When is the salutation "My God",
More realized
Than when Jesus embraces us
In the reception of Eucharist?
Category Archives: Poetry, Prose & Prayer
Poetry, Prose & Prayer
God on the Horizon
Lord, I rejoice to hear Your Voice
Echoing in my soul.
Through Your Word,
I have come to recognize that Voice
Even amidst the chaos of the world.
“Come to Me”
“Do not be afraid”
“Stand firm”
“Your God is in your midst. ”
Heaven sings “My Lord” on the horizon.
Spanning the day with Your herald,
Coming forth with the
dawn,
His notes color the firmament
In a symphony of splendor.
Playing with hues
As with a pipe organ,
He pulls out the stops in promise,
Until he captures the morn and subdued it.
Making it His own
In the mystery of You, O Lord.
He whispers to listening hearts,
“You are the Light of the world”
With eventide He strides
As Day’s work done.
Then God calls home the Sun.
But not without a closing hoorah.
As over hill and dale,
He paints for fun,
And angelic artists
Shout His blazing Glory.
All is put to bed
‘Neathe a cloak of many colors,
Finally, dimming their voices
In lullabys of peace
To sleep in childlike slumber,
Save for He, Who slumbers not.
God on the horizon,
Sun to sun,
Labor swallowed up in trust,
To await His Coming
In both darkness and the dawn,
All my life long.
©2012 Joann Nelander
All rights reserved
Abiding All the While
We await Your Second Coming, O, Lord,
But, in reality, You have never left us.
Your Body and Blood,
Upon the altar of Your Presence,
Witness to Your People, Your constancy.
Before Your dying upon the Cross,
You prepared a Body for Yourself in the Church,
Embracing those who would soon desert You,
Feeding the Apostles the very Flesh,
That would so soon be scourged.
Giving them as drink,
The very blood to be poured upon the ground,
Staining pillar and the coarse streets of the city,
Whose people had welcome and acclaimed You,
In Your wonders and power,
Only to decry your claim upon their hearts,
And flee to the side of worldly power and might.
Though You never left us,
How soon we forgot You,
You, Who cannot forget
Those You chose to be Your Body on Earth,
And were called to remember You
Upon at the Table of Your Presence
Transforming bread and wine,
To mend and enable a broken people,
To experience Salvation,
In the Divine Intimacy as friends.
Holy Presence,
Remain always in my heart,
That looking inward,
My stained garment may be purified in penitence,
Bleached white in Your Light,
And my eyes behold Your image as Promise,
Wooing me from world and worry.
May Your Second Coming find me with You
In this world or in the next,
As bride with her Bridegroom,
Your beloved beholding Her Love.
©2012 Joann Nelander
All rights reserved
Courts of Praise
This poem was written to express celebration at Easter. Everyday ordinary day is so full of God’s choice blessings, that praise should flow from every corner of the earth. In the deepest darkness, may hope arise through praise of God.
I invite you to linger a while and add a stanza.
Courts of Praise
Thank you, my Lord, for my life long,
For beloved family and friends,
And all dear hearts touching mine.My treasure trove of souls
Spills far beyond my time
To number as my own
Those who have gone before,
Your saints of ages past,
The cloud of witnesses on high
And pure angelic beings
In realms veiled from the eye.There never was a day
In which I was alone,
Nor forgotten
Before Your throne.There, at Your feet,
All heaven sweet anthems raise,
To set celestial hearts ablaze.
My heart, in chorus,
Swells, dilating in love,
Grown great in gratitude.Beside Your All Love,
I make small return.
You count my debt as paid,
And bid me enter courts of praise.
©2011 Joann Nelander
Come Forth
Call to me, loudly command,
When you call me forth
From the grave of my sin,
I rejoice.
When, on the Last Day,
You call me forth from the tomb,
From my burial rest,
I shall jubilantly rejoice.
With the saints,
And angels to cheer me,
Invite and speak my name,
Command, “Come forth!”
Death shall cower and fall away,
And the perfume of sanctity
Attend me.
My cloud of witnesses
Testify to Your many mercies
Showered and shown me.
Then shall my heart sing
And the feet of my testimony dance
To the music of Your Kingdom
And the song of Mary,
Who sang lullabies in my rest
Upon Your breast.
©2012 Joann Nelander
To Love You More
I live to love you more, O Lord.
Until now, O King,
I labored long for little.
I trusted to myself,
And drew life
From diminishing waters.
Famine and draught
Were upon the land,
For Sin had dried the well of plenty.
My nights were beset with worry,
And the day exhausted my meager stores.
I drew my energy
From the food of swine,
Never in short supply,
For the world, the flesh and the devil
Fed upon me,
And left, as my swill, their refuse.
Never satisfied, I cried.
My avarice outstripped my pride.
Only my growing greed kept stride.
Clouds descended
As night became my guide,
For hope is a thing of prayer,
And my prayer ceased
As from the Sun, I’d hide.
Death, the abode of Sin,
Fought to claim its prize,
And I, all but entered in,
Save for a memory,
Gleaned, as I remembered simpler times,
And leaned upon prayers said for me.
How now to thank
That faith-filled lot,
Who pled for me,
And spoke of He
Who bled to free.
I live anew,
Tears, my livery,
Shed in wanting You.
Feasting in abundant banquet,
My bread, Your Body, my Kingly Core,
Now and forever, in Eternity, O, Lord,
I live to love You more.
Copyright 2012 Joann Nelander
All rights reserved
Be Holy! 