1492

        Mahler 3

What God tells me.

          Why is

     God's music

  So much easier

Than God's word?

Brian Hick September 2015

©copyright Sally Hick 19.9.26

 1417

Guardian Angel

A little speck of God

And just for me;

Not because God needs you

As an extra hand,

But my sight's so poor

I cannot see infinity

And eyes prefer to focus

On what's near,

You're at my back, unseen,

But always there

Supporting when I faint

Cheering when I droop

Exhorting when I despair

Loving where I despise;

Lifting up my heart to sense anew

The path which always leads me back to You.

Brian Hick December 2014

©copyright Sally Hick 29.11.25

 1374

Be with me, I need you by my side;

I need you even when you do not speak,

I need to know that your love will abide.

Be with me

Even when I think I'm at my peak

When everything is flowing with the tide

Or when I'm devastated and too weak

To argue for myself against the snide

Remarks, the callous ones who dub me freak.

Be with me.

Brian Hick August 2014

©copyright Sally Hick 28.8.25

 1372

Switch off the CD player

Unplug the MP3

Turn off the television

Come, turn your mind to me.

Turn off that conversation

You planned but didn't make

Forget the acid put-down

Fired up to make them quake.

Cut through the endless buzzing

Of things you didn't do

Drop all the endless thinking

That stops me getting through.

For only when you're silent

When the birds begin to sing

And you hear the rabbit eating

Can I start to bring

My peace to still your yearning

My love to fill your soul

My joy to surprise you

Myself to make you whole.

Brian Hick August 2014

©copyright Sally Hick 25.8.25

 1369

I will seek you where I know you'll be

Down at the water's edge, beside the sea,

Upon the cliff top, where the morning breeze

Cools the air and drifts towards the trees

Which rest in blossom and your spring's new green

Before summer's joy and those unseen,

Unnoticed moments of continuing life

Inevitably unfolding without strife.

Each tiny atom, or the eternal round,

Reflecting all that is, and all I've found

Searching for you, until you found me,

Touched my heart and set my spirit free;

And here I am, surrounded by your love,

From deep in ocean's depth to heaven above.

Brian Hick July 2014

©copyright Sally Hick 16.8.25

 1252

The day is full of promise, so why not I?

The morning air is crisp, the sky is clear

The sun is pushing through the silhouette

Of winter trees, so why should I fear?

If you are in the sun and in the air,

If nothing can exist without your law,

If everything cell confirms your gift of love,

Why am I still shaken to the core?

Could it be your silence frightens me?

That knowing you are there is not enough;

Those indications of transcendent truth

Are pretty useless living in the rough

And tumble of our daily human lives

As in a moment all the world dissolves

Into a mass of contradiction, wrung

With guilt, adrift, and nothing holds.

For some maybe, faith hangs on by a thread

Hoping you are there, still in control,

While chaos laughs at our naivety

Believing that you over-arch the whole

In some comprehended innocence

Linking quantum leaps to summer rain

Answering all evils with a kiss,

All will be well, for Daddy's home again.

If only - but the silence never ends;

And faith is fragile in the face of facts

Hurled by the rationalist and scientific

To analyse potential god-like acts.

Brian Hick February 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 21.2.25

 1335

Boxing Day 2013

Suddenly it's over

And the noise, and bustle and the expectation

Fade into wrapping paper, cold turkey and sprouts.

Peace, so sung about, descends

On our streets where lights still flash in silence,

Waiting for the New Year to erupt

And move us on to weeks of work,

Winter greyness and normality.

Shopping returns to the Tesco list

Of stuff we always buy,

Confounded only when they move the aisles.

And church? The slight excitement of the snow

Which trapped the preacher outside Tunbridge Wells

Is soon forgotten in the round

Of meetings, practices and minor arguments.

And Christmas? Just another passing phase -

A date, a day to get through like the rest?

Or did this Christmas shock us a bit,

Realising God is here with us,

Though we so often act

As if Jesus were for Christmas -

Not for life.

Brian Hick December 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 22.1.25

 1225

I don't want to believe your miracles.

I can't accept you healed the sick and blind

But take no action in our fractured world

To halt the massacres which plague mankind.

I don't want to believe you raised the dead

Or met the prophets in a hail of light

When faith is an excuse for mutilation

And every preacher knows that he is right.

             So why my hesitation, why the instinct

             To pause, before I rush out to condemn

             The simple and misguided who would follow

             Anyone who seeks to flatter them?

             Perhaps I sense your smile behind the haze

             Which seems to complicate my rational ways.

Brian Hick November 2012

©copyright Sally Hick 14.10.24

 1186

Magic Forest

A magic forest, so I looked for You

In the Serpent's  Nest and Mystic Pond

The Indian Totem and the forest view;

But it seemed that You were far beyond

These tricks, which made me feel the You were there;

For all I found, thought pleasant, was the art

Of conjuring the surreal from the air

When all the time, You kept from me apart.

Deep in the woods the deer cropped unconcerned,

The peacocks lurked for snacks by picnic tables,

Sheep rambled the vineyards, while I yearned

To find You in the midst of ancient fables.

Then I heard you laugh - Can you not see

That everything you look upon - is Me.

Brian Hick July 2012

©copyright Sally Hick 17.6.24

 1153

You eased me to this day

Yet I cannot hear your voice;

The words get in the way

Insist there is no choice;

But You do not compel

You simply wait and give

Until my heart, o'erwhelmed,

Knows what it is to live.

Brian Hick May 2012

©copyright Sally Hick 22.4.24

 1022

Psalm

You have blessed me this day

You have moved me on

To a place I had not expected.

When I despaired and was ready to give up

You waited, supported, then gave me the word

Which touched my soul.

A word so quiet I did not hear it

A word so indistinct it had no meaning

A word which pierced my soul

Without pain or comprehension.

A word which changed my heart

And then my mind

So now I am renewed

My body ready for the task

The Word has set before me.

Brian Hick September 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 24.10.23

 981

I see you in the darkness of the night

I hear you in the silence of the seas

I touch you in the breeze upon the hills

I sense you in the garden, on my knees

While weeding out the plants which you have watered,

While warming chilly hands beside the fire,

While meditating on the evening sunlight

While singing cheek-by-jowl in the choir

For you have never left me when I doubted

Nor given up the fight I might have lost

When, ignorant, I thought that you had vanished,

Insisting I alone must count the cost

For all the stupid things, the selfish actions,

Which blight my memory and seek to crush

All hope of any single act of kindness

Which could alleviate the futile rush

To justify myself, when all I needed

Was simply to accept, not question why,

Your selfless love that's always here beside me

And always will be, till the day I die.

I see you in the darkness of the night

I hear you in the silence of the seas

I touch you in the breeze upon the hills

I sense you in the garden, on my knees.

Brian Hick summer 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 4.9.23

 945

Where were you when he slashed his wrists

Or she lay pain-wracked on the bedroom floor?

Why are you silent when the racist twists

His blade into the innocent and poor?

Don't tell me how you feel our pain

Or suffer with us; afterall these years

Of genocide and butchery that claim

Is worthless, and it falls upon deaf ears.

Rational, we look for evidence,

For any hint your teaching might be true

But all we see and all that we can sense

Confirms the bitter fact that we will rue

          The day that we were born and hope to be

          By Death's kind release, from Life set free.

Brian Hick May 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 2.6.23

The next blog will be posted on Monday 12.6.23. Sally

 944

If you are Love why is there so much Hate?

Free will alone cannot account for this.

I may have my moments but my state

Of mind is generally not averse

To all mankind, and I would rather seek

The loving and the kind, with compromises -

Emulate the blessed who are meek -

Than risk the isolation that despises.

Yet day by day the world seethes with the bile

Of desolation, creeds whose single aim

Is blocking any isolation while

Claiming to be acting in your name.

          I am confused; if Love were really all

          Why do so many fail to hear your call?

Brian Hick May 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 31.5.23

 943

Isaiah Ch45 v 7

So you created evil; you agree,

Or at least that's what Isaiah says.

I'm glad that you admit it and can be

Honest with us even as you rage

Against those who ignore your claims

For straight obedience to some dubious laws

Set up by tribal elders whose real aims

Were crowd control, subverting the vile roars

Of sweaty desert yobs.  But now we know

That everyting that is goes back to you

For good or ill, and all we have to show

For it are endless years of misery and woe.

          How glorious that we know how to love

          Despite the anger seething up above.

Brian Hick May 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 29.5.23

 941

Where are you in all these words

          Spilling out to fill the time

          With little sense of the sublime

And even less of what occurs

Between the spaces and the joy

          Of silence.  Oh, when will they pause

          To let a heart which here adours

The unspoken and unthought, enjoy

The richness that does not demand

          An explanation or a fact,

          Contented simply to react

To your spirit's soft command;

Because I need a sacred space

          Unconfused by text or deeds,

          Unconscious of human needs

Or even of specific place

But one where I can listen to

          Your voice singing from the earth

          Your music antheming the worth

Of everything that's born anew.

Brian Hick May 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 24.5.23

 911

If I accept that I can never know

Any more than this small human brain,

With its hardwired synaptic flow,

Can compass in the brief years that remain,

How on earth can I make sense of you

Who saturate my soul and fill my heart

With joy, beyond my meagre means to show,

And love's uncomprehended, enearned dart?

Words alone can only go so far

Confusing at the instant that they reach

A willing ear, where cold semantics jar

The mind, searching beyond what words might teach

          And all the while the universe runs on

          In conscious hope, as when it first begun.

Brian Hick March 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 17.3.23

 909

You are the elsewhere that has come to me

The un-thought thought, unreasonable rhyme,

Sudden unexpected inspriration,

Illogically divorced from place and time;

And yet you sing to me of chance perfection,

Of hope that goes beyond the written word

Turning all our plans and expectations

Into a dream which laughs at the absurd.

Why would I want to pin down this elation

With law and ritual meanly devised

By narrow-minded human misconception

Of all that is, because it's not espied

By scientific means or interception,

When all I need is streaming from the skies?

Brian Hick March 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 13.3.23

 893

Now I need no words to speak to you

Writing this seems somewhat out of line

But being human, even though I see through

Ther verbage, I need to take my time

Moving away from what I thought I've known,

Even if I abondoned it erstwhile

As infantile fantasy, hoping that I'd grown

Out of comfortable habits which beguile

But simply cannot pass the acid test,

The rational and scientific stare,

Which easily dismisses any quest

For actual answers to a well aimed prayer;

          But then, of course, prayer's just pie-in-the-sky

          To those who have not taught their souls to fly.

Brian Hick Feb 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 27.1.23

 892

Enfolded in Love

At last I can address you as my God

Without concern, for we know what we mean,

I feel no need to struggle or explain

What lies beyond mere words, which may seem odd

To intellectuals or those who insist

On disecting life up to the point

Where it has vanished and dismembered joints

Lie bleeding, meaningless, for they have missed

The beauty of the whole which was far more

Than simply an enlisting of its parts

And all scientific tools and arts

Cannot encompass that which I adore.

          I looked for you, but looked in the wrong place,

          Until you caught me up in Love's embrace.

Brian Hick February 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 26.1.23