Pursuing Joy

I never thought it would be this way. It seems that the message of Joy is that she will sweep over you with happiness and wrap you in warmth. It isn't true. The truth is, I've had to learn to follow her. She's always in the strangest places: huddled in an alleyway, jumping in the puddles, working in the slums. Of course, if She hadn't found me in the first place, I never would've known. A hundred lifetimes couldn't have prepared me for what Joy is. Mirth unimaginable. G.K. Chesterton put it this way,

"...we sit perhaps in a starry chamber of silence, while the laughter of the heavens is too loud for us to hear.
Joy, which was the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic secret of the Christian. And as I close this chaotic volume I open again the strange small book from which all Christianity came; and I am again haunted by a kind of confirmation. The tremendous figure which fills the Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. Yet He concealed something. Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth."

She is evasive. The greatest light hidden in the greatest darkness, ever waiting to be released, burning into the world. And this is why I pursue her. This is why I love her. Once we had met, there was no turning back. I think about her often, though perhaps not often enough. She looms in every building and peers from every tree. For though she can be found there, it is not her home. I can find her nearly anywhere. Only once I've found her, it seems she's slipped away again. The ethereal glow of her touch ever stronger than the last, only never satisfying. She always calls for more of me; and so I yield. Her beauty is unmatched. I've never found another, nor shall I, who can call me like this siren with such titanic power. Speaking in the voices of children and thunder; and so I answer. Her hand reaches out to me, offering both promises of life and of death; and so I follow. A life is but a bottle of perfume to be broken over the feet of her Father. One day, Joy will bring me home. The pursuit will be over, and the race shall be run. Glory.

Nominare

I felt like I was going to explode if I didn't write something, so here's what came out:

I love you from an empty heart.

Burning in the deepest parts--

Words unformed relay desires;

I pray these embers turn to fires.

For all things noble, all things sane,

They seek to steal You, take Your name;

And all things wicked, wretched, fine,

Have made me wander with the blind.

Scarred hands and feet, pierced side and brow

Are truly but Your love avowed.

Yet still I sit and ponder ways

To make You love this monstrous face.

I’ll prove my worth and make You see

I’m more than what You thought I’d be.

I’ll fight and give and run and wait,

If only I shall bear this weight.

But no. Your grace is far too vast.

You knew my fervor wouldn’t last.

And yet You bless me just the same

Through heights and depths, through flood and flame.

You took my sin and wore my shame;

And for it all, gave me Your name.