Demons

I fell to my knees as I was praying
And found a demon in my safest haven
Feels like it's getting harder to believe in anything
Than to simply get lost in my own selfish thinking

Tragedy seems unending
As I watch people I looked up to bending and breaking
Taking shortcuts and false solutions
To hide the truth and appear to come out the hero

I want to know what it would be like to find perfection
To see beyond my pride, to see nothing in the Light
Sometimes I wonder if I'm better off just hitting the bottom
To stop hiding how I truly feel to attempt to come out the hero

No matter what we breed
We are still made greatly of greed
Who knows what's right
The lines keep growing thinner

I don't want to let you down
But sometimes I feel as if I'm hell bound
As if it's woven into my soul
This is my kingdom come.

That through this masquerade
All will come crawling out through this mess I've made
Look into my eyes, but don't get too close, it's dark inside
It's where my demons hide, it's where my demons hide

These Hard Times

These few weeks have been rough. In a lot of ways they have been adventurous and I've gotten opportunities that I didn't think I'd get for a while, like being able to see family and friends I didn't believe I would see for a long time.

However, I find myself fighting depression.

Everything is unbelievably unknown. I'm facing having a long term dream crumble down around me and possibly come to and end. I'm miles away from friends that I love so much and are continuing an amazing journey without me. I find myself riding a roller coaster of emotions that change with the slightest instance. All the while trying to look through the smoke where the answers and the truth seem like they have cut their ties.

It's not clear to me anymore the answers to the ugliness that I feel.  I want the answers to what I need.
I feel like I'm hiding in the shadows, afraid of the light. I feel like I'm simply standing on the outside of where I'm meant to be and the door has been slammed shut in my face.

All I can do is pray.

   Give me the answers
   Give me the way out
   Give me the faith to believe in these hard times

   Show me which way to move
   Show me motivation
   Show me all my heart desires, when I feel like you're not around

   For I'm a troubled mind and a callused heart
   A failing engine that was trying way to hard
   Always second-guessing that little voice I used to hear
 
   I'm finally broken from falling to far
   Burning up, I'm trying to pick up the pieces and searching for healing from the scars
   I ask you take this cup from me cause the fear of the future is stealing all my sleep
 
   Help me in this hour of doubt and darkness
   Cause who I am affects not just me
   So give me the strength, so that love can finish telling this tale.

If I Could Tell You (Would You Hold Onto Me?)

Time and time again I’ve wrestled my thoughts, uncertain if this end I’ve come to was right or wrong.
I won’t try to pretend I’ve got it all figured out, that I don’t have any doubts.
I’ve gotta busted heart, I need you now.

I wanna tell you that it’s alright. I’m tired of telling lies.
It’s ok. It will be ok.
I wanna travel back in time, to say all the things I should have said...
...to have been who I should have been.

I wanna tell you everything. If it’s not too late. Is it too late?
Will you be there if I told the truth? Or will you leave me standing in the rain?

If I say it’s who I am, will you love me still the same? Or will you walk away?
I understand if you’re afraid, but people change. Understanding changes

Will you talk with me? Tell me I’m not alone? Will you still hug me and tell me I belong?
For so long I’ve felt like I’ve been here all alone. Pushing on a pull door.

I long for the time when all is healed, and hopefully love’s to blame.

Put Me back Together

Put me back together. I fell apart.
You Creator, you understand the heart.
I am prone to wonder, I feel it every day.
All of these years trying to escape home, now all I want is to return.
Just a spark to change the heart.

Put me back together. Is there a way?
If I am who I say I am, won’t I be who I’ve always been?
Oh I ache, for the real that takes time, I wanna be something real within a world of fake.
Oh my cynical heart, begs for bread from the stones. Can I live on words alone?
Just a spark, please, will it change my heart?

Put me back together. Teach me words like hope and peace.
Can I know grace? Words to heal this heart of mine.
I want to find a way. Can I be the real thing?
Just a spark for my cold heart:
To breathe in hope and grace, to breathe out peace and justice and mercy.

All of It Yours

Give up your heart. Hold it within your empty hands.
It’s the sum, the sea, of who you are.
Your hopes, your dreams, all the things and “whos” you love.
All your disgraces, your fears, and “sorrys” for the things you’ve done.

Give up your days. They are like grains of sand.
Look at them. They’re the sea, the sum, of who you’ve been.
Every hour, steal it. Every hour, feel it.
Every day, every dollar, it just washes away.

You just have to reach out and take it.
It’s yours. All of it yours.
Run to the Ocean. Feel it’s currents push and pull.
Let it’s power embrace you, take you, sweep the old you away.

The valley low, make it your home.
This I know. You can see the glory in the world.
Step up to the mountain top. Sing for the hope that you have.
Here and now, embody the things that you believe

Don’t have care about what happens to you know.
Just be changed, somehow find the change.
Look to the sky and be free.
Don’t build temples and walls to hold yourself in.

The Explorer's Heart

The path softly crunches beneath my feet. It’s gentle moan assuring me that it supports me. Each step though, a risk, the unevenness threatening to do me damage, but I like it. It is a game to be played, not but a challenge to overcome.

The sun’s piercing rays lick at my skin, beaming down with the promise of life and punishment. The carefree clouds float lazily across the vast spans of the African sky. Twisting, forming and reforming their delicate shapes, as they move the spirit with the beauty of their dance. Leaving the heart to groan with the longing for the promise of freedom their movements represent.

The sweetest of smells assaults my nose and clouds my brain with its overwhelming allure. The seas of grass shake their long appendages at me, trying to point me in the opposite direction. The wind that blows them whips across my face. Each soft touch of grace whispers with encouragement.

Moving through the underbrush, I let the strange alien succulent’s needles to scratch at my flesh. It is a masochistic enjoyment, as my cells part to give way to bushes sharp protectants. It is a reminder that I am alive, a form of penance.

A brilliant, black and white bird’s song carries me to the peak, giving musical theme to my journey. I crest the rise of the earth and the air escapes my lungs. The awe before my countenance is wide and vast, beckoning with the promise of adventure.

Wildebeest graze far below, dotted beneath the canopied arms of the acacia, moving slowly towards the lusty interior that spans between the legs of the foothills. Completely unaware and unthreated by the humbled presence above them.

Stars

I wish I could describe the stars at several thousand feet.
The unpolluted, all-consuming wonder they bring.

Millions of pin-pricks twinkling with hope, pierce the inky blackness surrounding me.

The crisp, thin air that already labours my breathing, cannot compare to the manner with which they take my breath away.

The arm of the galaxy lazily floats transverse, a trail blazed by millions of years, a glimmering haze in the darkness.

Constellations I am not used to, dance their balled across the sky.
The ones un-named to me, them the western world has no myths for.

The howling and chirping of unfamiliar animals sing their melody but they cannot capture the symphony echoing from my heart.

Praise that would not be coherent in words, You, the stillness I rest in.

I wish I could describe the stars at several thousand feet.

The Road Goes Ever On

"The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say."

This has always been one of my favourite little tid-bits from literature. For those of you who are not familiar, this is the song Bilbo Baggins is heard singing as he makes his way from the doorsteps of Bag End, having given up the burden of the One Ring to Frodo, on his way to Rivendell and unknown adventure.

It has always gripped me with a longing for the unknown, and up until this point, has always seemed like pleasant fantasy and honestly just plain good reading. This time however, as I read it I am enamoured by the unexpected similarities of context that I find it has with my life now.

As I have been preparing for the adventure that is to come I have had to be persuaded to leave 'the precious'. To forfeit the people and things that I love in exchange for experiences and stories that I get to live when I move away. Or in another sense I have had to stretch out my hand and let go of a couple things I have held tightly to for so long. Allowing God to take them from me and allow him to deal with the consequences.

So here I stand, on the steps that lead out my door, looking down this great road that has been set before me. I must strive for it with as much effort as I can muster. It is a road that will join with many other people's paths as it goes on to join to some larger way. Where it will lead, I cannot say, but I'm about to find out...

"Be strong and courageous. Do not tremble or be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you should wander." Joshua 1 v. 9

"The Secret to Immortality" -Original

The secret to Immortality is there is no secret.
Do not seek it.

Some men strive for it. Die for it.
Some seek to gain it through fame, others fortune.
But it all ends the same.
In utter misery and blame.

Listener heed me. Put out the flame.
The honest man knows that it can't be achieved, only gained.

To live simply, and simply live.
Daringly, lovingly, and with imperceptive humility.

For no man will forget a man like that.

The Shadow Proves the Sunshine

The thorn. Paul's burden to carry.

For whatever purpose, his second letter to the Corinthians, in which he describes his convictions and experiences with weakness, has been looping itself through my mind. In this passage he reminds us of our frailty as humans and a susceptibility to weakness and strife. The things in our lives that hold as a consistent reminder to keep us from boasting of ourselves.

The simple lyric (and also the title of the song) by Switchfoot has made a tremendous impact and initiated this whole string of thought process. It is one line but it holds an array of symbolism and artistic truth. We humans all have an encumbrance in one form or other that is a part of us, no matter how dark (shadow). It follows us, reminding us of our imperfection. If we are walking in our own way, we seek it and it dominates our path before us. But turn towards the Son, and suddenly it is no longer in the forefront. For his "grace is sufficient" and his "power is made perfect in weakness".

Read it for yourself: 2 Corinthians 12 v.7

St. Augustine Inspires

From my birth I have been apart of you.
In many ways you are my mother.
But time has a way of exposing that which lies beneath:

The Kingdom, you have abandoned the Kingdom for self-indulgence!
You savage that which Papa gave you,
Using it for your wanton luxury
You mistake gluttony for beauty, and mask the truth for the sake of simplicity

The Kingdom, oh the Kingdom you have abandoned for self-indulgence
You shout your "Devotion" from the high places
Yet, you disguise your debauchery,
Clothing it under the linen of popular belief; that of earthly standards.

You have let your Love become a Four-Letter Lie
Holding your arms out wide, you call to those with burdens
They put their hearts within your care yet you bind them up,
Placing upon them a weight they were not ment to carry.
Holding them to the letters of the Law, to that from which they have been freed!

You have let you Love become a Four-Letter Lie.
Allowing yourself to become weak and comfortable
You pray diligently for safety when you were made to be ferocious, a lioness, a force to be reckoned with.
Tarry not in worry over your failure, but fret over your success in that which is of no consequence!

You may be a whore, but you are my Mother!
As it is, turn from the path you have taken, and step out of the darkness!
Sink your fangs into injustice! Promote the Peace Everlasting!
Cultivate that which you desire to see, or receive only that which the World can give you.
Chase after An Geadh-Glas, pursue once again, and be unified with the One who gave you your voice.

2 Corinthians 13 v. 5: Read It.

Moment of Artistry, A Touch of Poetry

My eyes drew open, and I gazed in that somber direction.
There will be no more dreaming as the day when death itself is undone.
No more dreaming like a boy so in love, I'm just a boy so in love with the wrong one.

I ran from the dawn, fought with the day, trapped now always in this twilight.
I went down to the river, praying that the water would give me answers.
But this, the water gave me:
Memories slipping through my fingers and a pocket full of heavy stones.

Oh, how I pity poor Atlas.
The world is such a beast of a burden,
When you've been holding on for such a time,
As I have been, to my defences.

There is love in my body, but I cannot get it out
Since the tenderest of touches have left the darkest of marks.
There is no excuse for the state I'm in, but I have found
The sweetest of words have the bitterest taste

Hence, saddness shows on my face, catches in my breath
And the space between two lungs swells as it burns
When I recall the love I held from the start.