"Though the mills
Of God grind slowly;
Yet they grind exceeding small;
Though with patience
He stands waiting,
With exactness grinds He all."

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

The Mill

The grueling weight
of happenstance,
A millstone for to grind,
It deflates the ego
And shows us
Where we're blind,
It renders flesh a ruin
Obliterates the mind,
We leave our idols desolate
Leave the ties that bind.

Under painful hardship
We release the very things
Which put us in the circumstance
And caused the suffering
We leave behind our craving
For wealth and diamond rings
Everything exalted
All exalted above God...

That means EVERYTHING

Whatever you adore
On this temporal earth
Whatever gives you pleasure
In which you find worth

These very things will shackle you!
You'll find out they're not free.
They are just the Golden Calf
Of base idolatry.

But the millstone slowly purges
Turning hour by hour
Turning the wheat kernels
Into useful flour.

And so I am refined
As I surely must
Put to naught my flesh
Make powder all my lusts
For I am as ashes

for I am as dust.*


SS  (C) 8/23/2017

In the musings of the dark Koel
That perches upon the winding bough
The sun that flushes from the east
Upon the earth's curving brow
In leaves that bend across to brush
The fruit of life that time bears,
The carnation's awakened blush
In the unseen breath of morning air
In swirls of clouds that float across
A placid sky of limpid blue
The ripples on the lake embossed
With dancing drops of sunlit dew
I know His chants, sense His thoughts
I hear hymns of divinity
I see His hand, I feel His touch
Midst echoes of eternity

Sometimes - the universe comes to the rescue
On a down and out day.
Even when the world seems upside down
The sun shines from somewhere brightening the skies of the mind
The sun rays beam through the radio in much loved songs that play one after the other
Or a little surprise that draws a smile
A considerate gesture that gives wings
Signs they seem to be -
Coaxing us to look up
Lifelines of hope
And one holds on to them
With utmost gratitude.

oops

Nat Lipstadt Feb 2015
(Ketoma Rose) I hate owing money & poems
~for Ketoma Rose~

money, far far easier for me
to gift, give, loan it out,
with very generous terms
of no repayment due
indeed, with my luck down,
the less I have,
the easier it is to share...

perfectly sensible to me
living with giving hands
and a
giving mouth

know that I know
that there are
a handful of you,
who read me with affection,
loyalty and a kind tenderness,
I cannot ever repay

so it makes me guilty+crazy,
keeps me up at night,
these obligations that cannot be
repaid without the hard work of
patient poem-waiting for inspiration
that comes so easily
only when it's ready

and this day I am ready
to pay down, pay toward,
please forward, give what
you have taken from me,
the pleasure of stating,
an adoration of thanksgiving,
a joining so profound,
that once found,
cannot be lost

and you dear reader,
can't fully share, or see these
gratitude-tears-I-am-currently-shedding

but voyeuring come along with the
knowing insight that I would want you too...

so you write from where your heart's
rip tides
rip you open and wider,
yet so oft it falls into the tears in
the pockets of only holes and neglect,
and you, ego-weak human
cannot understand
just how that can be...

but there you are,
Ketoma Rose,
by any and all your names,
liking my words,
and I crease wetness
upon my face tracks
wondering who you are,
and more over
the why
of who you are,
this wondering,
an agonizing
guilty pleasure,
a trouble I just
love having...

but bills must be paid,
and now this debt,
finally tiny-tad dented,
and the fact that the interest
upon it,
grows exponentially
is the
best debt
I ever was given