I had this illusion that I mattered
And somewhere along the way . . .
Through the eyes, brows and backs of others,
I saw it slip away.

Love was the seed
that was supposed to multiply in the soul . . .
to reproduce after its own kind.
To magnify its meaning by giving itself away.
But stupid me, I thought I was its point
and so I took it for my own.
I thought I deserved it
and people should be privileged
to give me even more.

I ate all the fruit that love bore in my soul,
sometimes I'd spare a peel for others.
The more I gobbled of the love I got,
the harder it was to find.
The more I consumed the less I planted.
I thought it was me that mattered.

That, if I worked ever harder
I could gain some merit there.
So I worked my fingers to the bone,
And noticed that mostly
people gladly let me do that.
I'd turn around at 5:36 and found myself alone.

Maybe if I make a name,
become a president.
Surely honor will follow me then
All would seek me where I went.
But the greatest kings and royalty
with passing of time grow wrinkled and drawn,
needing fed by another's hand
and led to their bed, by the same.

The next generation barely knows their names,
They were someone, once, they say.
Perhaps they had some fame,
"Hey, I need a refill of my Coke here, Miss,
take care of that, yeah, thanks."

If I got love and didn't give it
It sprung a leak in me.
If the giving of love is the fountain of joy
Then I gotta give all I can.
Love, the inexhaustible fountain, always out-gives you.

If I can lift the unloved and unloveable
by long and tender care,
to be givers of love themselves -
there will I have stumbled upon significance.
Run smack dab into mattering -
will I have caught the scent of God.

Mothers were made to love
with a capacity beyond words.
Even those who've known little of it
give untiringly to their own.
Such approximates the most visible, natural
exhibition of God's love on the planet.

But even women starved of intimacy and love
will be ravenous to consume
whatever scraps are thrown their way.
Craving nutritional intimacy of soul,
often mistaking for food, they gobble
the styrofoam cup of sexual escape.
And for that flashing moment they mattered,
yet left with less than they came.

No thing is created for nothing.
Significance is.
Everything bumps into other things.
A beetle on a branch of a sapling
224 miles deep in the Amazon forest matters.
It's the measure and manner of significance that we consider.
No living thing on the planet
matters more than man.
Unlike every other creature
he may influence his own significance.

If the world thinks highly of me,
if it assists, favors or nourishes me;
drowns, ravages or crushes me means little -
for the world cares nothing for me,
nor did it bring me forth.

It's only the space of choices
for those able to make them.
The higher the nature the broader the range.
All creatures but man prioritize choices to survive and perpetuate.
Man's capability to discriminate is boundless.
Even to the contemplation of himself.
Even to hold council with competing thoughts
in the board room of his own mind.
A creature so distinct
from every other living thing,
must get understanding
of who he is and why he's here.
Since he didn't make himself,
Who made him, and why?
Why did his maker make him able
to even consider these things?
Why does his maker think he matters?
Why make man THIS way?

I saw a bird and thought that I could fly.
I began to have dreams that I took off.
Wearing my magic belt
I could soar and swoop.

I wanted to make big and wonderful things.
But some said I was dumb
and that kind of thing was not for me.
When they laughed,
I believed they were right.

I believed I could change things,
make a difference.
Then I saw I could barely get anyone
to notice me at all.
Except when I was bad.
Well, that's a difference,
but not what I was looking for.

So the world was talking to me.
Many of its pieces calling, hurting, shouting, scowling, hitting.
The cracking storms were scary.
The winds were chilly,
and the sun did scorch.
The sun-sparkling water was fun to play in
but the deep and strong currents toss you.
And all the people had faces . . .
funny, cruel, odd, old,
and they all spoke.
They told me what they thought of me,
those that looked at all.

People had hands too,
rough cut and calloused.
Slender and nail bit.
They had work to do.
Some slapped the side of my face -
my ear still rings.
Some reached over my head
and roughed up my hair.
Some bent down and picked me up.
Helped me tie my shoes.
Some rubbed Vicks into my chest
to help me sleep at night.

The pieces of this world had voices, too.
So many words were hurled.
So few do I remember.
But I do remember how they landed
and the looks that sent them out.
It was the spirit of them that told me
all I needed to know.

But my little heart was asking,
and indeed it never stops,
"Do I matter to you?"
"Am I merely one of your props?"
"Am I just your little audience?"

All the pieces of the world
were explaining things to me.
Giving me their version
of how things were gonna be.
Unknowingly and by degrees
I ate what I was served.
In no way did it target me -
it only gave me what it grew.
By degrees it began to sink down deep,
filling up my soul.
So suffocating, my hope stood on its tippy toes
when it needed a breath of air.

So long a time,
so many encounters and words and faces.
What residue remains -
is all the story this old world can tell.

The Spirit of Love can work with that.
It can blow gently on the shoots and sprouts
looking for the light.
Planted by hands and faces and words
here and there.
By simple ones who'd found the meaning
and planted what they had.
Ones not defined or defiled by the world -
of whom the world was not worthy.
Those who knew that what they gave
would be pursued and awakened
where it was received -
by the One who nurtures it to life in them.

What does remain after all?

Love is stronger than death
and fills the lungs of life.

Those I need to be kind, ain't.
Then, a peculiar stranger passes, smiles,
and their face says, "it'll be alright."
And something you did not know was lost
is returned to you in that exchange.

All of life springs from a promise
that no thing in the world can give.
The world can only show you
signs, symbols, and metaphors -
riddles of acorns and oaks.
The world is but a carriage for souls
who might carry the promise and give it away.
Life does not originate here.
It's born in the unseen Heart on the Holy Mountain
and beckons us home by that promise.

A promise is to eternal life,
what the acorn is to a forest of Oaks.
Everything on earth is a shadow;
however tangible, however beautiful,
however horrible, however Stark.
It's presence is proof
of its original, unseen substance.
Shadows are certain declarations
of that light above which casts them.

The world is telling a story.
It isn't the story.
It's the stage of presentation.
Sometimes it screams and shouts and sings the story.
Not to be applauded
but to point us to its maker.
Love is not merely a noun.
It's the everlasting intimate presence.
It is the baby's breath of the universe,

The illusion that I mattered
was, by the extended Scepter
of the Significant One,
shattered.

Through gouges in His feet and bloody side
mercy overflowed the aching, empty void
out of which my lost soul cried.
To a heart in this way loved,
Sought, found, and bought
Such matters need nevermore arise.