Missing

Yesterday I opened my journal.

Nothing was there.

Last night I looked through a telescope.

Nothing was there.

I dreamed you lay beside me, but

You were not there.

This morning I looked in the mirror.

No one was there.

Wherever you are, I hope I am there too.

Certainly, I am not here.

 

Eventually

I keep telling myself I will move on from this space.

I mean to.

Truly.

This last week I made the 1100+ mile drive from San Antonio to Denver.

Maybe that was a good start.

But if my physical relocation seemed a long distance to travel, I tremble at the emotional journey in front of me.

When will the dreams stop?

When will I quit looking back?

When will my heart again smile?

[and the ultimate question…] when will I start writing again?

There is so much I have vowed to never utter.  Things you will never know.  (It’s none of your damn business anyway).

But this won’t matter to you, True Friend. You don’t care to know the details. You don’t care to offer advice.

You are my silent companion.

When the time is right you will speak.

Until then you quietly accompany me.

Some day I will break open, speaking things not yet heard.

You will be there.

You will receive.

But the time is not now.

Not here.

I have not yet returned to The Present.

Don’t rush me.

The Truth of Things

I am waiting on the laundry to dry.  Then I’ll leave. Again.

Sitting in this house feels odd.

The place I have so willingly surrendered.

How empty it now feels, and not only because I am here alone.

 

I know I said Goodbye already.

This is quite unlike me.  I hate long goodbyes.

Normally I get through Goodbye as quickly as I am able.

 

I made that mistake with Andrew.  Never again would I speak with him face to face.

Of course I did not know that then.  Still. I hate how quickly I turned my back and left.

 

I had no intention of returning here.

But this is home.

For nearly a decade this has been my home.

Perhaps not these four walls or this URL, but “here” is so much more than time and space.

I have tried to stay away. I have no energy left to do so.

This is home.

I don’t know how I will ever again find another.

 

There are so many things I want to say.

So many things you would not understand.

So many things you will never know.

You will only let yourself know as much as you want to know.

Even then it will only be bits and pieces.

Maybe a little is enough.  Maybe enough is too much.

 

This is not the place to air the laundry.

That’s happening in the other room.

Here is simply a place of being and belonging.

 

This is not a place of justifying or explaining.

The truth is the truth, no matter how much of it is hidden or tainted.

Still…

Some things will never be known.

Never explained, qualified, or given context.

These things will forever be locked in my heart.

They will die with me, or perhaps I with them.

(I am no longer certain whether our Souls are within us, or we within our Souls.)

 

This has always been a place of honesty.  Even when it was not recognized.

It has always been a place of bleeding.  Even when the wounds were ignored.

It has never been a place of retaliation. Dare I cast a stone?

 

No.

This is a place to be.

Just Be.

I hope the dryer buzzes soon.

I need to carry on.

Goodbye

I miss blogging.

I do.

But the time has come to move on.

I don’t mean so much the act of blogging as the URL on which my blogs land.

The end has come for the preacher’s husband.

Maybe I saw it coming.  Maybe I was in denial.

Some moments I think I tried everything, and the next minute I am on all fours, face inches from the past, scanning every conversation- every word spoken, looking for where I went wrong (other than the glaring, obvious mistakes).

Maybe we were past the point of return, though I still don’t believe that.  Not for a second.  But what can I do?  (That is rhetorical question, I am sick of free advice… and the stuff I am paying for too).

It’s been six months since I have consistenly blogged.  I am not ready to start up again.

Everything I ever learned about God, relationships, prayer, or love has been all but tossed out the window.

This is zero-based budgeting at its best.

So what do I know?

 

 

**************************************

 

 

 

• My name is Nathanael James Renfro, a “gift from god.”
• I was born in Norman, OK on February 8, 1987.
• I share my parents with three brothers and three sisters.
• I have a nephew named Coen, and a dog named Addie.
• I like lots of things, but a Piano makes my heart melt.
• I am currently riding the third wave of coffee.
• A. A. Milne is my favorite author.
• “Little Women” is my favorite movie.
• Sandra Bullock was my first celebrity crush…
• Michale Caine is my current one (interpret as you will).
• I am morbidly afraid of nursing homes (and can’t quite yet appreciate the irony in that).
• Bearing my Gran’s coffin was the single greatest honor of my life.
• I buried my best friend in November of 2007.
• I am in love with Kyndall Rae, The Preacher
• We are getting divorced.
• This is goodbye

 

 

 

 

“Rivers know this: there is no hurry.  We shall get there some day.” ~Winnie-the-Pooh

 

How Things Go

Time is a despicable thing.

It runs, then slows, but goes

Always on. It doesn’t wait.

It doesn’t hurry. It doesn’t

Stop, so it never starts.

When did it start?  Where

Did it go?  All those times

I now hold in memory?

I don’t like things that go,

You might could tell.

I like to move slow, and

Slower still.  Come to think

Of it, I like to stop, and

Watch other things go:

Like the trickling creek,

And paths of shadows;

Toddlers toddling, and

Waddlers waddling – ducks

I mean! Down at the lake.

They’re so silly, how they go.

I once had a pocket watch-

The hand stopped ticking.

“Poppa”, I asked,  “did time

Stop Going?” He replied

“Perhaps, my son, what

Now should we do?

Sit silent and still?  Should

We stop too?”  Back then

I thought this not wise

At all. But now that I stop

To think on it, perhaps I shall.

Dark Side of the Moon

When I was young I looked at the moon

Night after Night.

Waxing. Waning. Full. New.

Little eyes straining

To see The Man from Earth’s view.

“But what of the other side?

The half I cannot see.

What’s it like?

The dark side of the moon?”

 

When I was young, grandpa sang

Songs of the stars,

Planets, Comets, Galaxies.

Celestial Melodies.

Constellations of harmony.

“Tell me tales of time,

Stories of space.

I want to know more. More. More.

 

As I grew older, enduring

Revolutions and Rotations,

Curiosity quelled not, nor

Wonder weakened.

Philosophy, physics,

All intrigued me. I vowed

To learn the whys and hows.

 

I studied, read, learned

All I could. Dreaming

grand things for my life.

“Aim for the moon,

you’ll land in the stars.”

So I believed with all my heart.

 

Now I am a man

Still searching. Learning.

Yearning for the answers

Avoiding my grasp.

Youth’s vigor gives way.

 

In my despair I turn

To terrestrial things,

Bees on wildflowers,

Butterflies fluttering by.

 

I think fondly of days long past

When mind mused on moons

And heaven’s maps. I sigh, “Alas.”

 

Beneath the stars tonight I sit.

Gazing into the infinite void:

 

Not above, but within.

 

For the One Broken

I cried a cry of anguish

On behalf of the One broken.

For the One broken I cry,

Wishing I could heal.

What will come of my cry?

What will come of the broken?

Will all the tears run dry:

Dried by words unspoken?

 

Suffer the Little Children

I have my suspisions why Jesus so highly esteems children, though I often forget them.

Perhaps we are all reminded during times like this.

Who knows.

What I do know is that I have been really selfish lately, not wanting to listen very much: to Divine whispers. To my heart.  To others’ words.  

I realized yesterday this all makes me nervous to go home next week… until I stumbled upon this poem that my then eleven year old brother wrote to me last Christmas:

No pillow can comfort me as you can!

No cocoa has the warmth you blanket me with!

May Jesus, our savoir

bless you of your kindness.

In times when I struggled

and when I was sad, you were there for me.

You plant a seed of love in me

and it grows into a tree of joy.

I’m rich in your love

for money doesn’t hold my hand.

I give you many thanks

and my joy to share.

I truly love you my brother, Nate James Renfro.

 

(Typos on purpose)

(Love more on purpose)

Dear Jesus, when I think of you as a little boy, I believe again.  Help my unbelief. Amen.

Window Watcher

She sits at the window.

Tall and elegant.

Ears, eyes, and nose attuned.

But to what?

Does she only long to be out there,

On the other side?

Tromping through the leaves,

Chasing the squirrels.

 

I often wonder what she is thinking.

What does she feel?

Her posture usually gives her away:

Her tail tell signs.

She turns towards me with those eyes:

Lazy. Big. Brown.

How I love her soft, black fur,

And her wet kisses.

 

But today she only ponders.

She relays no distinct desires.

What is she wishing?

What is she watching?

Again she sighs.

There is, I think, a great deal

To be learned from dogs.

Above all, Loyalty.

A Toast to the Young Scholar

I am officially in good company.

My little sister graduated from Colorado State University tonight.

Apart from being unnaturally gorgeous and irritatingly smart, she has literally overcome every obstacle imaginable in order to finish her degrees in English and Creative Writing.

And what a writer she is.  She surpasses me in every way, which is obviously humbling.

Check out some of her writing here

All of my sister’s are great.  Each one is so unique, yet they are all so alike.  I love them all equally, but tonight I toast my Lydia Elise: scholar, poet, and kindred spirit.

I am so proud of you Lydie.  You light up my life.  I love you.