Hold Control

Burned.

Taken down by my desires.

Purpose drained and ability cut off.

Nothing to write. My words are dry and stale, brittle to the touch and bitter in my mouth. I call to You with words, but what am I when what is left of me is emptiness and pressing silence? There is nothing I can say that will make me whole, will make You feel any less distant.

We want the truth in this world, but when we hear it, we turn our ears in disgust. This can’t be real, we marvel. This life cannot be so raw.

Oh, but it is. And You alone hold control of the chaos. Discord, hideous beasts crowding the caverns of our minds, where we huddle close together to ward off the damp fear that slices under our clothes, straight through our skin. I reach for pen to convey what the rest of the world surmises, but it explodes to my touch, ink spouting a geyser that streams across my once white fingers.

How dare I think I can solve the world’s brokenness in a sentence. String together differences and disappointments, pierce souls with feelings they only dare to glance at in the dark. I am no better in my writing than the biggest braggart who struts this earth.

Humility does not become me, yet You force this cloak over my shoulders time and time again. Drain me of my musing, carve out hollow closets in my heart. When I push my mind to write, blank pages torment me with jeering screeches, electric eyes. Make a mockery of what talent I once hoped to possess.

You can drag me to the deepest depths, squelch my breath straight from my lungs and leave me anchored under the surface as long as You desire. You are You. You have permission to do as You please.

But tell me, what do I do when I come to the end of myself, when all my fight is depleted? When I no longer look to words, nor seek to solve the inside torment of my soul? As I begin the delicate process of shutting down and caving in, when I do not even care that words have gone, when do You arrive? Because You fall so distant at my door, the timid parts of me begin to believe You will not come again to set me straight. Goodbye words. Goodbye heart. Goodbye self in concentrated stubbornness rubbed raw. Coherent thoughts washed away, flesh so despairingly unraveled.

Where do You begin when I have no reach? How can I stake my claim in new earth, gentle musing, when I can’t get past the blankness?

Call forth fresh wind, clean canvas. Bookmark the page between chapters I have lost, what I cannot write with my own hands. All has failed me. You cannot. Make all this death worth living through.

My pages have stained, stuck. Take my muteness and give voice to all I do not say. Find a space that has not blotted and start Your own verse within the black. You can deplete me as You see fit. But also You can begin to fill my lungs with lines that I have only ever dared to form in the deep solitude of my being.

You’ve cut the timber of my heart, but I hope that what burns in charred embers smolders greater sparks than first emitted.