The 60-Second Sabbath

grace

  • Scorecard

    God does not keep score. Why do we? Text and image © 2013 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved. Continue reading

  • Carol for the Sixth Day of Christmas

    Candles burn.    Baby cries.Hearts return.    Mother sighs. Church bells chime.    Love arrives.Carols rhyme.    Sadness dies. Snow flakes fly.    Devils fear.Hope revives.    God is here. Text and image © 2013 by Dirk deVries. All rights… Continue reading

  • Feast of Stephen

    Today, the second day of Christmas,    is the Feast of Stephen,the day, you may recall,    when Good King Wenceslas and his pageventured out to help a poor man,    who was struggling to survivethe wind and cold    of a particularly nasty winter night. When you hear or sing this… Continue reading

  • Gifts

    I might bemoanthe babe-obscuring frenzyof the mall at Christmastime:     The perfect gift!    The ultimate gift!    The gift they really want! Gift craving,    gift hawking,gift buying,    gift wrapping,gift giving,    gift returning… I feel gift pressure;I suffer from gift… Continue reading

  • Real Hunger

    The starvingknow real hungeropens the tall doorsto the banquet hall.  Text and image © 2013 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved. Continue reading

  • Thinning Walls

    How thin these walls have become,the walls between youth and age,    between the conscious and the unconscious,    between this world and the next,    between my heart and yours,    between our hearts and theirs. Permeable.Translucent. Through ever-thinning wallsI hear other voices.I… Continue reading

  • Good Friday, 2013

    Train mein the fine and necessary grace    of dying. Teach meto paint the watercolor wash    of my own decay,to draw in delicate detail    my inevitable deterioration,to compose my private melody    of loneliness and loss. Then I shall be ready    for resurrection,to be the me    imagined at the… Continue reading

  • Heresy

    There are no dues to pay.Nothing's to be earned.No merit system exists. To believe otherwise(to live otherwise)is heresy. Text and image © 2013 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved. Continue reading

  • Grace Waits

    They are the golden children,the ones for whom doors open,the ones who face few obstacles.And obstacles–when they do appear–can be stepped over or pushed aside,and turn out to be mere annoyancesthat barely impede their progress. And then, one day,the earth… Continue reading

  • Kindness

    She exhales kindness.It chills me like a whisper,    close by my ear,    unexpected in the dark. Only later do I know itfor what it is:    a light giving,    needed, welcomed,but so gentleit took awhilebefore it dawned: "Ah,that was a subtle… Continue reading