Sandra Heska King

daring to open doors

To Greet the God in Me

By

Within the fence I limp

searching for my soul

past faded cones and

seeds still clinging to the tree

past algaed walls and

rubbled piles of loss

and buried dreams

a grendeled past

of fear

and shame.

And though I wear

the helmet of a king

and carry a sharp sword

I look for just one small stone

ground smooth by murk

of work

and not enough

to sail it straight

toward broken image

cloudy vision

to find the rest

and kiss the life

to be

and

greet the God

in me.

In the middle of the road of my life
I awoke in a dark wood
where the true way was wholly lost
~Dante

Joining my friend Lyla and the Tweetspeak Poetry gang in the study of David Whyte’s The Heart Aroused. Or maybe I should just say I’m trying to absorb it.

 

 

Comments

  1. Lynn Mosher says

    Awesome, Sandra! I love the images your words paint in my head. I have one question: grendeled? I looked it up and it said a man-eating monster defeated by the hero Beowulf. Is that what you meant?

    • Sandra says

      Yes, indeed. The author uses the poem as a metaphor for confronting not just our deepest fears but the source (mother) of those fears–those things that keep us from embracing our creative selves.

  2. L.L. Barkat says

    awesome that this inspired a poem!! 🙂

    I loved these chapters. I feel like I need to go on a week’s retreat simply to begin processing what they gave me 🙂

    • Sandra says

      Maybe that’s it for me. Not so much that I can’t grasp all he’s saying–just that there is so much at one time.

  3. Simply Darlene says

    Ah, I don’t have the book, but plan to follow the results of the study.

    This poem summary is great… the shape, the sound, your voice, the message, all of it.

    Blessings.

    • Sandra says

      Thanks, Miss Darlene. 🙂 But I do wish you were reading, too. I’d love to read your responses. You make me think. You make me smile.

  5. Amy @ themessymiddle says

    The stone referenced at the end reminds me not only of David but also in Revelation 2 (I believe) — where we will be given a stone with a new name written on it! (Now I’m wondering about other ‘stone’ references in the Bible.)

    • Sandra says

      I did actually think of David and Goliath, Amy. Standing up to those monsters. 🙂

  7. Lyla Lindquist says

    I keep thinking of this “grendeled past,” Sandy. I love that. I really do. To me, looking back on all the things I hate and fear though it’s behind me, still following me around and haunting me… Maybe that’s not what you meant, but that’s just me. 😉 And I love that you did this as a response to the chapters. I wish I could do that!

    • Sandra says

      Great minds think alike. And I think of that junk pulling me down and under. I wish I could have written a response like you did. 🙂

    • Sandra says

      Thanks so much, Charity. I actually read the first two chapters–but oh my. There’s so much there. I pulled out some words and phrases I liked, walked several times around my yard, and this is what happened.

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