how exquisite is my sky today!
rosey and white cloud-banked around
her smile
her ever-present smile
sun-brightened
twittering
moon-brightened
humming
how lovely is my sky today!
bears love her
buffaloes move under her
winds scrub her cerulean eyes clean
storms race past her
pushing beyond her domed curve
to the sea
cloud-ridden, she lets them win
how precious is my sky today!
a treasure at the end of the rainbow
a ray of hope for all
is my sky today!


c. 2023 Roberta Compton Rainwater

I’m listening to gentle praising
the wind praises the trees
as it soughs through the leaves
the leaves tremble at the touch

birds praise the gusting air
as it carries their songs across
the nimble land to my ear
a trilling of joys and feathers

my heart joins in, making the trio
a quartet of flute, timbrel, song, and heartstrings
melodiously transporting all who listen
to join the angel choir in windy praise songs

to Life


c. 2023 Roberta Compton Rainwater

dense with stories
written on diaphanous pages
tales of love and dishonor
battles and travelers
torturers and healers
killers
mystical
mysterious
maculate
biblical
-read

fluid with melody
written in grace notes
and notes of grace
on staves like wires on poles
wrenching
beatific
dramatic
sensual
spiritual
-heard

movin­g with color
created in visions
brushed with the fire of gods
dull
plain
painful
exquisite
delicate
beauteous
-seen

touch­ed by angelic hands
formed of the earth
tempered in water
molten
chipped
hammered and carved
to perfection
spatial
dynamic
rounded
softened
crystalline
-containe­d

-felt


c. 2023 Roberta Compton Rainwater

there’s a child growing
in me
she moves and kicks
knows my voice - loves its music -
listens to my heart, beneath which
she thrives - loves its rhythms -
urges me to eat hearty
- loves the food I eat -
makes me dance
- loses control when I cut loose -

I remember!
she is the joy I once had
before birth into this spoof
this
virtual reality
this
emotional chaos

there’s a child growing
in me
she will be borne
not born
she is me
my Soul returned
from an exile
too long endured
mourned for
missed
longed for
returned at last from neverland
no longer
a sacrifice to a life unlived


c. 2023 Roberta Compton Rainwater

we have it backwards:
fear of others
when
we are likelier to hurt others first
therefore
be skurred of ourselves
rather than others

then watch how
God enters our lives
on the quietus
gentle
forgiving
watchful
protective

and being skurred
turns to courage and

caring for others
first
last
always


c. 2023 Roberta Compton Rainwater

plucked strings play dooms of love
as my Father moves over them
agonizing
guitar strings into torture
victorious   heated   triumphant
****** sacrifice
crucifixion by melody
made holy despite unimaginable selfishness
wiring His Wounds into connective tissues
through tsunamic surgery
opening ways covered in blood
but we choose to live in our dooms
our pink dooms of disbelief
rose colored glassy, glistering lies
and glossic dooms of disbeliefs

“I am become comfortably numb”


c. 2023 Roberta Compton Rainwater

the language of my heart
reduces to symbols
unspeakable
kanjis whose colors are bright
precisely painted
with brushes, imbued with
unknown meanings
as read by blinded eyes
obscured deliberately, without
a key

without
God
a cipher is my heart
a living kanji whose meaning is
undiscoverable
without the cleansing
blood sacrifice of the sang real
a living grail
made unspeakable and holy by
Love


c. 2023 Roberta Compton Rainwater