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Frances Jane Tatum Poem
>A mind game
Played on someone over time can maim
Crippling their sense of truth
For unlike the follies of youth
Thought
Is something that is not taught?
Indeed, much learning is encouraged by rote repetition
Yet for the most part the human condition
Communicates by sharing thoughts
Learning the mutual value of each others ought’s
Many of which we take on undigested
Even if hotly contested
Rarely do we absorb and understand our actions
How inadvertently we are caught up in chain reactions
Truth to be real needs a personal assent
It is not just a question of intent
Or belief being something to confess
Or profess
For a belief in God of whatever creed
Entails looking at and appreciating the reality of our need
For something beyond the machinations of the mind
A revelation of a wholly other kind
A profound recognition of something other
And our responsibility to one another
For life is not ours to deploy
As if the world was a toy
Jane Tatum©>
Copyright © Frances Jane Tatum | Year Posted 2017
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Frances Jane Tatum Poem
A sense of the universe
In all its diverse
Forms can give rise
To a profound apprehension of the lies
That abound
All around
As if we prefer not to see
How we
Are implicated at the very core
In a raw
Vital way in ecological catastrophe
By our desire for mastery
To be in charge of our fate
And we refuse to wait
To recognise deep within our heart
That we are part
Of the what we perceive to be the stuff of the real
And to recognise our need to heal
What is out of kilter with God’s rhythm
So when we find ourselves caught in a gigantic schism
We must not deny
The moat in our own eye
The block
That enables us to mock
The wonder of creation
As if life was all imagination
Amenable to sophisticated modifications
Subtle alterations
And not a gift given us by life’s creator
Humankind’s maker
For we are not the end of the story
And God is the source of true glory
Do we dare to pause and ponder?
The sheer wonder
That life is not something for us to sift
And re-arrange but is a gift
To treasure
Beyond all that we can ever measure
Jane Tatum©
Copyright © Frances Jane Tatum | Year Posted 2017
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Frances Jane Tatum Poem
Approaching Lent
The need to repent
Can resound in our sense of our need to prepare
For Easter, but do we dare
To see, that suffering can be
Christ’s way of enabling us to come close to him
For suffering is not so much about sin
But the reality that by suffering
Christ was entering
Into our lives, for he knows, the blows
Life entails and so we can see our suffering as a way
That Christ can say
You are carrying the cross with me and now I know my life was not about loss
For you are very close to me when you share my pain
And know that your life will share the gain
And as in suffering you are able to know me more intimately
And thereby you are more able to become one
With God’s only son
And he treasures this opportunity
To help you enter the mystery
Of God’s promise of salvation and participate in the revelation
Of God’s gift of grace leaves no place
He cannot use for he will never abuse
His precious people for he longs to be able to share
And to know we too dare
To draw near banishing our fear
For he is our all
The reality of the fall
Has been overcome and we have begun
To live in the light of his love, even in our darkest night
God is a true friend and as you carry the cross there is no end
To what he can do as you embrace his will
For he will never allow what is ill
For he knows and in carrying his cross
With him, we declare his pain was not about loss
And remember he asked his disciples if they too could walk with him
And as we do, come what may his life in us can begin
For the seeds have been sewn and we may own
Salvation as our very own
Knowing our God alone can and does atone
Copyright © Frances Jane Tatum | Year Posted 2017
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Frances Jane Tatum Poem
As Easter approaches Christ’s resurrection
Marks a change in direction
For faith now resides
In the reality that God never hides
As there is nowhere he has not been, even if seemingly unseen
He is and was ever here,
Do we dare?
Acknowledge his love encompasses all life, for his sacrifice cut like a knife
The divide between the sacred and the secular
The star
That shone in the East
Heralded a substantive release, for his gift of grace
Creates a space for us to be - free
Enveloped in a divine mystery
Transforming all of history
God is and was and ever shall be
Available for you and me
To know, and grow
Within a new domain
Where God’s reign
Overshadows our darkness and despair
All our crippling fear
For we have been empowered to begin
To recognise and counter sin
Within and without and cast out doubt
Living in God’s light, day and night
Resurrection means new life
Empowers us to overcome strife
In him we can and are
Ever beneath and blessed by the star
That shone to guide the wise men
And leads us on to the time when
Everything is made new, and crowned with joy it is no longer the chosen few
But all who may know
It is just so!
Jane Tatum©
Copyright © Frances Jane Tatum | Year Posted 2017
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