Eternal Melodies in the Cathedral of Compassion

The spears of sorrow pierce the worried brow
As hatred's flames within the heart do grow
Though preached the words of love and peace aloud
Deeds speak the truth that tongues cannot bestow
So tired am I of those who smile and scowl
With scripture's sword but not its spirit show

False guides who lead the blind into a pit
Their aching souls left hungering and split
Bound by the chains that bigotry has knit
No freedom found, no wings with which to flit    
Lost in the smoky maze which eyes does grit
While mouths cry "Glory!" and deceit does spit
On broken hearts who plead for just a bit
Of love and grace, but find they do not fit
The ready mold that makes hypocrisy's kit

Like ravenous wolves in harmless fleeces hid
These false apostles feast on souls unfed
With love's pure milk that strengthens hearts amid        
The storms of life, and gives the weary bread
Of understanding kind that heals and bids
Them come find rest, with gentle words instead
Of judging looks and accusations dread
They shut the door of hope on souls misled        
And drive away the lost with rules long dead
That cannot fill the ache so many dread
Within their souls, that seek for something real
Beyond the words that they have always read

My heart is grieved for ones so harshly used
Whose deep desire for meaning is abused
By those who should have been the hands that soothed
And showed the way to truth cannot be fused
With hate for anyone, if rightfully viewed
But they speak daggers, while their hands are bruised
With pounding scriptures, forcing twisted news
Of hurt on hearts, while crying they've been loosed  
From legal chains, as if their fight’s now fused
With God's own cause, when love they have refused
And mercy lost, while judgment fierce accrued
To pound all those who disagree into
Submission under creeds that leave them blue
With brokenness not healed but hidden from view  

I weep for innocents and thinkers free
Both smashed alike under cruelty's decree
Declared as heretics for daring see        
Beyond the veils of dogma's tyranny
Questioning the rules and groping for the key
To life and hope beyond conformity  
Punished for seeking their own identity
Apart from parents, church or nationality
Told they must comply or treated as the enemy
Of the faith, while executors act so piously       
As if their hatred saves integrity  
When truth it murders and crushes diversity
Of thought, expression, gender, sexuality         
My heart breaks for all whose identity
Is not allowed, but persecuted constantly

The juries of the just, who regulate
The boundaries of love, and indicate
Who is in, out, the saved ones from the lost fate  
Of sinners and transgressors who berate  
The truth with questions, seen as those who hate  
The righteous judgment handed down, so great  
It seems to them, but I can only state
It shuts the doors of hope and compassion shut
Leaving no way but darkness, fear and utter        
Desolation in its wake, as futures flutter       
Away, and ache remains inside to utter  
A mindless cry against divine love's mutter  
Judgment is mine, the Lord requires death for sin
But where is the still, small voice pleading to win   
People with love, break down the walls within  
Open up windows, let the light stream in   
Offering peace to all, life to begin
Again, forgiveness breaking condemnation's din?

So tired am I of dogma's either/or
That boxes people in groups fixed and poor  
No movement allowed from the place assigned before
Born into borders, branded true or whore
Given no choice but categories concrete, immortal  
Love must comply with rules stupid and oral  
Books and buildings cage the Spirit's soaring portal
To life beyond yet discovered or explored at all  
Religion's gravity has spirituality fall  
Into its orbit circling, when it should forestall  
Confining truth to tiny frames withstanding spiritual force none      
How can mystery be defined and completely captured within words of men?  
Must break openagain and again old wineskins cracked, restrain Holy Ghost's ken           
Lest new wine of now, ever expanding meaning, bursting limits, cannot be contained again

If scripture and spirit oppose, I must suppose
That human words fall short of truth that grows
Beyond their reach, and cannot be enclosed  
By laws and lines; God's love too overflows
The banks constructed to control the flows  
Of grace that spreads, to all its goodness shows  
Not just the few who strict requirements chose
To wall themselves off in, and fiercely oppose  
Any trespass on their small, self-righteous enclosure  
Hating all outside their definitions narrowly composed  
I cannot follow rules made long ago that goodness erodes  
By creedal tests determining who's in, out, less than, more than
Love's meaning grows; how can we pretend that it is frozen?

Love is my scripture, but it will not stand
Still long enough for me to understand
Its depths and beauty, mystery too grande
Captured within my creeds so weak and bland
Compared to knowing loving first hand  
Walked out daily, given a heart unmanned  
From hatred's siege, to all lives understand
Empathy embracing every place I land  
No longer tracing lines rules demand  
But letting go to where Love's currents strand  
Me new horizons found beyond the planned  
Maps of dogmas tight, unknown places now expand  
Before my sight, Gift of Prescence beyond human words commands

I cannot say that love's boundary lies there
And judge beyond that line to be unfair
Claiming holy vision, when I barely share  
A fraction of the truth that holds up flares  
Lighting unknown realms whose secret stairs
Lead far beyond the boxes built on dares
To capture timeless God within confines that wears
Away infinite meaning, till worthless is the pitiful frame that squares  
Off holy, squeezes down the Beyond to what doctrines can bear
Rather than opening up insights to show how much grander
Reality must be than present truth we understander  
How much higher and wider the Mountain's vistas for the climber!
Let go of handles, breathe thinner air, lose balance, trust the Guide

Those daring ascent on love's ragged peak
Find questions grow, old answers cannot seek  
To hold them now, as light starts to seep  
Into their eyes, opening world so deep
Below the clouds that hid it, unbelief  
Or fear of falling fading, as they leap  
Into the arms of Sacred Mystery
That catches and holds them lovingly  
As talons of the true set spirit free  
To explore its inner depths, and come to see  
Unity below all diversity  
Of thought, expression, ethnicity  
Gender, orientation, sexuality  
All part of one shared being, breathe the same air
All worthy of compassion, nothing to fear
In otherness, but beauty glowing there

How can I say what family love must be
Confined to bonds of gender, nationality
When love bursts all bonds of identity?  
Who can define which loves grant dignity  
And which get called unnatural travesty?
The heart speaks its own tongue, wild, primal and free       
Knows paths unseen by minds that disagree
With its direction, senses destiny  
Beyond the maps of human history  
Leading to love past all ability  
To humanly explain loves mystery  
No mind can trace heart's intricate tracery  
Lines interweaving lives so intricately
All are connected in love's tapestry
Woven on earth and through eternity         

Love writes its law upon the heart within
No outward document can discipline  
Or force this flow of spirit to begin
A journey mapped by someone else's vision
Love opens up our eyes beyond our prison  
Of time and space and creed, bids us listen
To melodies and visions we've not heard  
To free us to new landscapes, unseen, unstirred  
By mortal mind, but only by love's word
Whispered within, beneath dogma unblurred,  
Still speaking through the texts though unconcurred
With by human courts that have deferred
To latter rules, not love, love still undeterred     
From seeking those who truly have seen and heard
Its call to freedom, though their flight seems weird
To those who as yet have not seen or heard

How can I stand atop my temple's steps
And looking down, see all the lost as threats
To truth's security, whose surveillance keeps
Me safely in, all aliens out, heart weeps
At their damned state, though their baby still sleeps
In mother's arms as we did, love still seeps  
Into each soul the same, no relation ceases
Based on gender, nation, creed. Our pieces
Fit together in life's puzzle that increases
Beyond borders we defend. My soul releases  
Judgment of any heart that true love pleases
I can no longer view life's tapestry through lenses
Of approved colors only, discarding the rest God comprises
The whole includes each thread and beam love's prism supplies

Love's light shines through a myriad glass, yet binds  
The radiant hues together, no color blinds
The others out. Love's beauty intertwines  
Each hue, weaves harmony of all kinds
No original primordial strand divines  
The whole design, but every thread combines  
To make the beauty, all are of kind  
No lesser tint within the divine
Kaleidoscope where glory undefined  
By human minds, kaleidoscopic life is ground and refined
Prism refracting neonatal light, unconfined
To human eyes' narrow glimpse of glory behind  
Curtains of flesh, drawing aside reveals design
Interconnected, web of life each affects in ways unconfined     
To our knowledge, all are needed for song sublime

The tapestry unfinished has gaps still  
Waiting for their thread to help fulfill
The pattern plaid, though the workers' will
Cannot yet see how the holes distill  
Or shape the flaws within their vision till
New strands are added changing outlines, still  
The weavers cannot see beyond their skill  
To weave the threads already at their sill  
They think the plan complete, their duty nil  
To welcome different threads, until life spills      
New colors in they'd never thought to swill  
Within the brew, until the drink they'd fill  
Turns out the best wine ever served, its taste to thrill
All who imbibe life's vintage, harsh judgments spill      
Away, as chalice of humanity hosts new colors, all to fill

How can I reject a strand of brilliant hue?
Declare it worthless, claim it has no clue  
How it might help complete a pattern new  
And wonderful, when I cannot construe      
The whole beyond my tiny point of view?
Who am I to judge the value true
Of threads I cannot even see beyond a few  
Rows near at hand, declare them misconstrue  
The pattern that beyond me will ensue?   
How dare I limit beauty by my own poor sense of hue?
Cannot see how far the weaving artwork ranges
Beyond my grasp, the final vision estranges
Me by its grandeur, intricacy that changes       
All I imagined before, my small life hinges
On one thin string when through eternity love's singing changes

O let me not pull out one strand as odd
One color wrong, discordant with my plod  
Along the rows, not fitting with the squad  
Of friends surrounding me whose paths have trod  
For years together, treads now set concrete like gods  
Cannot imagine how new shades rearrange the facade  
Of the old building into concepts strangely brand new facades     
Never envisioned within my creeds strict parameters laid
Colors blending into stunning stained glass windows portraying stories untold  
Expanding temple walls to horizons expanding manifold  
New tapestries adorning rooms with tales eternity has still to unfold
Who am I to refuse the weaver's skill a strand bright and bold?   

I do not own the factory floors where life's looms run
I cannot see the patterns time's shuttles will have done
To weave the fabric universe has barely yet begun  
How threads will come together, none but Love knows what strands blend as one
I own not even tiny swatch but sit at single station minor, none
With wisdom owed to me, my knowledge less than speck in the divine sun
That lights up worlds whose wonders to me have not yet been shown
Humble take I my place as thread I am, both part and yet alone  
Not knowing how I fit within the grand design by Love's hands sewing  
But praying deepest colors in the spectrum around me will keep life's fabrics glowing

The chorus of creation sings in undertones and overtones resounding  
In harmonies unheard within my narrow melodies so limiting and bounding  
The greater song within and over me, all around me, notes above and beneath grounding
This life in music cosmic seething, screaming, whispering, resounding  
How dare I claim that melodies outside church doors are alien discordant wounding
The hymns I know by heart, when symphonies surround me new songs flowering unfurling
Beyond my range to hear the whole or plumb its depth, my eyes see blurring
While ears strain to choruses stretching imagination, sweeping, swirling
In glory only glimpsed through windows opening to skies beyond my universe swirling
With music divine exultant, colors blending, meanings ever unfurling   

Beyond the walls built brick by brick to shut out cries of pain
Inside, choruses of triumphal praise the conquerors still maintain
Righteous in their judgments against outsiders who complain  
At their indifference to agony outside domains  
They claim as holy, crying glory while others cry in vain  
For respite, solace, bread or cloak, just a touch of humane  
Acknowledgement of agony, not lashes of disdain
For crossing lines ruled sacred, bounds drawn tight as if God deigns    
To care about the boundaries human prides and fears maintain   
Not hearing cries beyond creeds coined, they sing refrains
Of glory while hell surrounds their worldly paradise contained
Within walls blocking outPlease listen to the cries outside the gate

Open up to let the world in, share your bread, make friends don't hate  
Tear down the bricks between us, we can reshape sacred space to celebrate  
Our common dreams and struggles, help each other navigate  
This journey to awakening, let spirit flow, collaborate  
In justice flowing down like waters, opening the narrow gate  
Walls remove that block compassion, innovation liberate
From calcified creeds splitting east from west, dawn unite with sundown late  
Walls dismantle between class and race and gender, between straight  
And queer and trans, let “other” be embraced into the fold to recreate
The realm of God where there is room for all, no one stands outside their fate  
Of belonging to the family of life together, holy love made incarnate

I pray these walls of bigotry will crumble at the trumpet's blast
The march of Love break through the bricks hate uses to contrast
Who's in from out, as mighty rivers long damned up flow fast  
Around obstructions stubborn resisting the flood flowing past
To cleanse and make community where separation cannot last
Love's tides surge in, salving wounds unchanged for centuries amassed   
Together sing aloud, let requiems of the dead be sung at last
The lost, forgotten lives trashed in baths of hate, hidden undercast
By laws, lies, violence and fear.  But nothing human can abide steadfast
Against the floods of Holy Spirit alive at last, transforming outcast  
Into beloved members of the banquet, family united new founded fast       
On love overturning rules of law and religion weaponized to blast
Apart humanity, now opening up our arms so none are passed
By any longer, all embraced, transfigured by grace abounding, sins unmasked

I dare no longer claim my church has heavenly vision
When blind it seems to pain beyond beliefs bounding
While banking on theologies of glory, salvation winning  
For chosen frozen few who gained perfection stunning  
The rest abandoned outside creeds confining and blinding  
Shouting matches raise the rafters disputing doctrines binding  
Damnation, salvation, who's worthy of love past finding       
Walls up to truth or grace while outside, creation is unwinding  
Along with human hearts yearning for care intertwining  
Unity, spirit mutual sustaining, according each dignity shining  
While rule books lay laws judging most souls unredeemable, pining  
In hell forever for finite flaws, love defined so narrow confining

Let risk breaking free from prison of human ideologies made
To seem so solid, resolute as rock, be not afraid
To doubt the claims to have found truth that will not fade
How can time-bound minds pretend eternities mysteries they've weighed
And comprehended, grasped complete truth never changing, only one facade
Faith must wear, when life and meaning still evolving, God's face has many sides    
Can never be fully known, described or circumscribed
Within neat boxes of beliefs like insects pinned inside
For doctrines' collections, as if living truth could reside
Within dead words definitive, end questings, close curiosity seeking to open wide  
New realms, but foolish sure it knows now.  How much more exists to yet explore, abide  
In light and life and love little sampled, unknown, than church doors hide
Away claim sole possession of, judgments keep out, from seeking open eyed
 
Break open minds rusted shut by fear of uncertainty, gaze inside
Sanctuaries of divine within, beyond words to reside
Let go into Presence, the uncreated, uncontained but every space abide
The Light behind light, within, beyond all sides  
No image or thought holds, yet is here.  
Time dissolves in this space undefined   
Beginnings and endings cease, doubts are stilled, sight can be blind  
To old scenery but still see, like fog lifting