You Are God

You are God
Wholly Other,
Yet Your humanity
Embraces me
By sacrament.

You are the Head,
The Church, Your Mystical Body,
And in it
I wash my robes,
To take on
The Infant Life of Christ,
Wholly dependent,
Yet gifted
With abundant blessing.

You are God,
Wholly Other,
My Father receives me,
Clothed in the living Flesh
Of the beloved Son.

Copyright 2012 Joann Nelander
All rights reserved

Cohabitator Vows

New Song

Love and praise hold hands.
Happy hearts rejoice.
Song rises from the multitude,
As lives lived in faith believing.

The Just sing with their being,
Resplendent and resounding love.
Praise embodied in saintly flesh.

New song, New Day,
New creation,
In harmony with Heaven
A symphony of faithful, forgiven witness.

Alleluia.

Copyright 2012 Joann Nelander
All rights reserved

Lord of All

Lord of all joy,
Lord of all sorrow,
Lord of plenitude and might,
Lord of hunger and suffering,
In Your Humanity,
You embraced all,
And elevated Mankind,
Giving the highest dignity
To our race,
Which, without You,
Is little more than beastly,
Roaming and devouring
Without hope or holiness.

Your Father waits
To embrace His wayward sons.
We, the Prodigal, are welcomed
To His open arms,
Arms You, Jesus, gave
The Father on Your Cross.
There with abandonment of Spirit,
Willingly nailed to His Will,
You raised helplessness
To heights of Mystery,
And consummate fulfillment.

We rush to You,
In delight,
As the Spirit
Once rushed upon David,
Caught up to the heavens,
Returning love for the Love
That saves and frees.

Alleluia!

© 2012 Joann Nelander
All rights reserved

Food For the Poor

Lord, make my ears
Hungry for Your Word.
Give me a living relationship
With Your Father,
Who Fed You
In solitude.

May every Word He Speaks
Resound in my spirit.
May it nourish me,
Sustaining me,
As all, worshiping the world,
Suffer famine,
For want of Faith.

With Bread comes
Health and vigor,
Power to feed others
With the Food You give me
Daily at Your Table.

I listen for Your call
I listen for Your footsteps.
I hear You,
In the breaking
Of Your Word.
Bread for the hungry world.

The Lord’s Joy

The Lord’s joy
Is my strength.
He persuades my heart
By gentleness.
His mercy is a fountain
Of inner mirth,
Springing up in all seasons,
To temper my sorrow,
To pour oil into my wounds,
To salt my friendships
And to delight the Father,
Who sees me
Running after His Son,
And dancing with David’s abandonment.

May I be the dimple
In Your smile,
Appealing as the uplifted arms
Of a child,
And the innocent sleep
Of a baby.

Gladness be my swaddling,
That You may
Impart to me
The power the weak
Have to touch
The Heart of God,
Accepting always
His Loving will.

Copyright Joann Nelander 2012