Thursday, March 20, 2014

The Sign of Jonah


I have long been anxious of signs.
I have searched for God in sortilege
And tea leaves, and on tarot cards printed
On the pages of my Bible. Clinging
To past and future I have wandered
Lost in darkness following fancy lights.

But the point of intersection was found in Starbucks
In the SM Supermall,
General Santos City,
Mindanao,
Philippines,
Earth,
Milky Way Galaxy,
Universe,
Mind of God and
Hollow of His Hand.
In a timeless moment within His eye,
I ordered a venti English breakfast tea
Three minutes steeped. Time not specified,
Implied that a barista would know.
But no. And I, foolish I who knew full well
Smell of overbrewed tea, received and paid
Said, “Thank you” and let it steep ten more
Before returning to the now to taste
The waste I had made of that innocent creature.

I know not what power tea leaves have to tell
The mind of God to their foolish fellow creature.
But unlike I, they answer to one only teacher
And praise Him without endyng righteous well.
In Lent our thoughts are turned to death and hell,
Heaven and judgment, and prominently feature
The cup presented in the garden to the wandering preacher
Who claimed to be who He is: (He Who Is)
Who saw, and mourned with sweaty drops of love
That tinted red the earth and washed it clean;
Who drank the bitter cup, the draught not His,
The mortal poison meted, not from above
But from the brewers of tea leaves (though truly we have seen).

Why blame the creature? The tea leaves did no wrong
They never claimed to know the mind of God
And if the brew now tastes of dirty dishwater,
Unmitigated by honey, whose fault is that?
There is still even now, thus, late, a chance for love.

My loins were girt about with khaki shorts
With flip-flops on my feet, and book in hand.
I raised the bitter cup and humbly quaffed
One-ing myself (by invitation) with Him
Who drank the worst I ever brewed for me.

It does no good to sink
Into myself and drink
Nod to Heaven, offer it up,
Toss it back and break the cup.
I must sip, sample, slowly savor
Swirling with my tongue the flavor
Strange, sharp and brown,
The rush to my head and down
Into my stomach the coarse
Clumsy
Callow
Tannic acid rudely forc’d,
Rudely overbrewed from innocent leaves
(At which sacrilege all creation grieves).
I must not waste
The moment! I must taste
And see its goodness
In its very rudeness
In its being-what-it-is,
All His and none of mine.
The bitterness divine
In-joys me and I enjoy
That tea like none other.
Blessed be He!

2 comments:

  1. Hello,
    I could not contact Google Support for 'Blogger' directly, but a response to a faq on the support site stated that I would need to contact the blog author if I wanted to delete my comments that I posted on a blog. As such, this is going to sound like an odd request, but in hindsight for privacy reasons, I am now hoping you could please delete my comments to your "Chivalry and Charity" blog of December 1, 2013. I posted comments on December 2, 2013 at 4:25am, 4:27am, 4:30am, and 6:34am. If you could please delete this post too I would really appreciate it. Thank you in advance and I'm very sorry if this causes any inconvience. - Mary

    ReplyDelete