For You were Made from Dust

Photo by Tejas Sanap on Unsplash

A Poem by Ross Meyer

It feels like fingernails scratching,

Scrabbling for purchase in the dark.

With panicked gasps, I scream and shout.

How long until the air runs out?

I hear your pain and fear, my son. 

Life clinging hopelessly in the ground. 

Rather, it is as the seed that’s buried,

Opening so new growth can abound. 

And from the seed comes the lily, 

Comes the fig tree, comes the vine.

Death to life while the curse lingers 

Is the pattern, is my design. 

But the walls are crushing, caving in.

I feel formless in the void. 

My plans crumble and structures break.

The bones which you have shattered ache.

My child, you see but only in part.

There is truth in what you feel,

Yet you know only as the clay 

While I am the potter at the wheel. 

When the clay starts to wobble,

And the walls have grown too thin,

The vision I have for you is grander,

So I find your center and spin again.

For in the days that are coming 

All trees planted will clap their hands, 

And all the pots, both fine and common,

Will be called holy in my lands. 

Ross lives in the mountains of Western North Carolina with his wife and three children. He writes to process the deep emotions that intersect faith and life. He is a pastor by day and a poet by moments of inspiration under a starry sky or minutes of peace on a path through the Smokies.