What is it with four letters?
That mere intersections of lines and loops
Of curves and edges
Of creations of ballpoint pens
Have managed to spell the faces of the voices that keep me up at night

P-A-I-N. Pain was the story of age 5
The reverberation of the door slammed shut
It is the sound of my mother’s wails and my father’s rage
It is the sight of skin kissing skin in the most unromantic of ways

H-E-L-P. Help were the tears that have run dry from age 16
The tugs and pulls, of scratching to hold on to anything and everything
They were of hand after hand that stretched only to push and silence the crying of the girl left with nothing
They were the stares that spat on my face, whose breathe have filled my lungs with words
Which said, “you are not enough” , “you are a mistake”, “you will never be more than your failures,”

L-I-E-S. Lies are the roommates that have taken over my bed at age 21
They were the tags that came with the packages of death and failure
It tells me bedtime stories of fault and regret until I dream of only those
It is the gate that have forced its way to barricade my heart because my heart; no, my life; no, my existence is undeserving of interactions outside these walls

What is it with four letters?

D-O-N-E. Done is the selection of ropes and blades, of bullets and train rails at 23
It is finally believing in the bedtime stories of defeat and condemnation
It is stepping on that last rock, layers above creations worth saving more than I
But no, done is the shadow that stretched into my vision
It is the intersection of two lines that drew a gap between my feet and the fall
It is the truth of the fallen and the risen that have tilted my head to look back
At nail pierced hands that have been embracing me all along

R-A-I-N. Rain was the prayer I said at age 25
It is the drops of red that dripped from places in His body that are now just scars of triumph
It is the ocean that kisses the shore anew a million times a day
K-N-O-W. Know was I never forgotten
It is the realization of a presence that have charted my life’s story since day 1

What is it with four letters ?
What is it with four letters?
Wait, what is IN four letters?

H-O-P-E. Hope is man redeemed
It is the truth pain have tried to numb us of and lies have tried to replace our memories with
Hope is glorious substitution, it is of spared lashes and whips
It is the inhale and exhale of a man enduring
Of steps- right, left, right, left- of a body stained with blood untouched by this world of gravel and dirt

Hope was of a baby born on straws resting on earth’s grounds
Hope is from His last breathe, a scandalous end that exhaled life into a new beginning
It is Chapter 3 of an “undeniability” that defeat is a myth refuted by an empty tomb
Hope is redemption from resurrection, deliverance from remembrance
Love and grace eternal
Forgiveness impartial like fire that consumes all sides: past, present, future- the done, doing, and did

Hope is Christ taking flesh to save a creation unworthy but loved still
An irrationality made reality
Accept that this is not the end, that life may have moved without you but the Author of life has never failed to write you in each time
So stand today with an authority respired by Christ and rebuke the sayings and said
Of screams and whispers by your stories of ages 5, 16, and 21

Know that you are the King’s beloved, paid by a price with an amount that transcends infinity
Darling, hope is a four letter word written in strokes that spell L-O-R-D
And as everlasting as those letters spell is hope as eternal
So place a cross on your front porch
So next time pain and lies pay you a visit, they’ll know that your home is not of bricks and stones but of a body lined with bones and flesh of man who have conquered their master who is death

Bask in the divine, it is finished