LISTENING TOWARD

No, you shall not know the word.

For, it is incendiary and troublesome; ofttimes a burden and anachronistic.

It is an awkward word, inside an orb of greed, 

narcissism, self-preservation, and con-artists. 

• However,
  

You shall know of its meaning:

/Listening toward/ 

again

/Listening toward/

 

What does that stand for  

and, 

                  what are its fruits does one suppose?

Oh, I know its glint and have savored its many flavors and sweets.

I have stood in its sweaty leafed tropics 

sensing the moistening rain upon my bent shoulders.

Many do fall by it; whereas, many do rise, lifting toward the God in Christ!

No ... No ...

I still shan't expose the word to you.   

Instead, the golden Fruits of it.  Its presents of Glory.

 Oh, how myriad/ 

and stark/ 

and needed/ 

and noble/ 

are its spiritual gifts.

These favors I have witnessed given to those living this word:

Peace.

Stability.

Inner Silence.

Civility 

Humility.

Grace.

Self-forgetting

Self-knowledge

Love.

  

We learn Love when we learn to be silent and 

/listen toward.

Oh, for it happens not in a vacuum;

 but, in a molten throbbing cauldron; 

transfiguring us through time and time's travail.

Seek this word. 

It lays in pitchy darkness 

upon your oh so muted lips.