anticipating scarcity

{photo by Jennifer Upton

I am vibrating. 

there's really no other description for the way I'm feeling than that. vibrating :: a quivering, a throbbing. it's more than just anticipation. in a sense, it's an overwhelming soul-tremor. 

this season is a cracking. it's foreshadowing of the next season of Holiness, for the breaking and bleeding and the tearing from top to bottom. there will be an earthquake then, too, as angel feet brush against stone. it's an opening in the darkest of places. it's a springing forth in complete darkness. 

there's a reason this is my favourite time of year. it's the time of the year where the darkness is not only expected, it's accepted. there's a word that flutters around the December page on the calender :: scarcity.

but then, that's been a theme over the entirety of 2013. a thousand things happened this year, things that filled me with more conflicting emotions than I thought a person could contain without exploding. there was grief so great it threw me on the ground, there was euphoria beyond my wildest
imaginings. there was loss and love and a mighty settling. but there was a scarcity.

a scarcity of knowing. 

there was peace, even amid the tremors. but there was barely any sort of knowing. and honestly? I'm not expecting 2014 to have any more knowing within it than 2013. I stepped into 1/1/2013 with a word on my tongue: release. and oh, every time I take a word, I wait for the impact. it always comes. and this year was no exception.

{photo by Jennifer Upton}

there was so much releasing. there were times that the letting go was pried from my tightly clenched fingers. I did not want to let go off the house that I was sure was the perfect one, my magic purple dream house tucked in the woods. I didn't want to let my grandmother go, but then, I didn't have a choice on that one, either.

but then, He was a table-toppler. He didn't come to settle into a corner with a cluster of lambs gathered around His feet. He came to stand in the gap, to stretch His arms out and shake things up. but He came in silence, first.

it's so appropriate that we end the year on this Savior-coming note. this Advent, this expectation. that's how every single year ends, wrapping its arms around us and crooning gentle against the ears of our souls.

yes, things will be scarce. and there will be such weeping, and such shouting, and such laughter, and such brokenness that you fear you will never stand again. but breathe, dearheart. there will always be air. and there will always be Me.

my word for 2014 :: it's coming, slowly. it'll be here when it needs to be. things never happen the same way twice. but there will be scarcity, this I know. and maybe it's time that I sat in the light of a candle, incense smoke swirling, and allowed it to settle here with me.

there is a scarcity of knowing. 

but never a scarcity of promise. 

revelation :: i am seeker

{via pinterest}

i've been pondering myself lately. and there's been a lot of poetry, and a lot of searching deep within myself, and such a journey to the mountain. and i found myself among the proverbial pine trees searching for the illusive spark.

and honestly, i'm terrified of this new place that He is calling me toward, stepping one toe in front of the other with my heart thudding louder than any tribal drum and the murmur of the Holy One at my ear

courage, dearheart

for I have overcome

because it was someone dear to my soul that chided all those months ago that not everything can be sacred, and i'm trying too hard to find something that isn't there, and what am i trying to prove anyway?

so it was with shaking trepidation that i found myself one week ago with fingers uncurled and eyes closed and breathing so deeply into my soul. i pressed my palms on the hardwood floor of the yoga studio and curled my toes on the mat and heard my heart whisper low, i am home here.

and i caught myself hesitating to open my heart and strike match to flint and touch flame to wick so that the warm Light beams through every corner, the way He-Who-Sees-Me does in that moment when the dark night of the soul threatens to swallow you whole.

i've written before about the Lion's song, the melodic mantra that blends with my heart's cry to form that strangest sweetest music. and He and i whisper it together under the moon, our own version of the precious breathing that leaves our lungs in a musical hum. it's an om of a different kind, His and mine, one we carved together out of crystals and tears and His own blood poured out when Death fell beneath His feet.

and even as they scorn, i'm putting down roots.

{photograph of myself, courtesy of  nikki jean photography}

:: because i don't want to lose the mystery 

that comes when One is Three, and to die is to Live, and how darkness melts like candle wax in the Light. and i am a seeker, captivated by the moon as she changes and finding myself moving with her in the oddest and most glorious of dances.

i'm not done yet, i am just beginning.

and i am seeker, journeyer, gypsy soul afire.

feather-haired braveheart, i am.
His lioness, i am.

I AM's, i am.

taking flight // incense

i've been making observations about this faith of mine.

little by little, i'm stepping deeper and deeper into the Holy of Hollies, the place now opened from top to bottom when He whispered it is finished. and the ground shook with the intensity of how much He desired me. and now i'm shrouded in veils with Him, a tent in the wild.

and i'm seeking, floating like a mermaid with fingers through the seaweed, sinking deeper and deeper in the water until i close my eyes and let myself drown to be risen again with a new name, a moniker of Light.

:: oh let my prayer 

be counted as incense 

before You

{psalm 141:13}

why do we fear the candlelight and the whispered repeated words and the sweet smell of incense rising to the heavens in a cloud of delicate worship? it's so strange when we look at the words and somehow wrap them up in a Church-appropriate package with a bow on top and pass it out as the only way allowed.

because He went to the mountain for peace be still, and i'm following in His footsteps, or at least i'm learning how to walk that way. for now, i'm riding on the Lion's back like a lamb with a broken leg. and i have a warm blanket for those cold winter nights among the fur trees with the stars above singing His glory.

and i'm drawing a circle in the dirt and sitting there with candles lit around me. and i'm worshiping here in my wilder-ness to the One Who Sees, to the Wild-Maker who tucks feathers behind my ear and whispers

rise up on eagle's wings, daughter
and I will teach you how to fly