Rosebud

Rose before dawn,
Nestled life in bud.
Sun of mother-love withdrawn.
Rose before dawn
Life, so sweet, soon gone.
Red flower, the color of blood.
Rose before dawn
Nestled life in bud.

Copyright Joann Nelander

(experimental triolet)

Love’s Return

Moved by Love, my Love,
How do I make return?
Struggles press, take hold of.
Moved by Love, my Love,
Power proffered from above
Too requisite to spurn.
Moved by Love, my Love,
How do I make return?

Copyright © 2011 Joann Nelander All rights reserved

(experimental triolet)

Yad VaShem - Remember

The names of the concentration and death camps / Wikipedia    
 
Yad VaShem - Remember

Stolen name replaced by number,
Savaged soul and broken heart.
Hell, a people to encumber.
Blind eyes outside in darkness.
Dead souls dismissed the human face.
Stolen name replaced by number
Rising from the ashes,
Pledging nevermore.
Hell, a people to encumber
Yad VaShem, the vault of memory,
Yad VaShem, the ground of tears
Stolen name replaced by number
Shoah: families, children.
Here named, remembered, mourned
Hell, a people to encumber
Faces pictured in the silence.
Tears cried forevermore.
Stolen name replaced by number
Hell, a people to encumber

Copyright © 2011 Joann Nelander  All rights reserved

(experimental Villanelle)

Reveling in God's Love

Image via Wikipedia

H/T Simple Catholic / Simple Catholic Living

Reminders:
1. “O Lord, your love reaches to heaven; your faithfulness, to the clouds.” Psalm 36:6
2. “With age-old love I have loved you; so I have kept my mercy toward you.” Jeremiah 31:3
3. “The Lord, your God, is in your midst, a mighty savior; He will rejoice over you with gladness, and renew you in His love, he will sing joyfully because of you.” Zephaniah 3:17
4. “As the Father loves me, so I love you. Remain in my love John 15:9
5. “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for his friends.” John 15:13
6. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal live.” John 3:16 (My personal, all-time favorite verse from Scripture!)
7. “What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? As it is written: ‘For your sake we are being slain all the day; we are looked upon as sheep to be slaughtered.’ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.” Romans 8:35-37
8. “For I am convinced that either death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:38
9. “I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the holy ones, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge-that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever!” Ephesians 3:16-21
10. “See what love the Father has bestowed on us that we may be called the children of God. Yet we are.” 1 John: 31

Found

My Lord, my Love,
Turning to you,
I meet Your gaze.
Your eyes never stray
From your child.
Since my conception,
That awesome moment,
You have kept
Careful watch over me.
Through fleeting years,
You have guarded me,
As the apple of Your eye.
Your angels await my prayers.
I part my lips,
Pronouncing Your Name,
And they are at alert.
“Thy Kindom come”
A flurry of wings
Break the silence.
“Thy Will be done. “
The brightness of electrum
Pervades the air.
“Give us this day
Our daily bread.”
Shining beings glow white-hot,
Wings unfurl.
Soaring heavenward
To the throne of God,
Weightless spirits
Obtain my abundance,
In measure overflowing.
Depending on You,
For even my gratitude,
I rejoice,
For the Sun rises
Each day in my heart.
Searching for You,
I find Your trail,
There is food on the table
And horses in the stall,
My children, too, are clothed,
And I am adorned in virtue,
Protected by humility.
What have I,
You have not given me?
Though I spend myself in labor,
My vigor, I have not exhausted.
Though, I fall into bed at night,
I look back on a day,
Lived in Your Presence.
Now, I recognize Your disguise.
I find You in the dawn.
Announced by  bird song.
Heralded in my children’s cries.
“Tie my shoes,
I hear You say.
Hope sends out new shoots,
As I find my strength refreshed
By your calm streams.
My duty awaits me,
And I am Your steward.
Drawing from coffers
That may appear empty,
They are, none-the-less,
Full of opportunity,
As Your poor
Are always with us,
Depending on You,
And, You, on me.
You no longer hide.
You await me in the voiceless.
Your vessels of helplessness
Beckon me, “Come!”
Your Cross surrounds me,
As I find myself
Nailed to the society of men.
The blood of Adam fills my veins,
But, so too,
The Blood of Christ.
As I expend myself
on family and neighbor
You are fed and clothed
In your hunger and nakedness.
As I lift my voice in song,
The high heavens resound,
Echoing Your Name.
My Jesus, You, fill the Universe,
For need and the Promise of Plenty,
Are all about me,
And I am Church,
Throbbing with Your Blood,
Beating with Your Heart.

Copyright © 2011 Joann Nelander  All rights reserved

Choice

Another day,
In which
I may chose
To love You,
Or crucify You.

Copyright  © 2011 Joann Nelander    All rights reserved

The Indictment

 
A nation that calls Black, “White”,
And Sin, “Righteousness”,
Cannot expect the respect and reward it merited,
When it called Sin “Sin”
And Black “Black”.

Copyright © 2011  Joann Nelander All rights reserved

The remedy:

“If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.  (2 Chronicles 7:14)

Cry of One Forgiven

How can I thank You
For Your forgiveness,
For that moment,
In which You scattered
My accusers,
And took my part?
As I looked up
From the mud of my despair,
Your majestic countenance
Was all.
You loomed before me,
Brighter than the Sun.
Who could have imagined
Such grandeur?
You wore holiness like a crown
That more than circled Your brow.
Rather, it emanated,
As light from Your Being,
Announcing Who You are?
Only humility can receive You,
And dare Your gaze.
For Your Eyes
Pierce the soul,
Revealing all.
Only those crying for a Savior
Dare look up,
To confess with that glance
Their fault and nakedness,
Helpless and all pleading.
Only the thirsty
Can drink in the majesty
Of Your knowing.
For pride is the travesty,
That hides,
For fear of revelation.
That moment shattered my fear
And rent the clouds of all my life.
Taking proffered Hand,
I rise to my feet
Then, as now, again,
Light embraces me
As my rags fall to my feet.
In their place
Love has woven a mantle,
A robe of Being,
That more than clothes me.
It is a signal grace,
That names me,
With it, You announce
To all Creation
Who I am in You.
My “Yes” reverberates
Throughout the Universe.
I am new,
Like a star at its birth,
Bursting forth
With Your Holiness;
Baptized in Your Redemption.
How can I thank You
For Your forgiveness,
O, You, Who took my part?
Go now,
In search of my accusers.

Copyright  © 2011 Joann Nelander    All rights reserved

Bill Board Censorship

Dr. Alveda King speaks out on Bill Board Censorship:

Dr. Alveda King, director of African-American Outreach for Priests for Life, released the following statement today regarding the billboard in Manhattan that proclaims “The most dangerous place for an African-American is in the womb.” The billboard was taken down after pressure from local politicians and neighborhood residents.
“It is an outrageous act of censorship that this billboard was taken down,” Dr King said. “This billboard should be posted in every city of the country. And it should provoke outrage in the African-American community—not because it is racist, but because of the truth it reveals; the truth that is being kept from the African-American community.

:

The Abortion Debate

A 3D ultrasound-fetus at 17 weeks sucking his thumb and waving /Wikipedia

For your consideration:

The most common abortion procedure performed after the first trimester of pregnancy is the “D and E” (Dilation and Evacuation), a procedure which is legal throughout the nation, and which the Supreme Court itself described in this way:

“The doctor grips a fetal part with the forceps and pulls it back through the cervix …, continuing to pull even after meeting resistance from the cervix. The friction causes the fetus to tear apart. For example, a leg might be ripped off the fetus as it is pulled through the cervix and out of the woman. The process of evacuating the fetus piece by piece continues until it has been completely removed.”
(Gonzales vs. Carhart, April 18, 2007)

Now is the time to ask the American public, whether pro-life or pro-choice, a simple question: Should dismemberment of a living child in the womb be permitted? Let’s go beyond the all-encompassing question of “Should abortion be allowed?” and ask, “Should this specific procedure, in which a child’s arms and legs are ripped off, and head crushed, be allowed?” (Fr. Frank Pavone)

His All For You

Your Father built the world
With you in mind.
You needn’t be important
To be important.
God has made you so.
You are carved upon His hand;
A perfect fit!
The Father’s desire for you,
Waits upon you.
The God of all the Universe
Halted by your will,
For without you
He won’t.
When your world
Stands still,
Limbo silent, and bereft,
Think to move the Hand of God.
“Who do you say I AM?”
When you can see it,
Say it!
Say it, so that the heavens hear you.
Say it, so the angels stop in flight.
Say it so that mountains move,
And flowers blossom.
Christ’s first buds,
Then flowers in bloom,
As Father God
Sets the world in motion
And blossoms forth in you.
Copyright © Joann Nelander  All rights reserved