a letter to you

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dear you,

yes, you. you beautiful one, you earth-shaker, you mountain-quaker. you with the feathers in your hair, you with the baby on your hip. you with the tattoos on your skin, you with the long hair and the ankle-length skirts.

you tucked in the corner with the tsk tsk tsk ringing in your ears because you said that one thing too loud when they said to be seen but not heard. 

women of the world, you are real. 

 :: don't let them force you to disappear. 

they're the ones adding millstone to millstone in a necklace of death that will end with a broken-hearted "depart from Me." 

they're all about death, these shadow voices that would rather keep you masked and silent. He was all about life and broken stones with the keys of Hell in His fist.

they made their list and ran off with fists raised high and left Him standing at the table with tears running down and a gentle you left Me behind. 

they don't read the red letters, do they? if they did, they would know that there was a perfume vial --the most expensive, the most precious. and it spilled over His feet as a broken woman with whore on her forehead in invisible ink and invisible fingermarks of men who were not her husband covered her body. and she prophesied to the world of His dying. 

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and that was a woman.

and you are a seeker. 

i wrote it before {here} and i'm writing it again now, word for word.

we are women. we are vessels, full of Him and aching to overflow.

we are brave and strong and beautiful and beloved.

we are more.

///

{this thing of beauty, of strength, of true womanhood has been on my mind these days. i'm praying ceaselessly as a project begins to form in my heart and soul for the coming weeks. would you join me on your knees before the Throne, sisters, for wisdom and grace and so much unceasing might from the Hand of the King?}

red-lettered lowercase

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i went back this morning and searched out the first post i ever wrote here sans capital letters. it was a spur of the moment, unstructured piece called ink of wait that i wrote in august of last year.

and i read that little poem and i cried like i did the day i wrote it, i remember. because oh, i wrote free then.

at the top of the blog of my dear friend, emily, there is a quote. thirteen words.

here is the world. beautiful and terrible things will happen. don't be afraid.

:: frederick beuchner :: 

and that quote grips me in the deep places that only me and Jesus can see. because it's more than just letters, after all. 

it's a fist pounding, a battle cry, a step against. because i am tired of the must-dos that Jesus didn't speak. the way the Church takes every word from their mouths and writes it in red, putting words and confinements into His mouth that taste bitter with sorrow and weigh heavy with impossibility. 

and letters are the first step.

i have turned the words of Mumford and Sons into a worship chant, a far-from-whispered battle march. 

awake my soul

awake my soul

awake my soul

you were made to meet your Maker. 

and that is where i live now. 

living in the red of His blood, and the black and white of truth and mercy. awakening to lowercase letters and unfettered freedom. 

:: releasing.  

Mailbox

And none will hear the postman's knock
Without a quickening of the heart.
For who can bear to feel himself forgotten?
~W.H. Auden

I love the mailman. 

I love running down to my little postbox, slipping the key into the lock, and opening the tiny copper door to find letters personally addressed to me.

I love signing into my email and seeing emails written from one friend to another...personal, without a foolish "chain" or a message full of coupons, packed with trite, impersonal gibberish.

I love the written word, seeing my address hand-penned on an envelope...

...perhaps a few inked embellishments here and there to give the paper more personality than it already inherently possesses. 

I love knowing that someone took the time to sit down and scribble their heart onto the page for my eyes alone. 

It's is a much-loved gesture. 

Of all the movements in this world...

...of all the friendly acts known to the heart of man... 

...there is none so devoted or as timeless as a letter writ in human hand. 

This is something that I will never cease to adore. 

Not even after all the ink has run dry. 

The post office has a great charm at one point of our lives.  When you have lived to my age, you will begin to think letters are never worth going through the rain for.  ~Jane Austen

Lettre

The one good thing about not seeing you is that I can write you letters.  ~Svetlana Alliluyeva


I am a huge advocate for the written word. 


Honestly, as much as I love and rely on technology for communications with the world beyond my own doorstep...


...there is something so heartfelt about a hand-penned letter, placed in a hand-licked and carefully address envelope, and slipped into a mailbox. 


It requires patience and love and a steadfast hand. 


It's a discipline and a virtue, one of which I am a devoted follower. 


I received my first penpal at the tender age of 11 with a little girl I met through a Christian children's magazine...


...and then continued with my letter-writing delights at the age of 14 with a guy friend I met at Family Camp, with whom I still have a wonderful friendship with to this very day.


And now, I have just recently begun a new mailbox-connected friendship with my beautiful friend Grace of Puddles of Memories. 


There is something so entrancing about the idea about sitting down at a table, taking a pen between my fingers, and allowing my thoughts to flow out from me onto the page...


...sharing everything, no matter how trivial, with someone who waits in a different part of the country to hear my soul's musings. 


There is magic in the art of the pen and paper. 


The computer has its delights and its requirements, that is certain. 


But the whispered mystery of the written word...


...novels made of paper, fragrant with ink and unspoken promises of lands to come...


...the scritching sound made as my pen traces across the blank page of a eagerly-waiting journal, aching to fill its empty spaces with teardrops and overwhelming joys...


...letters written in the careful hand of a patient and tender friend... 


These things have held me spellbound all my life.


And regardless of technology,


I would rather hold the words in my palm. 


The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the light of letters, is simplicity.  ~Walt Whitman