A tear for not getting my way, pain,
The things I want…
The dreams never come true…
To offer them is a chore,
A hurt radiating to youth,
A simple reckoning of truth,
A mild submission to will,
Forgive me Lord if I cry.

For all my deeds done,
And undone,
Those in need of undoing,
For deeds never done,
I plead for mercy,
For my imperfections,
Failures and weaknesses,
My omissions,
My hardened heart,
May Your Holy perfection,
Be enough to suffice,
To protect and bless,
All those I have harmed.

Turquoise teal, the lack of mildness,
The sudden shift of desert sands,
A thirst seeks living water,
The sun scorchs,
Heat and dryness forms,
Waves in the air,

A mask removed upon demand,
I needed and there you were,
A life for the taking,
Someone to force into a making,
A figment of imagination,

Who were you to rebel?
To express a voice,
Contained within a wound,
Scratching advanced to clawing,
Blockage one cannot hear,

Day by day,
Notch by notch,
Second by second,
Sprouting imperfection,
Concentration holds steadfast,

A distance must be maintained,
In order to establish distinction,
Sanctifying grace takes time,
The lack of desire, detachment,

Faith, a baby’s cry believes in attention,
Large strong, calloused hands,
Protecting, elevating,
Passing forth to a loving Mother,
The tenderest embrace.

William Butler Yeats

Turning and turning in the widening gyre   
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere   
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst   
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.   
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out   
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert   
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,   
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,   
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it   
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.   
The darkness drops again; but now I know   
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,   
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,   
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Fr. Thomas Lequin

’Shadow’

The dark shadow
of the red barn
cast by the bright moon.

Only with light
does
darkness become.

Flood me in
Your light, Lord,
that I may face my shadows.

’Hanging On’

He held to the Cross,
blood drops nourishing the earth.
Plant your garden here.

’As For Me’

Northern Maine was my home
before I arrived.
It was what I was all about
all my life
even when I wasn’t living here.
Someday
I will walk into the woods
and become an oak tree,
be cut down
and made into a cross.

Thomas Lequin is a priest in Maine, who is also a farmer, Maine Master Guide, hunter, fisherman, and poet. His work has recently appeared in Iodine Poetry Journal, Anglican Theological Review, Iconoclast, Echoes, The Whirlwind Review, The Daily Bulldog, Church World, A Parallel Universe, The Alembic, and an anthology of contemporary animal poetry, The Wildest Peal (Moon Pie Press), Presence: A Journal of Catholic Poetry.

Barn watercolor painting Norma Thomas-Herr
Walk in the woods watercolor by Larry Golba, my junior high school art teacher

We perceive that only through utter defeat are we able to take our first steps toward liberation and strength. Our admissions of personal powerlessness finally turn out to be firm bedrock upon which happy and purposeful lives may be built…self-indulgence and permissiveness, when I came to realize that, by myself, I could do nothing to overcome…I realized I had no recourse except surrender. In surrender I found victory – victory over my selfish self-indulgence, victory over my stubborn resistance to life as it was given to me. When I stopped fighting anybody or anything, I started on the path to sobriety, serenity and peace…I will discipline myself. I will do this disciplining now. I will turn out all useless thoughts. I know that the goodness of my life is a necessary foundation for its usefulness. I will welcome this training, for without it God cannot give me His power. I believe that this power is a mighty power when used in the right way…I pray that I may face and accept whatever discipline is necessary. I pray that I may be fit to receive God’s power in my life.

Faith……….conviction
Hope………dreams
Love………achievement
Oh Holy Mother within my lack of words,
Recognize my weariness,
Praying with a statue still,
Easing into a tone set apart,
Your face radiates, transforms,
A hint of something unknown, masculine,
Eyes closed, cheekbones, and countenance,
Motherly love unified, an aspect you took upon,
Grace, reflecting to the best of abilities,
Changed in appearance, you took on the look
of your Son,
Intimate consequence, you became full,
Fullness and overflowing, a virgin’s kiss.