Dawn arrives. We have been talking for so many hours I am startled by the transition into the Sabbath. It seems to manifest, to take shape around me like a living presence. Something told you to look at my recent photo and you didn't like what you saw. I could never fool you. Why would I want to? Dawn washes over the roof top and the world is white light reflected between white adobe and white clouds. I blink for a moment, transfixed by beginning again.
"Sometimes I find that I don't need to sleep." I think this is odd for you to say because you have Chronic Fatigue and you aren't supposed to be able to go two or three days with out sleep.
"Sometimes I find that I don't want to wake." I regret the words the moment I say them but equally so I know that lately they are the truth.
You let me get away with nothing.
"You're either awake or you're dead, grrl. Make up your mind."
Tough love mama pushes me off the roof.
Which is exactly what I needed.
Message subject: Re: ...
From: Angel
Sent: Fri Jun 26, 2009 1:15 pm
To: Wings
I feel disjointed, disconnected. The world around me is raging, moving. I march with my cause but I do not hear the drums. My heart beats; The sound is hollow even to me. Reach me?
Opening my eyes (as I fall from the roof) I reach out my hand. A dove alights in my palm like a slow, warm kiss. She spills silk ribbon between my fingers embroidered with your message.
Message subject: Re: ...
From: Wings
Sent: Sat Jun 27, 2009 2:53 am
To: Angel
I remake my reality. I reshape my world. I place you in it.
We're walking down the beach. The clouds are overcast, the wind seems to come from every direction. I am listening to 'Diamond in the Rough.' I have one earphone. You have the other. We walk along the solid, wet sand and rocks, towards the cliff. We don't speak. We don't need to.
We reach the edge of the beach and the tide is still out enough for us to sit on the smooth four and a half foot rock past the driftwood. My mp3 player changes. 'Cobblestone Walking' begins, the original harp music by our mutual friend. The perfect mix of harp and wave combines to form something closer to divinity and forever and heaven, far away from the finite and momentary.
Here is where we find our peace.
Minutes pass. They are counted by the changing of songs if nothing else. Softly I begin to tell you of the ideas I have for a novel we will share. It is complex and complicated and I know it will speak to you because I was inspired by one of your favorite authors who I am reading for the first time. I am discovering fine literature and am startled that I spent twenty years without it.
To the right, the sun is beginning to set. The sky is, however, still lit by the day that remains. I find myself silent. I am anxious to return to the cabin. I am anxious to stay here with you.
You see my face and you calm my worries with only a few words that somehow always say so much. You help me find driftwood for our friend to create harps. You walk back with me to the cabin, your hand in mine. You settle my fears with your presence.
If you were not there in body, you were there in mind, in spirit.
I think they are one in the same.
And I think, just perhaps, you had no idea how much I needed all of your words but more than anything that one last sentence. For to me, to any true Christian, the word is the Word, and word and deed are one and the same. Word and touch. Word and song. Word and oath, benediction, passion, struggle. I watched a tv show recently where a young man wore a t-shirt emblazoned with the slogan, "Actions speak louder than blogs." I would have to agree which is why I do march, whether or not I hear the drum, and especially in June. However, I am also very aware that blogging is an action.
Message subject: Re: ...
From: Angel
Sent: Sat Jun 27, 2009 5:18 am
To: Wings
On the other side of the world, in Iran, more than a million young people are fighting, dying, disappearing, standing up for the first time... it is a revolution that the world is watching.
And right here, crying, tears running between the keyboards keys, I read your words and I recognize that right here, with no one watching, there is a revolution. You are waking up. You are standing up. It is just as powerful because, in the eyes of Christ, one and many are the same.
It is easier to stand behind a national or global cause then to change the personal corruption in our own private, intimate lives. I have grown weary of talking about green politics with people who blame genetics for their drug addiction. I am tired of arguing morals with men who have made the mythology of denomination out of God's word.
Heal thyself. Revolution begins at home.
Actually... it begins in the heart.
Every Iranian fighting for a voice understands what I'm saying. Their movement is (globally) millions strong in support but every single person marching began the revolution alone, in their hearts, in the blood pounding through their own individual bodies.
No matter whether we sleep or wake, whether we are walking in friendship or struggling in conflict, we have the power within ourselves to overthrow the corruption that threatens us. We know what it is. We know the truth of what it is doing. No one knows ourselves as well as we do... with the exception of the Lord.
Perhaps it would be just a correct to say: Every personal revolution begins with Christ.
After all, He did away with the idea of being born with original sin, away with spare the rod spoil the child, away with women as dirty objects. He turned the tables and turned over the tables. No more blood sacrifices. No more mediation. Now then forever, He rose up made His revolution of salvation. Our revolution began in His heart and is carried in each of ours now.
Christ as brother, father, lover. Christ as revolutionist.
