The Spirit of the Stairway

Autumn came too fast this year
Winter whispers its cull in my ear
Singing all things are dead they are dead and they are mine

I find I’m awakened by
the ghosts in the night
singing louder and louder…

“break off the dead…
shake off the dead…and move on”

The old lake from the dock
boasts all winter long
of his solemn reprieve
from the times we believed
the summer nights would last forever…but those nights are gone

In the front room my old father’s chair
His haven, fallen in disrepair
but it’s withered the storm…I’ve withered the storm

Sitting on the old wooden swing
It tells the songs I used to sing
about you…about me…all the things I should have said

“break off the dead
shake off the dead…and move on”

the ruts in the dirt
no this shouldn’t hurt
you said oh I love you
but this can never work
and I jumped from the swing
to chase you down the street as you sped off and left me…you left me…

I’m left with my ghosts and you took the best of me…

M. Black Enters the Village

We'll sing welcome to the you stranger, we've prepared a place
where you can lay your weary head
Come sing fa la la la la and welcome to the new year
and think of all the tears we've shed
We've been fighting for honour and glory and power
we've been fighting all year long
and in the midst of it all we've lost all sight
of our joyous happy songs...
get out of here ghost...

Well I think it's time we got out of this town, and let's quit while we're ahead
I've seen enough movies to know this time tomorrow one of us will be dead
and it won't be me...it won't be me NO IT WON'T BE ME! get out of here ghost!

We've been kicking and screaming with bags over our heads
suffocating in your sweet lies
And the choir of angels in the church loft sing their choruses
and alibis
For the years we've lost in this little town,
all the days and the months can't compare
Let's gather around, gather around brothers
gather around town square...
we'll sing, "get out, get out, this fight is over. get out, get out, while there's still time!"

we've been fighting tooth and nail...tooth and nail to the end...to our bitter end

Pre Empty Nest Syndrome-Addendum I: If You Want Something In Life Reach Out and Grab It…So She Hugged Him

I’m watching the setting sun from a new viewpoint in a new manner of understanding. I’m realizing that my time in this season is coming short and coming short of my expectations. I look back at what I’ve written and I realize that not always do green lights point you to the exact path that you’ll follow. Sometimes there are cross roads and intersections. I’m cultivating new friendships and new gut wrenching realizations of my needs. There are people that I assumed that I would be close to that have filtered out of my life and the enthralled surprise of friendship that never would have presented itself in normal “me” situations. I’m coming to realize that the more and more I walk along this path and begin to find so called exits that I’m coming to a complete halt out of confusion and frustration. The notable thing though is that God does not spare me from confusion. I think it’s a call to His character. As I grow into Him and become more so His, He’s saying to me, you want me? You can have all of me. And it’s this statement that has brought me frustration. God doesn’t ask that we understand just His good side when we need something. He wants to show us His entirety. The problem is that not too many people are standing in line for that ride. I don’t think confusion or frustration, either one are attributes of God, but mystery is. Power and sovereignty is. My Pastor says all the time that everything in this life comes through the hands of a sovereign God. I think of hobos and hippies in bigger cities who ride the bus to the station at the end of the night because they have no place better to go. Am I willing to surrender my life so much to the point that I ride the bus because I have nothing better to do with it? Or is it because I want to see where it’s going and believe it’s a better means of arriving there? I think my fundamental breakdown is that in my head I refuse to see that everything is a God moment. It’s not that I do it intentionally; it’s that I have blinders on to so much potential in the world. I want the confusion of God. Not so that I can relish in the fact that I’m continually confused and not so that I can feel like I’m in some eternal waiting room, waiting for my opportunity to go in and see the big man. I want the confusion of God so that I can jump into the foray and fight for something that I might not understand, but will be beautiful. I think confusion and comprehension go hand in hand in God’s kingdom. I think to fully understand peace and experience it we have to fully go through the storm and experience it. Our mundane sunsets must look incredible to someone that’s healed from being blind. And our confusion and frustration look incredible from the outside looking in. There was a movie that changed a lot about how I looked at things. The main character told his girlfriend when he left that if she wanted something in the world she had to reach out and take it. So she hugged him. God is reaching down and saying if we want something we need to be responsible to take it. It’s important that I don’t forget that when I take it, I have to take all of it, not just the good, but the seemingly bad. And when I look back at the path I’ve walked, I can’t even see the beginning anymore. I can’t see the end, but I sure can’t see the beginning.