a digital commonplace book
I grew up back when screens were something that kept the bugs out, but never kept the boys in. Out there, in the little yard of the house my parents chose to buy, were plenty of my one request: a climbing tree. On our one-third acre plot, there stood no less than seven giant sycamores. One of them was my favorite, for in its welcome lower branches my older brother built an elevated platform… just for me.
As I think about Luke, wealth, the fruitful tree, I become less a Pharisee, and daily more a grateful conduit: imago dei as I was meant to be.
My work is done for the day. His work may now proceed.
Last night, instead of sleeping, my mind was aswirl with thoughts of trees, vines, fruitfulness, and the relationship of these to imago dei. Too often, I have stopped at noting the object (e.g., the persistent tree) without noting its purpose: fruitfulness, provision, generosity like that of the Creator.
“Be fruitful.” “He is like a tree… that yields its fruit.” “Also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.”
Forgive me. I usually try to write poems that I myself understand. This one captures an actual vivid dream that I’m still trying to figure out.
This is increasingly true, but increasingly threatened, always in question.
Thinking of Abraham, Moses, and others* who thankfully illumine even now.
(background image from Pixabay)
*Poem was my immediate response to a Facebook post by Sten-Erik Armitage, where he wrote
In my pride, I don’t need God. I know better, and I can do it on my own. In my despair, I don’t want God. He doesn’t care, and he couldn’t help me anyway. In cultivating thanksgiving, I recognize my total dependence upon him and grow in humility and peace.
Sten-Erik Armitage
Don’t misjudge “mindless” in this poem as I often misjudge it in life. Thinking matters; DOING God’s will surely matters more.
Background photo was taken while climbing the Red Couloir to Crestone Peak (2005).
Here’s one for my fourth-grade teacher, “Aunt” Eleanor Timmerman, who likes the word play of sun/Son.
TIP: think of how a boy from East Texas pronounces “soil.”
Most days I take time to reflect on beauty. No king anywhere has more of this than you or I.
Background image: Willow Creek Falls near Silverthorne, Colorado
I was contemplating the metamorphosis of people willing to die to faux prosperity.
I grew up in the mountains, and I still grow up there, little by little.
I took the background photo from the Air BnB that our family was staying at on vacation in Silverthorne, Colorado.
I have no idea why this little song came to mind. I was on vacation, looking around at the mountain flowers. Below the song as I formatted it then, I have posted something I’m playing with, the score and rendering by Musescore. The voicing is ridiculous, I know…. I’m just learning that program.
I was sitting outside our Air BnB while on vacation in Silverthorne, Colorado. It was a crisp mountain morning. The birds were singing, occasionally geese flew over in formation, and this beautiful mountain filled my view (Red Peak?). But next door, there was a workman happily whistling as he worked outside. He distracted from “nature.” But I knew my being annoyed was wrong. I had to write this rebuke to myself.
This strange poem is the nightmare I had last night. I *think* it wove two strands: contemplating Acts vis-a-vis evangelical triumphalism (really!), and reflecting on the vulnerability young people have to passions (I’m a father, who once was young).
I read that a writer comes alive by telling dead men’s tales. Here’s one such tale, though it’s not the *men* who died. This little poem was a lament. A dear friend had tried to persuade someone that his even-handedness in politics is NOT a retreat from righteousness. But the opponent was trapped in his or her allegiance to one end of the political spectrum.
December 20, 2021 Update: This problem has only grown worse over the last 17 months. I’m now reluctant to talk openly with people I once considered eminently reasonable. I fear being disappointed, and I fear opening the door to enmity where no enmity existed before. Now, more than ever, I live with this refrain: “Anything I say can and will be used against me.” I have a Christ-like friend who had to get off social media because there is someone out there — supposedly a Christian — literally building a case against him, misinterpreting anything he says, casting it in the worst possible light, and cataloging the supposed sins. Call that someone The Accuser.
The Internet browser fills my head with worrisome headlines. They did this! They are doing that! They, they, they. Soon, I forget to look for what He is doing.
Surely I’m not alone in catching a whiff of arrogance in the way I sometimes think of those who went before. This came to mind just now as I read Hebrews. God is merciful, not least in revealing the many reasons our elder Brother had to suffer in our place.
Gratefully, I cry with Browning:
My times be in Thy hand!
Perfect the cup as planned!
I took a half-mile detour to capture this image on yesterday’s long hike, knowing that a poem was brewing. Storms should never be wasted.
At Christmas, we often hear a child recite the first 20 verses of Luke, chapter 2. That’s beautiful. But it’s the section immediately following that affects me most deeply. When the child Jesus is presented at the temple, Simeon and Anna recognize that they are witnessing something that will change the course of history. They have both waited a lifetime for the “consolation of Israel,” the “redemption of Jerusalem.” And here He is!
This is the least emotionally honest of the stanzas. On those rare occasions when I pick up a printed copy of the Bible to read (my go-to is digital text), I can see through the thin pages to printing on the other side. I am not actually moved by BEAUTY when I see that. Rather, what that points to in this stanza is thematic. What all the other stanzas have in common is the anticipation of beauty replacing ugliness. MacDonald said it well: “The end of the Maker’s dream is not this.” I think that anticipation of beauty is what affects me.
One day, my son and I were waiting at Sonic for the waitress to bring our order out to the car. As we waited, Jonathan commented, “She doesn’t seem very happy.” I responded, “When she comes out, give her a big smile, and watch what happens.”
She came out, holding our tray of burgers and fries. Jonathan flashed a big smile at her, and her tired old face twisted into a responding smile. After we rolled up the window, I asked Jonathan if he had seen the transformation. He had!
I am looking forward to the smile of God, in the restoration of all things (see “Violets”).
Last year, I had spent months photographing flowers on my walks. In Autumn, the flowers were spent, and I wondered what was left to photograph. Then I started looking closely at what had become of the flowers. Seeds, of course. And some of the seeds were also beautiful and fascinating. But what really grabbed me was the realization that seeds are not the end of beauty, but its beginning (see “Dawn of Eternity”).
I love to watch young children moving to music. There is one video in particular that comes to mind. I believe it may be a young Malawi boy moving subtly to music. His smile and movement are enchanting. So why “my little brother”? I’m the youngest of my family. I don’t literally have a little brother. Rather, I look forward to a day when barriers are removed and we can fully enjoy the brotherhood of man — with all its cultural diversity and beauty.
I have had several exchanges about language with my Ethiopian friend Yohannes. When he points to beautiful speech and ideas expressed in Amharic — a language I do not know — I tell him I’m jealous. His response: “That’s beautiful my friend. It speaks of a lot of good things. The wonderful thing is that one day we shall all understand!”
I wrote above that the accounts of Simeon and Anna in Luke 2 affect me deeply. Here’s how deeply…. Once, I was walking around the lake listening to an audio version of the Bible. When I got to the account of Simeon and Anna, tears started streaming down my face. It was a good thing nobody else was out walking that day. Why was I so moved?
Simeon and Anna were both very old. They would soon die. But this child filled them with hope. Perhaps it was “merely” hope for their people. But you and I know the rest of the story. Thirty-something years hence, Jesus would die a death that will forever put an end to death and ugliness. His Resurrection from the grave demonstrated God’s power and pleasure in restoration. Like all who believe, Simeon and Anna will once again embrace their beautiful Creator.
This is a companion piece to Music: Beauty’s Channeling
This is a second attempt to understand beauty as preceeding its so-called production. Although it may seem that I am empasizing the heavy task of the artist, the real point is that the artist is unveiling beauty from the time he or she begins the project. As one who believes that creation is full of beauty put there by God, I am trying to appreciate his role… without diminishing the role of the artist.
Michelangelo said something similar long ago:
The sculpture is already complete within the marble block, before I start my work. It is already there, I just have to chisel away the superfluous material.
Michelangelo Buonarroti
Every day, when I lie down for a nap, I listen to beautiful music and try always to think of where beauty was born. This may sound silly to some, but I’m trying to put myself in a place where I can better appreciate beauty. So — brace yourself — I picture myself sitting on the edge of a cliff, looking out over a beautiful creation. The creator himself is sitting next to me. I am listening with him. That’s how I fall asleep.
After several weeks of doing what I just described, I was sitting one evening listening to beautiful music. Suddenly, I had a different perspective: the music struck me as a capturing of the beauties of sound, not their mere production. So I thought of an orchestra:
The strings “pluck it from the air.”
Percussion releases it from drums in all its vigorous exclamations.
Brass and woodwinds kiss it with their lips.
Strings express the tension of pent up beauty with their bows.
And then, the point: God can’t help but express (voice) beauty, and loves to share it with us, his creatures.
I dedicated this little poem to my friends of color, by whose grace, wisdom, and other beauties I hope to better appreciate our Heavenly Father. It’s a slow process. Foolishness is bound up in this heart of mine.
The background image is a stylized photo that I took from my office window. There are times of day when several birds come to my garden. I haven’t figured out why the various species pick the same time, but they do. Almost always, the titmouse and chickadee couples come at the same time. And when they come, they are often joined by a cardinal couple. Is there a certain light or temperature that is just right? I don’t know. Thus the question: “What is that secret chime?”
I titled this “Nearer, My God, to Thee” because the pleasure that I take in the variety of birds who congregate in my little garden must be akin to the pleasure God takes when people of every nation peacefully enjoy the world he created.
DREAMS OF ANOTHER LAND
That life should get progressively better, and satisfactory here and now is illusory. We are exiles, who learn our condition slowly, if at all.
This week, I got to do the scripture reading for our church’s virtual worship service. The passage was 1 Peter 1:1-2. That’s a short passage, easy to read. But when my pastor indicated that he liked the idea of a personal introduction, I had an extremely hard time recording it. Thinking about what it means to be an exile, and the hope we have — given God’s kind plans for us — I was overwhelmed with a mixture of sadness, hope, and thankfulness. I’d get to “according to the foreknowledge of God the Father” and stop the recording, because I just couldn’t go on. By the way, the background image above is a frame from the reading when I finally got hold of my emotions.
Thinking of my birth city in another land brought back memories last night, and I had to work them out in a poem this morning.
I’m not sure if Mom ever actually wrote poetry. She definitely was a terrific story teller, which hundreds of now grown-up kids can confirm. And she wrote tight accounts of her childhood, and of God’s remarkable provision for our family over several generations. She was skilled at oil painting, and flowers were always happy to grow for her.
The reference to a “dying perfectionist” is self-referential. I usually refer to myself as a “recovering perfectionist.” It’s a gift and curse I inherited more from Dad. He and I enjoyed discussing Robert Browning’s difficult “Rabbi Ben Ezra.” We never discussed the kind of loose-form poetry that I write. Would he approve? I’m not sure….
Back to Mom. She was an artist. Truly. I grew up understanding that she had a gift I will never possess (although she, like other artists would insist that I could possess it, if only I tried).
My work on poetry has been an attempt to reach honestly into my heart, and then to express clearly what ugliness and beauty that I find. Bacon grease, milk, flour, salt and pepper…. Stir, but not too much. The gravy emerges, slightly different each time, but always a perfect complement to homemade bisquits.
Speaking of which…. Where are the bisquits?
You should probably never ask me to TALK about this little poem… too emotional! The background photo is of my mother when she was a little girl. The photo was taken in the early 1930s. Mom was taken in 2006. It occasionally becomes obvious that I’m not through grieving.
The setting when I thought of the words really was waking up from an afternoon nap. As is often the case, I was wearing ear buds, and had been drowning out the noises in the house by listening to one of my favorite Pandora stations. As I awoke, I was keenly aware of how beautiful the music was… something from Pat Metheny.
I listened to another piece, and then another. Each was as beautiful as the last.
My mind went back through the years to the experience of taking naps as a child, to the awareness of family in other rooms, their voices becoming distant and indistinct as I fell asleep. I cannot actually remember anything before that. However…
Traveling back in time, I arrived at the conviction that my exquisite experience of beauty — here in music — has always been rooted in the love of my mother. She herself was beautiful. She loved me, and she loved beauty. But she also pointed me farther back, to the Author of beauty.
Time did not begin with my birth. When a Christian like myself refers to “love from the beginning,” he or she inevitably alludes to our belief that God has loved his children and had kind purposes for them “from the beginning.” When the Apostle Paul writes about this, he gets into one of the long run-on sentences (in the Greek) that signal his excitement:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.
Ephesians 1:3-10 (ESV)
I’m convinced that knowing the Creator, and being confident that He loves me, enables me to better appreciate the beauty of His creation.
This is not an Easter poem. Or is it?
I jotted this down yesterday morning after a sleepless night, one where an admittedly minor ailment was reminding me of what took the lives of my parents. I’d have posted it yesterday, but ran out of time. Now, as I post this, it is Easter.
If you see ambivalence, mixed with annoyance, mixed with underlying hope, you see well. Hopefully, my reading of the poem (above) will reveal the negative side of my feelings.
The background photo is one I took up in the mountains last year on a similar morning, after a similar night.
Here is an exchange I had with a concerned friend, when he asked about the ailment. After describing the ailment, I wrote:
So, the poem was written out of fear and mild exhaustion, but with the realization that I was not acting in the full hope that often moves me. It’s full of double meaning.
Darol responded:
Yes, the middle of the night amplifies our fears and disappointments. I tell myself that the daylight will scatter them, and that they will end forever in that eternal morning.
Good, wise friends. They’re the best!
Last Fall was a revelation. I thought, like a friend had said, that I had “…about covered it all.” I had been taking photographs of wild flowers around the lake for several months. Now, everything was beginning to die, to dry up and shrivel. What was left to photograph? Then I looked deeper. I decided to focus on what was becoming of the flowers I had photographed. That’s when I came to the realization voiced in the poem above.
Yesterday, I observed a photo someone recently posted for their parent, and a subsequent video. The aging that happened between the photo and the video was marked. Then I looked in the mirror, and the opening lines of this poem popped into my mind!
This was prompted by a handful of memorable experiences, mainly when I was blabbering, and my listener was not.
[March 31, 2021 Update]
Recently, I have had many occasions to revisit this pleasant reflection. I have several friends who are considerably smarter and wiser than me. That’s not surprising. What IS surprising — and endearing — is the courtesy these friends extend me in conversation. When we’re talking, they don’t interrupt me, or they quickly apologize if they do. They sit there and LISTEN as I “think out loud” and then they have the patience to let time heal the wounds in my thinking. Such people, I can’t help but love and admire. God make me more like them!
[September 16, 2023 Update]
I often come away from conversations with my best friends amazed at their courtesy. They’re my best friends largely because they are smarter and wiser than me. I VALUE what they have to say. But because they are courteous, they generally listen without interrupting. These friends are the very people I wish would interrupt, but they don’t.
Yesterday, I had an encounter of a very different sort. I introduced myself to a patron at the library. We began what I thought was going to be chit-chat. But it turned into very little chit and a whole lotta chat. She had much to say. Every time I opened my mouth to comment, she’d say “Hold on!” and keep holding forth. After two or three such “zip-its” I literally put my finger on my lips so I wouldn’t be tempted to turn her diatribe into a conversation.
Since I didn’t really have anything I felt compelled to say, the whole thing amused me. I served her by listening… on her terms for sure.
Incidentally, the poem in this post was inspired by a conversation with my friend Sten-Erik Armitage. He was my pastor at the time. He’s still a friend to whom I sometimes send raw poems, when I fear posting them to the general public. Such a friend is priceless!
I recently began listening to the Audible recording of Augustine’s “Confessions.” Last night, before falling to sleep, I was watching a lecture by James K.A. Smith on “Augustine Our Contemporary.” Just as I got too sleepy to watch anymore, he was talking about authenticity, and how that resonates with modern thinkers.
So, when I woke up this morning, my mind went immediately into writing this poetic response. The subject occupies a large part of my thinking. What is real in my everyday behavior, and what is fakery? By God’s grace, I believe there HAS been progress in becoming sincere, authentic, genuine. But the cost of that transformation is a clearer view of what remains untransformed.
Writing poetry is a strange activity for me. My recall of language is spotty. In fact, it would be rare for me to be able to quote even one of my own poems. I look back on them and wonder, “How did that come out of my feeble mind? I can’t put the words together now; how did I do it then?” Words are often just beyond reach. Simple words. It’s a little painful. Just now, I needed to look up the video I reference above, and for a few seconds, I could not think of the word “YouTube.” If this had not been a weakness of mine since youth, I’d be worried.
So, you may be able to understand why writing poetry is a special pleasure for me. It is a small triumph, a pleasure to balance the pain of a language deficit. It is very much like the pleasure I experience in reading Scripture for a worship service, or even in recording my poems. There was a period in my life (Junior High through High School) when I had a speech impediment that interfered with smooth reading and speech. To be able to pull off a reading or recitation now without major hickups is a small triumph. It’s pleasure to balance pain.
This poem is about judging others harshly, and the need to deal with my lack of grace.
“Miserly of grace”
I may be leaning on questionable grammar here. The point is that I am being miserly in my exercise of grace.
“That I should blame the flower”
This poem is about my attitude toward people, not toward flowers. But I draw on the analogy of judging flowers harshly. Ridiculous, huh? If I can see the folly of that, maybe I can extend the lesson to my harsh judgment of people.
A NOTE FOR THE CONTRARIAN:
You may ask, “Don’t people have more control over their own behavior than flowers do over how well they bloom?” Yes and no. Since we have a will, we can choose to make progress in the refinement of our behavior. But progress can be slow. We all have backgrounds that predispose us to failure in particular areas. For example, a person who was abused as a child may WANT to be more trusting of their friends and partners, but the channels of mistrust run deep. We ALL have deep-rooted emotional baggage. Some of it results in easily-recognized behavioral problems. Some of it results in masked arrogance (or is that the mask of arrogance?).
“Some are not as they SHALL be”
This line moves from the universal problem of a fallen creation (flowers and people) to a smaller set of people. Who are they? It refers to those who trust in Jesus Christ. They expect someday to be resurrected with a glorified body — and mind! — similar to what He has. Now, they are frustrated in their attempts to be better people. Then, their limitations will be lifted.
“Enough for now that one like me”
Here, I look in the mirror. If I insist on judging and demanding change, I should demand it of myself.
“Should blossom far less miserly”
Back to the flower metaphor…. If I’m going to judge how flowers — and people — bloom, I should make sure that I am blooming well, that I am being generous with grace.
UNJAUNDICE VISION
Only in the shadow
Was the yellow light
Sufficiently subdued
For us to welcome
Beauty unforeseen.
— Brad Hepp, 2/22/2020
There, now I have tied this to the conversation I was having with a friend when I took the photo. We were pondering how weakness and inadequacy may actually be celebrated as part of the suffering that precedes restoration and exaltation in the Divine economy. See James 1:9-18
Dear God, let me not be this guy!
Actually, in the careless way I built this poem, I WAS THIS GUY. I can do better with my poetry — and occasionally do. The almost comical reality in my life is that practically every time I point to “someone else’s” failings, it is my own failing that quickly comes into view. I have seen this so often when criticizing grammar! Point out someone else’s poorly-constructed sentence, and I’m sure to blunder within two or three of my own sentences.
I’ll never forget the illustration my friend Jim Adams gave us for the blemished sacrifices passage in Malachi. He brought the class a big bouquet of wilted flowers. That was over thirty years ago. That’s how good a teacher he is!
I didn’t get much sleep last night, pondering thoughts that wouldn’t pass muster in Angelology 101: Imagine for a moment the possibility that angels don’t possess our (humans’) imagination…. How odd we might seem to them. We philosophize, rhapsodize, and consistently compromise, imagining all along that thinking counts as doing, believing as obeying.
I guess every poet comes up with this one eventually.
This “poem” is not silly. In fact, I have never been more serious or intentional in anything I have written. It is not that I have no thoughts. Nor is it that I don’t want to share my thoughts with others. It is that there is no such thing as thoughts I have while “alone.” It may drive me to insanity, but I am determined to become consistent in my belief in an all-knowing and very present God. One of the worst hidden hypocrisies in my life has been holding the belief that I have “the ear” of the most powerful being (God) but not voicing my thoughts about others to Him. How many times I have scrolled through Facebook and thought this or that about my friends and acquaintances without “voicing” those thoughts to the One who can do something about my concerns? Do I see someone who is filling his or her life with hatred? Why would I not voice my concern about that to all-powerful God, the one best able to teach them love? Do I see someone hurting and reaching out to friends for comfort? Why would I not voice my sympathy to the great Comforter? Hypocrisy is usually associated with action. My hypocrisy has consisted of inaction.
This scene, and the words I attached to it, is extremely moving to me. I guess that by my age, there is a lifetime of grief that will not go away in the short term. As a friend wrote, there are “So many missing springs.” Indeed. I can never see the daffodils, wild violets, and other spring flowers without thinking of my Mom. Ever since 2006, they have bloomed without her.
The scene is what I saw when I crossed the bridge where Rush Creek enters White Rock Lake. A few weeks before, I had taken the following photo, which I then captioned “Grow Old Along With Me” (an allusion to Dad’s favorite poem, Rabbi Ben Ezra by Robert Browning:
Too often, people are not on this journey at all. Instead, they look only for confirmation that they already arrived.
At a recent luncheon at Dallas Seminary, a young lady asked the Australian speaker a profound question, which he didn’t seem to understand: “Does having grown up under monarchy help you better understand these concepts?” I immediately understood her because I think a lot about what is influencing my thinking. The following [above] poem is one attempt to discern how I am affected by having grown up under representative democracy. There have been societies where people didn’t spend a fraction of the time we do THEORIZING about how GOVERNMENT should use our neighbors’ money to effect justice and virtue. Sometimes it seems that’s ALL we do.
We Protestants love the phrase “Kingdom of Priests.” But I fear we may love it for the wrong reason. We love the privileged access we have to God, not the responsibility that entails with regard to God and our fellow man. We are in danger of exchanging “proxies” for “priests.” If you think this is a call to embrace one perishing political system over another, you could not be more wrong. It is precisely the reliance on foolishness of the left and foolishness of the right that I am trying to escape.
