Contratimes Writing Tip #2: 'Tis A Game With Lots Of Clues

Try it just this once. Think small, act big. Do not hope for loss. Pray to win. You know you can do it. You just need to try.

There is a God and you think He might be too small to help. Is that what faith does? Does faith quit on the sun, the moon, and the King of them all? Is faith just a dream, naught more than a wish on a lie, a trust in a doubt? Does it quit at the first sight of a storm on the edge of the sea?

Do not let your heart be hard. Lay your sins at the foot of His grace. He will come and give them back to you as gems. Each pearl comes at a great price, but for you, each one is free. All you have to do is pay your debts, which is no more than to ask that your debts be paid. He has paid the price, and you know that to be true, deep in your heart. Why let clouds of fear or the gloom of old pains keep you from the grace that sets all free? The books have been cleared. Sing praise.

How is it that so few love love? Where do these men come from, those who love hate, who hate love? Is hell for them? Who knows? But know that grace comes to those who hate their own hate; who plead for health when death looks like fresh rain. Don’t hide, don’t run, don’t bow your head in shame. Just ask, “Please?” Joy will come on blue and clear wings; it will brush your head and sweep your heart clean, and you will laugh. Feel the breeze that comes on the heels of each word prayed; and know each hand held high shall be held through all time, through all that must come to pass. One hand held is a whole life lived.

We run through closed gates. We chase strength down weak streets. We miss it at each strange turn, near each dark bar. Strength runs just out of reach; it leaps when we fall, as we pant for lost breath. Sweat pours down our frayed grins. We know that the game is His to win if we but let Him. He will come on His own terms. Chase not. Wait. And then take, eat, for this is His flesh; drink, this is His blood (like wine). You know the rules: He is the one who serves, who gives, who grants the grace you need. Just ask. And then bend the knee.

***

Do you not yet see the point? Come. It has to do with depth, strength. It has to do with breadth, with loft, with the great heights found in small things. Can you see it?

We have blind eyes; we have ears drawn shut. We see the big, the grand. We hear a boast and we think it has said all there is to say: Big is best, best is big. If one is good, ten must be grand. That is the lie that has shut our eyes, the song that has left us deaf, the draught that has left us with tongues that can’t taste. Tell me you see it now, please! I beg, I plead!

You know to what I point. Truth does not care for the size of a word. One sound, one word. That is the rule.

Try it just this once. It will not kill you. Think small, write big. Write prose as light as a bird on the wing, a leaf in the breeze, a flake of snow on the tip of the tongue. Watch words spill down the stream of each page you write; and make right your dreams. What truth may come will be up to you, and His grace, and you might just change the world. Who knows? One sound is all it takes to move the ear, the heart. To save from grief.

Turn off the dark. Turn on your light, and let it shine!

(And for those of you who still can’t quite see it, I leave you with this clue: There is just one word of more than one syllable in this whole post [the name does not count]. And yet, with just small words I can write with great depth. Can you find the one word? It sticks out like a sore thumb.)

Peace.

©Bill Gnade 2006/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.
[For more on this topic, see my comments, and two other samples, at Contratimes Poetry. Thanks.]

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