As one who has moved a
number of times over the years, I occasionally must plow my way through old
packed boxes of papers and things that have become permanently “stored
away.” Last week I was doing this,
looking for something I needed for the Lenten gatherings at church, when I
happened across a booklet of poems I wrote when I was in college. Of course, not only had I forgotten these
poems, but it is strange to think I ever wrote poems at all. As I perused these ancient writings, one
stood out from the rest and took me back in my mind to the very day and scene
that inspired it. I was working for the
electric utility in Wichita, it was summer time, and I was on a lunch break. The day shift lunches were an hour long, so I
was walking through a park along the Arkansas (in Kansas, it is pronounced
“Ar-kansas,”) River when I noticed a very sad looking young woman sitting on a
bench. She was staring at a water
fountain by the river. When I returned
to work, I couldn’t get her sad look out of my mind, so I wrote the following
poem about what may have been going on in her thoughts.
She sat
quietly for a long time
watching the fountain,
watching the fountain spray and flow
while nearby the River ran deep.
Many
people hurried across the plaza.
They did not want to be late
for work, or for an appointment.
But she
watched the fountain.
It
helped her to think
about things
that she would like
in her life.
Things
which maybe could ease
her longing,
her loneliness,
her wish to be more real,
and more honest.
But no
one notices.
No one really knows her.
Oh, for
Someone to share her longing!
But they all just hurry
and no one stops.
She
just keeps watching,
watching the fountain
while nearby the River ran deep.
Hoping,
wanting, praying
that Someone will come,
talk,
and make it all good.
There are so many people
like I imagined this woman to be: isolated and lonely, yet still hoping that
somehow her life could become meaningful and worthwhile. In this poem I capitalized “Someone” to
emphasize that only an encounter with God could bring the “good” that she was
seeking. We all stare at “fountains” in
some form or measure. And like this woman, we sometimes miss the abundance of God's love nearby, like the deep running river next to the fountain. We are all looking
for a person or an event that will give us a sense that life is truly good. Only Christ can do this, and this is what
the Easter message is all about: that
God has taken “notice” of us, has “stopped by,” and spoken to us words of love
and affirmation.
If this life-giving
encounter is what you long for, then I invite you to immerse yourself in the love of God that comes to you in Jesus the Anointed One. God's love in Christ knows no
limits and is beyond all bounds. God
wants to touch your life and make it all good!
In Christ’s Peace,
Will
