Echoes and Stars

Amidst all the funny memes and lists and posts of Bible verses, I am assuming there is a lot of disappointment out there. Lots of cancelled plans. Life coming to an almost complete standstill. You can only binge-watch so much to hold back the emotional tide of loss. Laughter can help, but before long it feels like a band-aid on a growing tumor.

Dylan Thomas said poetry “makes you know that you are alone in the unknown world, that your bliss and suffering is forever shared and forever all your own.”

With a wink he points out that poems – like songs – remind us that in our unique suffering we are not alone. It is ours, yes. But by force of logic, the poet has captured what we have felt and known. “I know that feeling!” We realize the poet has seen what we have seen before we could. The same light dawned on them.

Joy?

There is much to be had.
This is why the debris field
of broken glass hopes
is so hard to walk over.

We see in those shards –
ought to have been.
Could have been.
But are not.

And so a dream unfulfilled here,
a failure there,
and life cut short
right there at your feet.

You’d kick at the pieces in anger,
but for a shining glint
when the light turns just right
on jagged edges.

If there can be dancing
in a valley of dry bones,
then all these too
can now be made new.