joy

  • Another Prayer for Lent

    Let me stretch imagination.Let me break the curve of time.Let me cut through bland conventionto the heart of the divine. Let me say the unexpected.Let me be what's on God's mind.Let me leap to reach the heavenI have faith is… Continue reading

  • Fashion Week

    Along the spare runwayskinny, slack-faced models slouch,whose bodies movebut faces do not. When did the lack of feelingbecome sexy? When did boredom(or is it death)become beauty? Text and image © 2014 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved. Continue reading

  • Twelfth Night

    Now it is Twelfth Night.Beyond the windows,snow falls and darkness encroaches,but the lights of our treebeckon with welcome, joy and hope. Tonight we say farewell to Christmas;tomorrow Epiphany dawns. This year, what has Christmas taught you? Text and image © 2013… 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

  • On the Third Day of Christmas

    All that stuff you've lost through the years–     Barbies and Hot Wheels,    LEGOs and barrettes,    baseballs and golf balls,    jobs and hobbies,    best friends and beloved pets,    lovers and loved ones,    innocence,   … Continue reading

  • Haiku for the Christmas Tree

    Washed in colored lightand tears and memory, I'mundone by wonder. Text and image © 2013 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved. Continue reading

  • Corduroy

    Was going to write something this morning,but then a cat climbs up on my lapand curls into a tight, plump, capital "C,"settling onto the brown, wide-wale corduroyof the bathrobe my mother sewed for meover thirty years ago,and then the cat… Continue reading

  • Existence/Experience

    When my father died,I looked through his vast library,and ran my fingers over the polished surfacesof the furniture he had built,and asked,"What was the point?" Then, when my mother died,I looked at her wall of needlepoint,and thumbed through her boxesof… Continue reading

  • Writing Again

    My muse unleashed, unfettered,roams the grounds like a dog in heat,whimpering, whining, trotting from tree to tree,eager, alert, responding to every new sight, sound, scent,gathering sensations, collecting,distracted always but distilling everything. She returns at dusk,sweaty, tired, sated,flops beside me on… Continue reading

  • Through Me

    Life, live through me,    not shame,        for shame drives us        to cut ourselves,    not fear,        for fear drives us        to cut others,    not perfection,        for perfection drives us        to… Continue reading