Just because the frost needs time to thaw
Before the flowers can really grow
Just because the clouds need time to gather
Before cold winds turn to snow
Just because our hearts and our minds often fight
Just because we have to give them time to understand each other
Just because our hearts seem to be eons ahead
of our doubting, dismissive minds
It does not mean we never know
What we truly want

We just have to give ourselves time.

The amazing graces sung by grizzled sailors
As they sailed human cargo from the delirious African coast
To the throes of the Western Empire.
And these grizzled sailors
the odd lonely ducks
Seeking self validation from their lofty superiors
Set sail to embark on a crime against humanity
For a living

And in the end, your Sunday School favorite
Amazing Grace
how sweet the sound!
It is perhaps the single most church song
That doesn’t make you feel guilty or fake happy
It’s simply a song that unabashedly feels

I know what I want
I just have to give myself time
Which is a concept I hardly believe in anymore
Time

I am aware that I can be a fierce wind
Capable of tearing down everything
In a tumultuous bluster of love
But also feverish madness
Manic, sure, but also a wonderful spontaneity
If something feels truly sublime then how can it be wrong?

I am also capable of gentle breezes
Like the soft airy kisses of a whispering night wind
I am wind that can make your arm hairs tickle
I am wind that can gush and chill you to the bone
As I try to envelop you in a nurturing embrace

And if my tender gushing alarms you then please forgive me
For with every fire you ever built you have lit a fire in me
So suddenly I was frightened
At first that looking at you made me melt and burn
To ashes my heart was scattering and falling apart
What a frightening thought!
Unlike a moth I first shied away from your brilliance
And so from a delicate but deeply loving distance
Your presence warmed my chilly gusts
And as your flames gently licked the wind that grew stronger
So too my wild and wonderful breezes hungered for more warmth

Watch the fire deeply
See how the flames massage the air
Look above the fire and see that the air is falling apart
Its molecules expanding and undulating in the warmth
Heat is a beautiful thing
but intense
So is a strong wind

As you so warmed me so I longed to be nurturing
To fan your fire with my most spectacular torrent
A few things might have burned down
Like the walls we built over the decades
Walls of paper tigers guarding our souls
Well the wildfire we built together burnt those walls rightly down
Let’s admire the ruins of the false lives we’ve lived in the past
To protect the God residing within us
from the realm of the material world

Grace teaches our hearts to fear
And by grace our fears are overcome
Through faith I exist
Through hope I keep existing
But it is through love that I understand why