Wheat must be crushed to become bread
And bread broken to be eaten.
The chrysalis crumble for the butterfly,
The egg splinter for the chicken.
And sheets of coloured glass
Must be shattered
To become stained glass
Through which the love of God–
In rainbowed light–
Shines.
* * *
And I consider…
Did growth spring green
From my own brokenness?
It always does!
My rejected manuscript
Got me to hone my craft,
Again, more diligently.
Read more.
Write differently,
— simply.
The friendships which shattered
With shards of my heart–
Well, I sure won’t make those mistakes again,
But treat precious friendships as what they are–
Precious.
Burnt by fires I lit,
In the emotion of the moment,
I am learning to take
Emotion to Christ, and be
Governed by Christ, and by head
And spirit—not wild emotions.
* * *
There is much I have broken.
What stained glass,
what mosaic,
can I build from the shards?
I have extracted this from the fires:
And it is worth the pain
For the peace it gives,
I cannot do life by myself.
For if I do, I will drop and break
My beloved antique vases.
The best I can do
With my writing
Is hand it over to You
To blow through the molten glass
Of broken dreams:
Delicate faery things
I give you the rest of my life
More whole-heartedly
Than if I had not mucked it up.
You manage my life, Lord.
It’s now your worry. *
* “ A man once worried so much that he decided to hire someone to do his worrying for him. He found a man who agreed to be his hired worrier for a salary of $200,000 per year. After the man accepted the job, his first question to his boss was, “Where are you going to get $200,000 per year?” To which the man responded, “That’s your worry.”