your Riches

My soul is raw from struggling,
Feeling stretched to the limit.
I cannot break through the wall
That limits my human journey to You.
Cast your cares on Me,
Your gentle voice reminds me;
What you lack I will fill.
Your Heart overflows with love.
The more I desire to be all You ask,
The more I fail,
The deeper I know
You are all I have,
You are all I desire.

I teeter on the tightrope
Knowing You are all
That holds me from destruction.
Any step without You
And I fall to ruin.
I want to hold You
But know You hold me.

My longing to love as You desire
Overcomes me.
My longing like a bridge to Your Heart
Carries me over the abyss
And I am Yours in desire, at least.
What can I give You, I ask,
To fill Your longing for our love?
My love next to Yours
Is like a lost grain of sand
Hurling through a vast universe
Searching for a place
To not feel so small.

Your hand reaches for my heart
Holding my smallness
In Your greatness.
This is all that I desire,
You whisper in my soul,
That in your smallness
You are all mine.
My brokenness,
My rawness from struggle,
My longing unextinguished,
All move Your Heart
And in my struggle to love,
My poverty is met with Your riches.
Pour Your riches
Into my heart and soul, my Love,
And grow in me
All that You desire.

5-8-2001

Face of Grace

The soft radiance of
Pure Perfection,
Most Sacred Love engaging
Even the unbelievers.
Who could deny
The grip on our hearts
His soft face of grace,
His gentle healing hands held?

Molded onto a wooden Cross,
The embodiment of purest Love,
Soft like clay to our touch,
Docile and vulnerable
To our every move of love or hatred;
Abandons all power of the Divine,
Humbling Himself to inside out,
Displays unquestionably His Law of Love;
Nothing held back
To the destruction of self, for Love.

Perfect Holy Countenance,
Beaten, bloodied, scourged,
Pierced with thorn,
Swollen and disfigured,
Did still radiate
Most Perfect Love.
Beauty undeniable,
Unconquered by darkness and hate.

Precious Blood,
Nectar of Love,
Falls to waiting hands and hearts.
Press Your Love into our hearts
Molding us to Your Sacrifice.
Dissolve the masks that hide
The countenance of grace held within
As we hold Your Passion in our hearts.
Reveal hearts burning with Your Love,
Exposed to love and hatred
As we walk Your Way
Holding the hand of humility.

Soft Face of Grace
Reveal Yourself to us again.
Gentle hands of healing and love
Touch Your people again
By a touch of compassion
Through hands consecrated
To the desire of Your Sacred heart.

3/29-30/2001

Your Bread

Clinging to Your Cross,
Bound by love,
My heart attaches to Yours
In painful, loving union.
Keep me, O Lord, in Your care
As I attach to You more fully,
As I am crushed to become Your Bread
To be consecrated to You
And I am pressed to become the wine
That will be Your Life Blood in me.
Pour forth in me Your Life and Love
As You empty this chalice
To be filled with only You.

My heart is Yours, Beloved,
But as I am crushed,
I need Your gentle hands
To gather me up,
To knead me into the Bread
Offered to You.
Consecrate what You have made,
Wholly given over to You,
To Your most Sacred Heart.

Lord, strengthen me as I die in You.
Hold my utter frailty
In Your hands and Heart.
Moisten the dust of my death
With the water from Your Heart of Mercy
And make of me Your Bread,
Filled with the Love
Of Your most Sacred Heart.

As You feed this Bread
To Your people,
Will You still hold my heart
Close to Yours,
Embraced in Your Love
And in Your sacrifice?
Fully poured out,
Yet fully held in Your Most
Beloved Sacred Heart?

3-5-2001

Love So Revealed

Is there a place in the world, I ponder,
Where love is gentle and kind,
Where beauty is in the heart
And is a fountain of joy?

The gentle sparrow intrigues me,
So simple yet so profound.
Pain embraces me,
It’s tentacles curling and burrowing
Into all it can reach.
I watch the sparrow
Like a prisoner behind bars
As I struggle in my shackles.
The sparrow does not weep at pain,
Nor shout for joy,
Yet hopeful he seems
With his quiet way,
Content, concerned only for today.

Love is so bare, so raw,
Unable to hide behind masks,
Revealed in all its tenderness.
Utterly revealed.
My heart aches for You.
Your Heart aches for me.
The lure of Your Heart, so Sacred, so raw,
Catches my heart, unable to escape
The inner chambers of Your Heart.
Trade the raw prison of Your Heart
For the shackles of my pain!

Contents revealed,
My heart so easily touched,
So easily hurt,
So easy to walk away from.
Alone in its nakedness
My heart searches for You
To find You are already there,
Revealing all.
Your shocking humanity
Reveals but Your gentle Divinity.
My overflowing humanity
Reveals but my need for You,
The gentle Divinity that reveals
My humanity
And my need and my desire
For the Heart of my God.

Immersed in the profound simplicity
Of my need for all You are,
I am profoundly humbled
By my love for You,
Hoping Your gentle hands will lift me
To this tender Heart that I adore.

3-2-2001

Rising From Ashes

Most tender Heart of my God,
Whose gentle yet passionate Heartbeat
Moves the flow of my soul,
You have taken my heart
And You are not letting go.

You have moved me to such depths
Of anguish and pain
With Your torturous, passionate Cross,
With every humiliation and abuse
You have suffered then and now
That I, like the dead corpse
At the foot of the Cross,
Could take no more.

My soul is so moved by Your Sacrifice of all
To such a disturbing extreme,
Yet Your Heart flows with Love still,
Without cold drafts or hidden callouses,
That I awoke from that depth of agony
To a new life.

Morning came
In a flood of passionate love,
Love so sweet, so tender,
So passionate, so deeply moving
My heart could die from bursting,
So in love with You I am.

Your agony so thrashed my heart,
Crushed so like grapes in a wine press,
Ground like grain crushed in a mill.
But You have fermented my crushing
Into the wine of Your Love
And risen my ground up heart
Into the Bread of Your Life.

And I arose in the Morn
Unable to contain my love for You,
Unwilling to stop
The trembling love in my heart
That had risen from the ashes
Of Your agony.
With joy you catch
The overflow of this poor heart
And Your Passion is stirred anew,
Loved beyond the ability
Of a human heart to express.
Gathering up my bursting heart,
You press it to Yours
Until there is nothing left of me
But You, my Beloved.

6-8-2002