You’re doing brightly

And that’s a happy song

From upward heights

It’s about time

From upward heights

Many question

Why you took so long

To simply do, to simply do

Your job that was your job to do

Your busy schedule

Did not excuse your responsibility

It appeared to be truly

Intentional neglect

Yet no one has the nerve to say

You are blue when you are blue

You are red when you are red

And we are worse for honesty’s door

To be closed hard and long

Well it’s true

That everything in me

Wants you

To know Jesus

Yet personally

I tend to keep

Him at arms length

Much of the time

Yes it’s true so true

I believe He loves you

Yet personally

Guilty I keep

Distance between

Much of the time

But forward is forward

And by faith

When my disquiet says bullet or bow

Your proficiency says five smooth stones

And I take my time to the stream

And fix my eyes on infinitesimal things

I’m so confident

That You are my giant’s colossus

Yet cyclically unsure I’m Your lad

Confident You are steep

Shrewd in might

Yet unsure

If I will fully participate

I know You stand ankle deep in oceans

While I drown in the sweat of your brow

I’m the poor pauper of knowing better

While You are the Rich King of know how

There’s a winning story crowning here

Even so, I take my time to the stream

If no one does that sort of work

Everything comes to a screeching halt

Might as well be me

Might as well be me

Don’t be afraid to be

The hardest worker in the room

Not to be noticed

Not to be lifted up

But simply because

If no one does that work

Everything comes to a screeching halt

They are going crazy

Drop dead drop dead

They are going crazy

And they know because

They look

Up from the bottom

Under 10 feet of glass

At my heels

And I’m glad

Truly glad ’cause

They’ve known wrong

Like few others

And each in time

Knows my bite

Each in time

Came around

And silenced

That foolish arrogant mouth.

I believe you knew then

But all the heaven and earth

In your souls knows

That you know now

It was the vodka cranberry days

And the truth is that I was very scared

To be so alone plus so brave

I just knew I could kill me

And why that didn’t happen

I don’t know

In the high rise of my prime

With such poor vision, yet drive

And I met people like I was someone

Cause shoes on a stage before a crowd

Had me living as if I wasn’t dreaming

In my mind I was a wonder boy

In my mind I was a wonder boy

Who I hid a lot

There’s trauma in that house

You know it. I know it.

So much ugliness.

We all know it.

Leave the steeple

One. Two. Three.

Mama tags along

You’re a strange sort of grown-up

Insecure in a deadly manner

Drowning for approval

So willing to drag others from their joy

So long as you have an audience

And you’ll badger on

Even if the win is wildly unsatisfying

You only see yourself

Self-appointed queen

So so innocent and over-qualified

So so self-loathing

Even your soul’s fake friend

Has a tooth ache grin

Just now

I searched and searched

For two poems I had written

That I feared I had lost

So I found them and read them

And I realized they weren’t very good

Not nearly as good

as they were in my memory

They were a little sloppy

Not as nuanced as I remembered

And I wonder now

If that is just the way it goes with me

That nothing is as good

As I remember it to be

Or is it just as good

But I can’t be pleased

Is it like this with everyone

Probably not

Some people think they can sing

Even when they cannot

Then others know they have no talent

Some people look back on their work

And can see brilliance

Or lackluster

They have a pretty firm grip

On the facts of the matter

And I believe this is me, most of the time

Except when I look at what I’ve written

I want what I do to be pleasing

There, I said it

But before you celebrate

Let me just point out

That wanting people to be pleased

With what you do

Is not necessarily the same thing

As wanting them to be pleased with you

And before you say I’m splitting hairs

It’s just this simple

I can desire that you be pleased

by an experience

or an encounter

or a product

or a word

that comes from my mouth or my hand without desiring

wanting

craving

Or needing you to be pleased with-me.

Do you see?

Think of it this way

There are people who don’t believe

there is anything all that

pleasing

unique

superlative

gifted

or precious

in themselves,

but they still want

to give you something

wrapped in pretty paper

that will make you enjoy a moment.

Without needing you to enjoy them.

I don’t need you to be pleased with me

I just want you to receive pleasure

You will wither away

You know

That is why

We only see your eyes

Behind the branches

All of you is shaking

While red strangles you

You fake being regal

But you give yourself away

Cause bitterness

Has made you ugly

It does you no favors

With your hand

On your neck

You know it

You hold your head high

And walk away

Like a girl on heels

For the first time