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A GOD DESPERATE TO BE LOVED

A Poetic - Artistic Spiritual Journey

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By ED GRAVES

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2012 FR. ED GRAVES
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4678-7684-1

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Chapter One

A GOD DESPERATE
TO BE LOVED

"I have loved you
with an everlasting love,
therefore have I called you,
taking pity on you."

Jeremiah 31:3


    A GOD DESPERATE TO BE LOVED

    I, a God desperate to be loved?
    I, the gaping wellspring
    of original desire?
    I who cannot but love,
    I who am love itself?

    Yes! Oh, yes!
    I am desperate to give my love
    but also to have it given back to me:
    I need - and I need you -
    oh, you, at least,
    for so few see:
    my passion to love
    is also a relentless need;
    (All lovers are like that,
    are they not?)
    and I,
    I am a passionate lover.
    (Where do you think the idea
    came from?)

    Did you not see this when,
    like a master painter,
    I painted my ultimate masterpiece,
    rapacious Calvary,
    across the vast canvas of your heart;
    or when I, utterly spent with love,
    sat back in my easy chair,
    set down my well-worn brush,
    and said, "I shall never paint better?"

    Remember? It was that afternoon
    too impatient to wait for night.
    Did not my love, a crimson river,
    ash under jagged, distraught arrows
    as thunder boomed in outrage
    over the weeping, thrashing land;
    did not my love rush with intrepid desire
    from my Son's pierced heart,
    seize grieving hearts with awe?
    Did I not seek to ravage
    all hearts - yes, even yours,
    my handiwork?
    Did I not seek
    to make all my lovers?
    Have I not, with reckless abandon,
    shown that I, your Maker,
    a crazed suitor,
    am your hopelessly
    desperate Lover,
    your fading life's
    ultimate harbor?"
    Did I not?
    Do you not remember?
    Oh, my distracted love!


    REVELATION?

    What is this vision
    bursting from the womb
    of my prayer?
    A revelation?
    A dream?
    A freak apparition
    of which I never,
    ever
    dimly surmised?

    Is not every prayer to be
    so -
    never birthed
    before?
    Oh, it is so cunningly fresh,
    so new to me!

    But others say "It is
    too radical!
    Do not touch it!
    It is not the way
    things are."
    (The way, they mean,
    they think they are.)

    But is it a marvel
    that deceives –
    this vision
    rustling in the leaves?

    "No!" I blurt.
    "Deception never comes so -
    pregnant with peace,
    bursting with love for God,
    humbling with thankfulness!"

    Oh, I seem to see my very Lord -
    his wounds, radiating the crimson
    rivulets of his forgiveness -
    lovingly xing me in his gaze.
    I feel him touch my spirit
    with such a radical awareness
    that all my failures,
    all the shame
    that has pounded me -
    all was his handiwork.

    He was always leading me,
    repainting me day by day
    into the arm-upraised, heart-
    bursting, minstrel of praise
    I am today.


    PRODIGAL GOD

    Prodigal God,
    did not you, the great I Am,
    forget who you are?
    You hid your beauty
    in withering esh
    (Was that a joke?)
    and chose to loom over us,
    a bloody, ridiculed criminal
    on infamous Calvary?
    Did you not then
    strip off your majesty,
    become prodigal
    to your very self?
    ("Where is God?" we
    gazed at you and asked;
    surely not this bloody,
    contemptible mess!)

    "No!" you said.
    "You are so so dense!
    My majesty had to become prodigal
    by losing myself in you,
    my masterpiece.
    How else could I make you see
    my passionate love
    unless I became like you,
    stripped off all sel shness,
    spread out my arms
    like an eagle over her young,
    empty myself to ll,
    to restore you to my likeness?

    I longed for you to grasp
    my consummate passion -
    to repaint you
    in the pristine beauty
    I intended,
    the proud creation
    of my concentrated energy
    of love.
    I needed you to see
    that I, your Master Painter,
    your creator,
    your ultimate destiny,
    cannot bear seeing you
    de led, distorted,
    made a caricature
    of your original beauty.

    Only by a radical undoing
    of my divinity
    could I show you;
    only I, I alone,
    alive in you;
    I, your original perfection.

    Like me, your destiny is to be
    a prodigal lover,
    imparting yourself
    wholly to others
    by dying to erase
    the crude distortion
    sin makes of my children.
    I have so yearned
    to restore you
    with my love's livid re,
    and even share with you
    my painterly task:
    to shine with my own brilliance,
    to make all see, all who grieve
    in all the sordid, crumbling,
    sin-infested
    tenements of the blind:
    I am your life, your source,
    your glorious,
    your indestructible
    destiny.


    THE NIGHT-COVERED SEA

    The stars never sleep
    that sparkle without cease
    in the crystal sheen
    of the night-covered sea.
    They shine far above
    the turgid gloom of your
    disheveled years.

    Oh, surely, I am God!
    I so wish
    to wrest perfection
    from your need,
    that you might grow.
    I could hurl you,
    did you ask,
    instantly into burning tears,
    erase your gloom and grasp
    your heart 'till it bled
    far brighter than these
    magic stars to make night sing.

    I could fell all fetters from
    your mind, make you shine
    glorious, divine.
    ("So full of me," people would say,
    "Christ is here in you today!")

    I could, did I choose,
    make your heart-tendons tear,
    make your tears
    refashion your ailing,
    tepid years, light
    your murky darkness
    brighter than any star.
    I could fill you to the brim
    make you
    my Tabor-gleaming gem!

    The ancient agony of your love
    is that you cannot grasp above
    the pitiful, craven aspirations
    that blind you
    to my Spirit's inspirations.

    I who walk with angels high
    on Tabor, Zion, Sinai -
    I call you like my Son to grow.
    He alone can help you know
    the treasure he so richly gives:
    my own magni cence fully lived.


    THERE IS A TREE IN EDEN

    There is a tree in Eden
    Eve could not see -
    her heart was so brazen.
    Oh, how this tree bloomed,
    shy in a sea of shadow
    where God's firelove shone
    in mystic brilliance.

    God alone knew:
    this tree, though smallest,
    was the greatest;
    it alone was his heart's
    greatest treasure;
    it alone shone -
    and still shines.
    Nothing can quench its re
    to repaint death's
    dark perfidy into
    eternal sunrise
    unveiling life in it's fullness
    where greatness is an adjective
    attached only to the sovereign
    love of God.


    THE DAY IS BORN

    Though moonlight be frozen
    and forlorn in the garden
    of dying dreams,
    to the lone lover of God
    a blithe, endless path gleams
    where twisted branches weep joy
    and scents of deathless spring
    waft, full of high gaiety.

    Deepest dark could not see
    sunlight straining at the gate
    as eternal dawn was rising
    to blaze fiercely-fair
    like the silken cascading locks
    of newborn Eve.
    Dark did not surmise
    Eden re-birthed in a crib
    (in Bethlehem, for God's sake?
    Impossible!)
    in a day that shall never set,
    where all tears turn silver
    in the wondering, upturned,
    startled eyes of prayerful
    night-walkers.

    "The day is here!
    Be merry!"
    we will sing. "The day
    we so ached for -
    finally.
    Now we can lift high
    the golden chalices
    of cheer and sing
    the unheard song,
    the frail, siren song
    of forgotten firstyear.
    "Oh!" everyone will exclaim,
    "Do you not feel
    the Father's kiss?
    Have we not entered
    his regal halls of forever?"


    WHAT DARK MONOLITH IS THIS?

    Sun blushed as night stole
    radiance from noon;
    storms tore the sky, outraged;
    earth quaked violently to see
    the rising dark monolith,
    a shameless siren - strutting
    over our troubled days;
    Calvary, a grotesque monument,
    brazenly baring her breast
    to feed Eden's outcasts with her
    prideful lust, only to famish them
    with self-hatred and disgust.

    We, whose dignity is to share
    the boundless love of God,
    saw that blest but hell-torn Friday
    our maker, savior, brother
    overpower her shameless pride
    not by force but gentleness,
    not by might but mercy,
    in a raging tide of love that
    burst from his pierced side as
    he showed us our worth and
    himself our way, out truth, out life.

    O lurid siren! You no longer
    strut with your obscene pride
    but cower, a broken monument
    to sin's demise; your melody
    grown stale, your deformity faded,
    but a sign of my life remade,
    as I walk reborn toward Christ
    who smiles, beckoning me, his beloved,
    into love's radiant timeless sunrise.


    RESURRECTION

    What is this?
    A beginning? The!
    The ultimate
    sunrise
    of a birthed God,
    the sigh
    of an eternal Father
    capturing our hearts
    finally.

    We, the child -
    yes, we -
    whisked
    into the
    simple yet regal
    palace
    of Today -
    at last;
    at that point
    where all is still,
    all made new?
    Yes!

    O
    motion,
    you begin
    now!
    He!
    He is!
    He is alive -
    and here
    for me -
    forever!


    MOTHER OF SORROWS

    What sorrow is as great as mine?
    My boy, heaven's solace,
    for all ills
    so cruelly silenced!

    What mystery did I
    cradle in my arms,
    nurture at my breast,
    guide through boyhood
    to now - to be so despised,
    so mangled - God's
    master pot crushed
    by the reckless wheel of evil?

    O bloody night!
    What crimson glimmer rises
    in the frail stealth of dawn,
    bloom of that love
    for which his dead corpse fell?
    Dawn in midnight!
    Victory in defeat!
    Rebirth of Adam's race!
    Harvest of a Father's tireless
    determination to salvage,
    to reform his incomparable
    masterpiece.


    WE REVERENCE YOUR CROSS

    In your cross, Lord,
    your love blazes
    in cruel glory - a bleeding,
    erce sunrise.
    Your face
    gazes through the years
    at everyone.
    O loving eyes whose tears
    hallow with unspeakable love,
    eyes in which I see
    the eyes of my mother and father,
    indeed, of all I ever loved - all
    part of you and me; each
    a part of your gaze; your loving voice
    theirs, saying, "O, how I love you!"

    So many, many times we came
    to reverence your cross -
    my mother, father, many
    family members -
    through my edgling years.
    Oh, and today, how they and I
    are one with you in all
    songs sung on Sundays
    in our family church.

    I hear so clearly my mother
    and other loved ones.
    Voices were never so beautiful!
    I see them in you - ever here,
    ever with me at your cross,
    to be so - eternally:
    for the love that bound us
    through life, you assure,
    is forever - yet ever better.

    This awesome awareness
    moves me to tears:
    how your love
    has guided all my hallowed,
    my often troubled, years;
    and even now, Lord,
    the sun of your glory rises
    and we shine with you -
    we sons and daughters
    of your re-birthed creation -
    and our voices unite
    with heaven's emblazoned throng
    of angels and saints
    who, seeing you, cannot but sing,
    "All glory to your holy cross!"

Chapter Two

CALL OF THE
BELOVED

"Arise, my beloved,
my beautiful one
and come."

Song of Songs 2:13b


    THE SECRET STREAMS

    The secret streams
    flow on and on,
    their soft murmur
    mingled with the singing
    of wild birds and the smell
    of damp pine thickets;
    their endless song
    ever magnified
    by the haunting voices of silence
    chanting longingly,
    of monks and hermits
    whose pilgrim prayers
    pierce the deep recesses
    of murky swamps
    and rotting corpses
    of bygone years.

    Who
    walks alone
    among the mossy sentinels
    of heaven
    as day's first rays
    spot with heavenly splendor
    the world's leafy floor?

    Who feels,
    as his eyes shut to see
    the smooth, warming in ow
    of heavenly light,
    the gnawing pain
    of hunger, thirst, and exile?

    Who
    bows his hairless,
    browned head
    beneath a frayed
    homespun hood,
    as tears of longing bliss

    flow on his frozen cheeks?
    Who is this
    who never speaks,
    whose heart
    is never silent?

    Is it not you, little one?
    Is it not you -
    ushered
    into the halls
    of silent voices
    and motionless shadows,
    emptied
    into the damp presence
    of swept corners
    and muddy forest roads?

    Be still, little one!
    Sip the still waters,
    you fearless wanderer!

    Look! There in the creek
    under the bridge:
    a worn, forgotten reed
    sailing alone
    on a never-ending stream
    under a timeless vault of
    cheering pines
    and moss-laden oaks -
    marked, forgotten, tired,
    ready to die!


    PRIEST

    Sun daily comes to light
    the silent woodland paths
    with gleams that stir
    their placid cover;
    then, sounding slopes
    descends in sparkling ares
    that send
    mystic dreams on river.

    Stars each evening wake
    to shine with magic gleams
    to rustle restless hearts of lovers,
    as houses come alight
    and dogs bark at their quiet
    revery from leafy covers.

    The timeworn map that plots
    these well-trod paths,
    now daily charts my steps for me,
    and inside I feel the touch
    of a fairer sun of such
    luster, I reel deliriously.
    Then as deeper night descends
    where stars like children sing,
    "We crown you high priest
    of heaven's charms!"
    I walk the breathless night,
    lifting high their light,
    transformed to source from
    musty effigy.


    THE HEART OF A GOD-GILDED UNIVERSE

    Outside, children gaily play and shake
    coffee-craving sleepers from their stupor,
    as awestruck angels in my chapel gaze
    with me as, at the altar of your mercy,
    I raise and reveal to another waking day
    the heart of a God-gilded universe.

    Everything today may see -
    every act and plan and happening -
    shall receive from here its meaning,
    to become, to you, my Risen Lord,
    an endless psalm of love.

    But I, I who denied you,
    who wandered about oblivious,
    now gaze into your rapacious blood
    and see your face!

    So many times you have shown me
    your crimson, passionate gaze!
    And - you choose me?
    To raise your risen flesh,
    to feed your flock
    your precious blood
    to make them clean?
    O Shepherd, really?
    Me?

    "Yes - oh, surely yes!"
    you seem to say. "For
    only the hands of one
    who knows his nothingness
    can bring me to my people
    as befits my Majesty.
    For, in you now, my son,
    heaven's minions see
    a masterpiece of my mercy
    painted clearly."

    Cities shall grow as I stand amazed,
    streets and coffee shops will bustle
    as crowds hasten to work or play,
    to continue their regular oiling
    of their city's restless machine,
    and - all for a vapid purpose.

    If only they would stop to see:
    their frantic furies cannot seize
    the prize their hearts desperately need
    shining crimson at the table
    of their neglected God.

    "I am just a thought away."
    you, my captive Majesty, say.
    "One thought can return me to my world,
    one silent pause prepare it for my goal,
    (How many know where they are going?)
    to live and find in Me
    that alone which gives life meaning."

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from A GOD DESPERATE TO BE LOVED by ED GRAVES Copyright © 2012 by FR. ED GRAVES. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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