Grief

Ecclesiates

/ jill autrey dorman / 5 Comments
brown book page

Photo by Wendy van Zyl 

 

There are no new words that I can write

No way to change the world tonight

I can feel a sadness coming round again

Trying to take me someplace I’ve already been

 

I am just calling it what it is

The way God made me, I am a child of His

When loneliness visits and friends don’t call

It is best not to compromise the Truth at all

 

Contentment is not happy and sad is not depressed

I’m still so far from wisdom, always was I guess

This melancholy often drives me to my knees

It is just the way God made me, I am a child of His

White Sky

/ jill autrey dorman / 3 Comments
white feathers illustration

Photo by Aleksandr Slobodianyk

 

The galaxies in the Night’s heaven are like living poetry

Your beautiful idea happening right in front of me

The air is clear and crisp in a season of knowing

Joy and grief, tears and smiles the evidence of living

Love falling down like white feathers all around 

I cherish your gifts to me Oh God, I see you in utter Holiness

Drift off into the opioid of sabotage…

/ jill autrey dorman

 

grey cliff beside ocean

Photo by Simon Clayton

Do not let me go to sleep and drift off into the opioid of sabotage

Sin and persistent failures a cunning addiction 

I grow weary of all the brutal truth of how one must guard the deep longing of their heart

For I wander high upon the cliff and the sea glistens enchanted below

I envy your assurance but  find mine for my self

Though I am anxious to arrive I wish the journey to an end

A silence I cannot hear whispers of  the Living Water where there are no dangers hidden

 

“…if you would ask him he would give you living water…(John 4:10)

 

 

 

 

 

I Know…

/ jill autrey dorman

 

aerial photo of boat on sea

Photo by Pok Rie

 

I was not your faithful friend

I was not truthful, no

I am not the best daughter, sister, wife, or mother

But I know The One who is all I have not been

 

The One who is a kind and faithful friend

The One who always tells the Truth, yes

The One who is the best in me that I cannot be

The One who’s is all I have not been

 

So when you think of how I let you down

And remember the times I did not live in truth

I want you to know that I know

Jesus is The One who is all I have not been

Everybody moving blindly forward…

/ jill autrey dorman
school of fish

Photo by Matthew T Rader

Everybody moving blindly forward, like fish in a shoal

How long have we been losing touch with our souls?

Everybody hating what they can not  understand

 

We surely did not gain good from the knowledge of evil

We surely forsook the only wise God and Creator

We tried to be our own gods but could not do it better

 

I know this is not how the story ends for His image bearers

I know the Master Writer’s plan can not be thwarted

Let it be oh Lord I pray  our Faith be made sight today

The emptiness of my conceit and arrogance…

/ jill autrey dorman
photo of river during daytime

Photo by Ionut Cerchia

 

As I sat in the still and In the mess

In the emptiness of my own conceit and arrogance

The old man with white hair said,

“these are your thorns to bear…”

 

When the only free person in the room

Is the one who is in chains

Then it is time to look at what man calls “justice”

Pontius Pilate could not deny his claims

 

It is in vulnerability that God’s Grace comes

It is in the mourning that the Grief is fulfilled

It is in the freedom of Truth that I want to run

It is in humility that true courage is spilled

 

 

The Legend of Annie Bell

/ jill autrey dorman

 

grayscale photo of woman having breakfast

Photo by Suzy Hazelwood 

She never scoured with tears

Not her face, not her life, not her floor

She was as strong as the Mississippi’s speed

And tougher than the man who made her bleed

 

Relentless in love, quiet and strong was her way

Not hardened but not taking back her living

Until one day she took that shotgun round

The shot that rang out put him in the ground

 

She did not scour herself with tears

She washed herself clean in the blood

She held her head high for her children

That man would never make anyone else bleed again

 

Gray against gray the dawn awakens

/ jill autrey dorman

abstract ash burn burning

 

When you stand close to His gypsy fire

your heart will hear a blue cold note

He will burn you with his lies

but His truth will hurt the most

 

He has always been a runner

and cares nothing for all he has not been

He will stoke his gypsy fire higher

and steal your heart away again

 

Gray against gray the dawn awakens

the grayest ashes have all turned cold

Just when you believe his dreams were real

you will find to the highest bidder you were sold

I was flayed open with a razor sharp knife

/ jill autrey dorman
silhouette of girl during evening

Photo by luizclas

He was the only one there in that dark still night

I was flayed open with a razor sharp knife

He said are you ready to rise from the dead?

Through sobs and his blood yes was all I said

 

He said I am the love you are counting on

I am the only One when all  others are gone

I am the one who carries you when you fall

Through doubts and sorrow I’ve paid it all

 

He is the one who  gave His all for me

He fought for me to the bloody end

And on that day when He rose again

He said I am all I have ever been

 

He held me there as life seeped in

He is everything no one else has been

He is my champion, teacher, Redeemer, and friend

He is the one I will count on until the end