In this Lent, Spring
threatens with her breakthru
of new life amidst showers,

but in these moments
I am mindful
of a different

turning…a journey.

a journey with Jesus
into the wilderness,
a place not unfamiliar

and yet each time I venture there
I am surprised by places that seem
so known to me and yet are not familiar

wilderness spaces never seen
despite my sojourns long and weary
oh, I know the dry topographythe landmarks’ names
(suffering, disappointment, doubt, sin)
caress my heart like tattoos

darted into my soul with ink invisible.

I want to rush thru the wilderness
to get to the other side and done
but am compelled to burrow deeper…

into deaths and deprivations
like the Shepherd did when He took nothing with Him
in that desiccated place.

in this wilderness of unmet needs,
what shall I do?
Where will I turn?

I dig deep for water but tap only the dust.
I seek to meet my howling needs in my own time and place
but all my clever methods only blow up in my face

and once again this journey ends
beneath that shadow long, that mark,
beneath the cross that stands so tall, so stark,
so still…

it can’t be circumvented or avoided,
it cannot be escaped, or null and voided
it’s the entrance and the exit all at once.

and once again anew I realize
that the suffering of the wilderness
transforms us, shapes, delivers us

into the resurrection
and the naming of our soul.