David Michael Lippman

today i tried to slip on my Fathers coat, a heavy weight with shoulders straight, it bent down almost to my waist. encloaked and wrapped, i wore His hat, and sat and ate like Him, then i drank and sipped and thanked and then i sipped again. i waived a hand, and wrote a check, jotting down an note… but all along it wasn’t Him, it was jut my Father’s clothes so i tried to shout like Him, and then i called his friends, and with them i could act like Him but they know it’s just pretend. and i tasked to write like Him and sing like He would do, yet i only wrote my name i only sang my tune. so i tried to give like Him, i scraped and lost and bled, i showed my love to others yet they only said, “that love, my boy, it looks like you, my boy, that isn’t Him.” so i, defeated, lonely still, packed the clothes, finished the notes, and gave my goals away. only then as a naked boy did i hear my Father say, “where are you, where are you? My son, My own? I’ve found My things scattered everywhere

i don’t want to be in hiding anymore my Lord, my Lord i don’t want to be in hiding anymore and i'm tired of making all my excuses try to stand ignore my ignorance, Jesus and repeat in me the work done through You my innocence is through (and has been since birth) my fire’s out, my life is blind, my way is wayward without You. i don’t want to be in hiding anymore i will stop the lies i give You my rebel heart and wait here in the light.

among the dark things             came another sounding like them looking about                         searching everywhere             till every corner heard about it. and all came stammering over             in collective voices                         to give their two cents             and to see who was commended yet in every word                         and every proposal and every breathy second did they ever really know him or stop to ask him about it?                         when the world sings—                                     it seems like everything’s in question—                         but one nod                                     a smirk a tiny suggestion (from him) and all is stopped— and the world itself is put into question and its answer is rhetorical, obvious, unmentioned…

take a breath and let the cool of night settle in on your back make the new vision hopeless and come out renewed when the variant tombs open case and the dry death of limbs splays  open  with ancient breath children of anger call on your name while catacombs and undergraves keep shaking chains still can you hear volatile and virile can you hear reticence and reptile oh the very things that make men shake the very things that push him to the edge and what is it that all the world      worries about at night? When the quiet sets in and the earth slows down—      dead things have made a home in our souls                  and we shake and moan                              we hide and groan                              because we are scared of ourselves.