"Day 8"
Father’s Day falls on a Sabbath
—like tasting good fruit from painful toil,
our hands till generations in the soil,
laboring to put rest to wrath.
We make all the working days
in life—sweat running over
our brows, burning into our eyes
the dust and salt, the ground forsaken.
All Creation groans for the days
where our cups are running over
like a river—washing our eyes
that see the salt and light: awaken.
His mercies are new every morning,
and harvests of Salvation are prepared
for the wedding feast, our hope compared
to the curses we sowed in mourning.
Our Father’s grace falls on today:
our flesh returns, but so does our soul—
by the Spirit we live and say
the Truth tastes sweet, our lips on the scroll.
Bitter, our hands take it in;
the bowls poured out, covering the Earth
with furious love, He crucified our sin,
our faithful choices reaped and gave birth.Reading the Poem
The Creation by Lawrence W. Ladd, 1880, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Inspiration
This poem started out as a Father’s Day poem. By the third line it fully shifted into telling the story of the consequences of rebelling against our Father in Heaven—our Creator—and the ultimate results of our choices.
This is also the longest poem I’ve written in a long time, in down-the-page length. 24 lines total. (I typically end at 12–16 lines.)
I kept wanting to get to the end, but the words kept flowing in an ordered stream of consciousness—until the last line brings the context full circle.
“Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat food from it
all the days of your life.
It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.
By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.”
Genesis 3:17b–19 (NIV)
I took the little scroll from the angel’s hand and ate it. It tasted as sweet as honey in my mouth, but when I had eaten it, my stomach turned sour. Then I was told, “You must prophesy again about many peoples, nations, languages and kings.”
Revelation 10:10–11 (NIV)