Sunday, January 27, 2008

underwater psalm

coral lungs and salty breath~
my lips are forming your name here
in the quiet of this
underwater
grave.
resurrect me out of the
algae and tangled weeds.
leviathan fingers curled around my neck~
uncoil the pressing night
to see the beauty of your
deep blue love.

~terri '06

32 comments:

  1. ok..that's just not fair! SHOW OFF!!!

    LOL...Terri, seriously I LOVE you...your heart, mind and poetic gift!

    SANDY PATTY!

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  2. Terri, this poem gave me chills (in a good way). The images are so rich. Just imagining coral in my lungs -- scratchy, pokey, sharp, can't breathe -- it really made me feel like being underwater and having coral poke through my lungs would cause me to drown because water would come into my lungs so that I die. Is that what it felt like? Is that the terror you describe?

    I am in love with the deep blue love you describe. Thanks for sharing this, friend.

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  3. marcia: i can always count on you to help me not take myself too seriously.

    christianne: yeah, you probably know the feeling...like you're submerged, holding your breath...but under it all the love and the hope. thanks for the way you understand.

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  4. I had to read this a couple times, let the words wash over me before I could respond. I love how poetry uses words to convey meaning that is wholly beyond the words it contains. You do it here with these rich images. Sustained, doing your utmost to cry out, but trapped ... then those "leviathan fingers".

    And the deep blue love. I think I am beginning to know what that is.

    thank you.

    peace,
    k

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  5. Huh? So my Nemo friend is a poet, I did not know that, a very good one I might add. This is going to sound really morbid.....go with me.....it amazes me how people are all like forgotten graves that only a good grave robber can find treasure that has been buried with the decomposing corpse. Terri, I am staring intently at this screen. These are the thoughts that I formed from your words. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, one pair of eyes may see rotting flesh while another pair of eyes may dig, search, and tarry until they uncover the jewels that the wealthy person was forced to conceal. We may die with great riches, but the wise will dig until they find life in the gold. So your poem is a lost and found treasure.....or maybe you are.

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  6. i love this even more than the first time you opened my eyes to the endless sea of talent that is within you...beautiful, deep beauty appearing now with every choice word ready to emerge. this wraps me up completely in every sense.

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  7. I just noticed your description says "part hard-core realist" -- I like that ... poetry is a gift you either TOTALLY have -- or TOTALLY don't. I totally don't -- but you obviously do ... I think you writing might be some of the most descriptive writing I have ever read ... Jen says maybe a book some day???? That would be cool.
    Happy Monday from Haiti.

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  8. Ok so my gifts are driving a big rig and a bunch of useless sports knowledge. . . lucky me, opposites really do attract!!

    Wonderful words hon

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  9. kirsten: that's one of the things i love about poetry...you get so much mileage out of the imagery. i think you know a LOT about that deep blue love.

    are you in transit as i write this?

    poet: yep...i write poetry. not much these days, but i love it. thanks for the way you dug into this (no pun intended) for your own imagery and meaning.

    di: *blush* thanks for that. i love the way you dive in with me.

    tara: yeah, we might not exactly share the poetry thing, but we most definitely share the hard-core realism from what i can gather. and the book: that's kind of a dream of mine, but i don't know if/when i'll be able to pull it off. thanks for the compliment though, and for the monday greeting from the place i love so much.

    dave: oh honey, you have many more gifts than those. you are a whole treasure chest of gifts bursting open from the overflow. you're yummy.

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  10. Terri,

    Your reference to Leviathan had me thinking about Greg's reference to it and its relationship to waters, evil, etc., in God At War (or was it Satan and the Problem of Evil?). In any case, it was mad deep.

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  11. In about 18 hours, I will be in the air, on the way to a place that is about 50 degrees warmer.

    Hallelujah!!

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  12. Terr your psalm is so awesome! I love this gift of yours!!!

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  13. your way with words leaves me aching for the beauty of it all.

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  14. nate: i'm pretty sure he deals with the whole leviathan idea in both books. i must have been channeling him when i wrote this. ha ha ha!

    kirsten: woohoo!

    shelley: you're sweet too.

    bella: that means a lot to me, coming from the delicate word-sculptor. thank you.

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  15. Your poem paints a powerful picture in my mind.. it reminded me of a post I wrote a few years ago about Easter.

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  16. Tom: I wish I would have had that image to post with this...I couldn't find one that really worked for me. Thanks for sharing that.

    And by the way, I went scuba diving on the barrier reef in Australia about eleven years ago. I have never seen anything so amazing and beautiful in my entire life. Gratuitous beauty.

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  17. Terri
    I wanted to give you an update on Nate and I. We have decided to start one of those old time pentacostal snake handling churches (this is a southern thing) I thought you might want to be a guest speaker one day, this is a "bring your own bottle" kind of affair, so in this case you should bring your own snake, but if you don't have one the church will have one you can borrow. I am still trying to con Nate into being the pastor but he says that since the church members keep dropping like flies, there is not enough tithe money to support his drug habit.

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  18. May the force be with whoever reads that blog comment........Terri we are going to destroy any kind of image that you could salvage.

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  19. I only work with those plastic green snakes and I don't take checks. :)

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  20. How is it that always find myself being hijacked into religious craziness with neither my knowledge nor my consent? Apparently Tammy has been handling one too many of those serpents in her own personal devotions (either that or she's been licking a particular species of toad) because delusion has set in.

    Tammy, I know your congregants don't carry the kind of cash it would take for me to pastor such a church. And I most definitely know that I could never become "southern" enough to play with a rattle attached to a tail.

    I'm sorry my sister, as much as I love you, you will be leading a congregation of one. Hope your faith can handle that . . . and ummmm, the snakes.

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  21. Spectacular,

    The jewelled mermaid
    breathes
    her psalm of love
    from out the shadowed womb
    of night

    it glides
    along the curve of
    the waves

    to our hearts.

    With love to you, M

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  22. Terri
    just dropped in to say hi...so looks like the snake idea did not fly..... such party poopers you all are. So this means that yall have forced me to find some other form of deadly entertainment, oh the frustrations of an idle mind. What shall I do with myself? It seems to be an on-going danger for me to have too many days off from work. I keep trying to find some sort of mischievousness to occupy my mind. Start a cult.... run over a pedestrian....or something,...decisions, decisions. And they label me eccentric? Who knew?

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  23. nathan: you're not fooling anyone. don't play that victim card here. :)

    maithri: oh dear, i think i'm speechless. i'm breathing in the loveliness of your heart.

    poet: yikes! does your entertainment have to be life-threatening? how about a good book?

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  24. Maithri;

    Awesome, wow. You have the gift also.

    Blessings on you and your ministry

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  25. AH hA! Nate, so Terri busted you out.

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  26. Terri, Terri
    why read a book when I have my own personal zoo following me every where I go?.......of course that would be Nate....it doesn't get more entertaining than that. Or why read a book when I have hours of educational cartoons? Besides I only hit pedestrians when I am frustrated and can't kick the cat. Nate and I went to Home Depot today looking for something (that I told him they did not have.) His reply? "oh yes they do, I am positive they do" My reply after a lap around the store and passing 4 stockers, "shouldn't we ask someone if they carry this?" His reply, "this is good exercise, we need to walk anyway." FINALLY we hail a staff, and no they did not carry the thing. His reply "I knew I felt a disturbance in The Force." I am at Nate's sneeking around like a mouse on his computer, he doesn't know that I am gossiping to the blog world about him......sssshhhhh maybe he won't notice.

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  27. Hi Lady,
    Thank you for your kind word on my blog. Your blog has been very cathartic reading for me. I didn't realize we had so much in common (down to the fabulous blog template!). Raised catholic, attended catholic school fully equipped with nuns, getting "saved" in a pentecostal youth group in high school,having my life controlled during those very important developing years by legalism and not being able to make decisions on my own - I vividly remember getting torn up and down by my youth pastor because we smoked a cigarette and it was pure, pure evil. Fire may have actually come out of his mouth and burned my eyebrows, I can't really remember.

    Anyways...all this to say, I hear you..and even though I look back on some of those days with pain, I also learned so much and did, in fact, grow closer to the Lord through it all. But, I'll pass on going back!

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  28. wow! simply poignant!
    **sigh**if (only)poignant is just that simple.

    so deep..

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  29. poet: i'm sure nate doesn't read this blog.

    becky: we should get together and compare surgical scars someday. :) I'm glad this is cathartic for you. It is for me too.

    li: thanks so much. i'm glad to have you here!

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  30. Lovely,liquid, and haunting poem Terri.
    Alexandra

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  31. Terri...this is breathtaking beautiful!

    for some reason you keep touching my heart..and I found myself coming back daily to see how you are doing...some connection here...on which I cannot put my finger...but your words touches my heart!

    ahhh..the connection must be God! xx

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  32. alexandra: that's an amazing compliment coming from you. thanks so much for stopping by.

    periwinkle: i feel the same way about you. must be God indeed. bless you linni.

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