Wednesday, November 09, 2016

Reflections of a Wayfaring Stranger


Here's a poem I wrote back in 2005, when I was waiting in a bus station to complete the last leg of my journey home after six months' mission service in Angola.


Reflections of a Wayfaring Stranger 

Trapped in the tiresome limbo
Of a quiet bus station, I wait…
Rain drips wearily from the sky,
Angry and dull in its gray monotony.
Home is still beyond me,
Hours from this lonely wayfarers’ purgatory.
My love is behind me now,
And many a lonely month,
      Many a distant land,
            Separate us for this yearning moment.
Secluded amidst a crowd of wanderers,
I long to be able to connect,
      To learn,
            To laugh,
To escape this cage through a spark of fellowship,
A single gasp of the divine breath
      That fills us all.
But I am not a bold man,
      Though I wish I was;
And my heart does not flow with fervor,
      The outreaching joy I wish I had.
In times like these, I remember my humanity,
      My frail heart,
            Still so fraught by the fury of small things,
And I know I need His strength.
I am a child, still a child,
And I need my Father’s loving arms.
Only through Him will I ever be
      A man of strength and passion,
            Of peace and contentment,
            Of the tireless wonder of simple things.
But here in this moment I am grateful,
For I know that wherever He takes me,
      Whatever He makes of me,
I will always need Him
      As I need Him now.