A Sermon on Emma

Amelia is learning to write. Her letters are whispery lines attached at delicate angles. She practices her waif letters at church, on all of the post cards and offering envelopes located in pockets in the back of the pews. She writes on anything she can get her hands on. She is a particular fan of these yellow leaflets entitled, "I Wish". They are meant to be used to request certain things, like a visit from the pastor, more information about becoming a church member, or to offer an idea for a sermon.

On a certain Sunday, Amelia hands my husband an "I Wish" leaflet. To her, it is as special as a fancy, embossed Hallmark card. Chris looks it over, and then elbows me gently. He points to a line in the leaflet, where Amelia has made a special request.

The line in question states, "I would like to hear a sermon on ______________".

In the blank, Amelia has written in her faint script, her sister's name. Emma.

Amelia puts in our mind, although she is unaware of it, the idea of a sermon on Emma.

I need you to know my Emma is like me, and then she is not like me. She is not like me in ways that make me impatient. She does not get in a rush for anything. She brushes her teeth (after at least 15 minutes of prodding) as if it is the ultimate leisure activity. It takes her even longer to choose appropriate socks. Emma does not consider her appearance much. She only wants to wear clothing that touches her minimally, which reduces her wardrobe choices to a pair of jeans a size too big for her and an over sized pair of pink soccer shorts (which, I may add, are made out of thin material perfect for allowing her patterned undies to be viewed by all). Emma is not bookish, much to my dismay. She is lackadaisical in completing homework, or reading. She peppers her math papers with doodles of peace signs and stick figures sporting smiley faces.

I find myself more often than not shutting my eyes and counting to ten when Emma is involved. I say her name too loudly and too accusingly too often. I want her to conform to my image of a well behaved child.

So how would a sermon on Emma work? How could her actions be used to inspire others into a Christ like life after walking out the church doors?

Let me tell you something else about Emma. She is selfless. She spent all of the money she had saved in her piggy bank on buying the neighborhood kids ice cream from the ice cream truck over the summer. She leaves me notes on my night stand that tell me how much she loves me. She sometimes gestures to me, beckoning me with her hands, so that she can kiss my cheek.

Once, when we were driving in the car, and I saw that she was deep in thought, I asked her what was on her mind. Emma answered, still staring out the window, "I am thinking of my family.....or maybe dolphins."

The sermon on Emma would probably go something like this. God has dreamed of each of us. He has fashioned us from His design. He knew how we would be, at what we would excel, and at what we would fail. And the beauty of it is, He wants it this way. We are each a priceless portrait crafted by the powerful, unchanging hand of God.

My Emma is a masterpiece. She exemplifies perfection clad in transparent pink soccer shorts, despite the aspects about her that sometimes drive me absolutely nuts. But she is not wrong. She is unique in her Godly design, and she is packaged just the way she needs to be, to follow the path already cobbled by God.

I am so flawed. I know this. I know this every time I whisper between clenched teeth, "Emma Caroline, you will be the death of me." Emma, in her pure view of everyone surrounding her, loves. She loves despite the differences in people.

So, if I were to hear the sermon on Emma, I believe the crux of the message would be this: allow people to be who they need to be, and love them anyway. God has blessed each of us with idiosyncrasies. And they exist for a reason.

Now, I wonder what the Gospel according to Emma would sound like. Jesus perhaps would forgo walking on water and swim with the dolphins.

Ordinary

My ordinary
is wrapped
satin ribbons
of ordinary
fluttering
in blue air of
ordinary
I am mesmerized
by the landscape
of ordinary
Until it turns
turns
on a dime
into infinite
memory
into something
that pierces
into the fabric
of living that
makes the recall
of events
a sharp pang of
realization of
change
something
that alters
that takes what
was normal and
shifts it into
concrete lines
of dividing
between
before and
after
of lines
cutting crevasses
into the sane
and leaving
behind a memory
of the pretty
ordinary the
soft angles of
ordinary
the gentle tangles
of ordinary

Lost Letters

I will send a letter
to nowhere to no one
I guess but I hope it
winds up washed into
your gutter in a frosted
bottle note tucked
away inside ink fading
but it would clearly
say what I wished on
thin paper yellow
at the edges
denoting the age
of the message
a timeless idea
something written
in hieroglyphics
lost for ages but
revered when
discovered in the
dark crevasses of
a tomb I want you
to know
to know
to know
but if you
don’t know
perhaps my
letter was never
meant to reach you

Letters of Straw

Write your notes
of warm affection
here where the farmer's
scythe has scalped the
wheat and left hard
stalks weathering
on a plain where the
wind once blew the
grain in mellow ripples.
The harvest has drained
the sea of nimble grass
and left behind this
rough canvas
which is fitting for
your letters. Pick
up your pen and begin:
"Dear, dear",
as the remnants of
a plentiful crop
bring blood to
your hands. I
know it hurts
to write them,
your words,
forming among the
tiny drips of
red on the field.
But see, it hurts
more to read them.
I run my hands over
the bends and loops
of the alphabet
and I prick my fingers
and the feeling is
like that of biting
the inside of your cheek,
painfully sweet,
something you do
over and over.
Thorns among the crops,
your intentions cut
open my skin and
reveal what you
meant all along.

Memory

I'll fly away

In a pew, with light filtering through the stained glass window, I am transported back, back to being a child. I put my hands on the red cushion underneath me, and I am back in the church called Gethsemane, in Martin County, Kentucky, and I am watching my grandfather, along with his sister Florna Bell, singing at the front of the country church, and their voices mingle with that of the small congregation. I am part of that congregation, with my mother and grandmother, and I am at an age between a child and a teenager, that awkward stage, where you are influenced by what surrounds you, and there I was, surrounded by these people six or seven times my age, singing, waving hands in the air.

I'll fly away, oh glory,

This is an old song, a song they usually don't sing nowadays at the church to which I belong, but when the praise band begins to sing along with one person strumming the guitar, I find myself falling through a portal backward, a swift move, and so vivid the place I land, the church, the cemetery behind it, where my ancestors rest, my great parents, Alec and Emma (my daughter's namesake), and the rest of the Cassady's, including Thomas, the patriarch of the family, who found his way into the deep folds of the Appalachian mountains from Virginia in the 1700s. I see them, my family, some distant relatives, and some closer to me, including my grandfather, John Sampson Cassady, and his hands are clasped in front of him, and he sings, with the others, old hymns, mournful but beautiful, and they stand, in stadium fashion, ascending up the cemetery, among the headstones of those who have passed on before them. I stand, a child, looking up at them, singing, and the sky showers blue and clouds over them, and the mountains stand guard and throw the gravestones into shadow.

When I die, hallelujah by and by,

I watch the band play, in my modern church, and I can feel my grandfather next to me. I remember him playing his guitar, the guitar he taught himself to play. I remember him with his Bible in his lap, studying, learning, usually quietly, always by himself. He didn't have a lot of education, but he was wise. I feel him next to me, humming to the familiar tune, one he has sung many times before.

I'll fly away.

As I write this, my daughter, my Emma, questions me, asking about my grandfather who played the guitar. She is tired, she says she is going to sleep, but before she does, she asks if people sleep in heaven. I say I am not sure, maybe we won't be tired in heaven. I tell her that we will all be happy there, and she will get to meet my grandpa, the one who sang at the our little family church in the hills of Kentucky, and played the guitar for his grandchildren. She smiles. She thinks this will be a nice reunion. She falls asleep, and she feels safe.

I am thankful for my church, which always surprises me by awaking in me feelings that have laid dormant in me for a long, long time, and for the deeply profound memories I have of my family, my roots, of things that have molded me. The old things that even now affect me, and even affect my children.

Just Breathe

"Oh I don't want to hurt, there's so much in the world to make me believe.
Stay with me, Lord, I see."
Pearl Jam



Just breathe. Feel the air enter and reach out, growing long, thin tentacles to reach thirsty molecules. Just breathe, in and out, and the world rushes like a top around you, leaving you dizzy and faltering with your hands out to find a stable place. Just breathe, a simple, involuntary act, yet when you hold your breath to make the turning stop, you are forced to take in air at the point that divides being and not being, and you are so thankful to fill your lungs up, like finding the surface after being forced under water. Just breathe, slowly, methodically, as the blur of people you know, and you don't know, and the people you think you know but don't, weave into something abstract (and at this point, a man in a dark, ill-fitting suit is looking at you saying, "I can see the points of pain, in the middle of this mess of people, who may or may not have been important, but clearly there is a point of impact here." He thinks he knows, but you breathe, controlled. He doesn't truly know, in his art head, you. As you proceed and look at the sky, you take in the air of what you know and though it should make sense, the stars circle like they are entering a dark galactic drain, and you blink hard, and shake your head, like rattling a great magic eight ball, in hopes that the right answer will float to the top. "Yes". "No". "Maybe". "Try again later." Just breathe, breathe, the audible sounds of air entering and exiting and grounding you, because in the end the pure element of oxygen, there standing proudly on the periodic table, a big emphatic O screaming, "Look at me, I am a building block of the universe, I am a great Fundamental, I am a reason for Being", is what matters. The breath in your lungs and the beating of your heart. It all comes down to this.

Neverland

Your Peter Pan shadow
Sewn childishly to
The naked balls of
My feet follows
Me everywhere
In the fading wash
Of daylight you appear
And dance long legs
Stretching out in
Front of me
You mimic
In dark motion
Me swift
And clinging
Symphonized and
Yet distorted
Your head appears
Too far away but
In a linear equation
To mine which translates
Into as fast as
Elements approach each
Other they never meet
In the center
Even if they
Seem to