The Ache

Stumbling through the winter woods at dusk
Is the perfect grounds for a spiritual meeting.
Dusk is the in-between of day and night and this weather--
The constant shifting of lukewarm to cold to lukewarm again.
And so I find myself here, too, always shifting--
Oscillating between celebration and lament and despair and hope and 
All states in-between as I feel
The vastness of the world around me and my own experience. 

And I open myself to truly feel what I have been suppressing and 
Hiding away in little compartments within me that allow me to convince myself that
Everything is going super well and I am doing super well and everything is super well
When in actuality I feel an aching so intense it is steeped into my bones and pores and 
I don't know how to get it out. 

An ache.

An ache to be intimately seen. To be intimately known. To be intimately understood.

Is this the ache of loneliness? Or is this just an ache that's reflective of all of humanity? An ache that's reflective of a creation groaning, awaiting that which will satisfy the deepest longings. An ache that awaits the Messiah's return where all of creation will be rejoined in intimate communion with the Creator. 

I am a creation groaning. 

I am a creation groaning.

My breath a fragile prayer as I walk the crisp path--
Stumbling, searching, aching.
Aching.
Aching.
And I cry out "My God!" because it's all I know how to do 
When the ache is all too much and I find myself 
Nearing the end
Or at the end
It's all the same when you're there
In a state of embodied desperation
Ache.

It's sound tickled my ears before I could see it, and
My head jolted up from the path, trying to locate the sound.
Something about this sound was touching the deep ache--
The ache of loneliness, of not feeling known.
It was a steady stream of soprano, and I yearned to see it.

I know not why you speak to me in the water, only that you do.
And this time was no different as I stared at the small trickle of water
And my heart breaks and I begin to weep and sob 
Because in the trickle I know that  
You see me and that you know me and that you understand me
And that you know the cadence of my heartbeat
More intimately than anyone
And always will.

A sweet phrase through the tears said aloud, "You're my friend."
A phrase so simple and yet so profound.
A knowing that you care.
That you see.
That you know.

*  *  *

I am a creation groaning,
But you always give manna to sustain.