Ancient

Ancient

There is tremendous pressure when from the seed breaks the shoot

There is a great energy spent when the infant comes from the womb

There is enormous straining as the butterfly escapes the cocoon

So why should my life be any different?

There is a great fragility as the shoot breaks through the soil

There is the same as the infant breathes in the toil

There is that moment that the butterfly cannot 

So where am I in this vulnerability?

There is tremendous stability in the ancient oak

There is a vast wisdom in the ancients’ cloaks

There is truth and wonder in the butterfly’s flight

So why should my life be any different?

K, Duane Carter 2-16-12

Glimpse

Glimpse

I have seen a glimpse of angels

Right here on the porch

This morning eternity was in the creek

Meandering through time’s torch

While those of the highway overpass

Went by toward their destinations

All the while they still went by

The creek moved still in contemplations

It always has, it always will

So I rest here in my chair in the sun

The hovering came, watching my watching

Then came a display of the bright heavenly ones,

Which I happened to simply catch in a moment

Yes, it was more than mere reflections

But it was much better than a nothing, naught

It was a marvelous resurrection

I didn’t need an answer, 

I didn’t need to know

I simply needed beauty

To remind me it was so

K, Duane Carter 6/30/12

Midst

Something about this picture reminds me of me

Formed by volcanic activity

Rocks and desolation everywhere

Yet

Signs of life breaking out in the midst

Water, though frozen, is present

Promising more

More life, more goodness, more refreshing

All of this covered in the cloud

And even in the desolation

It is beautiful

K, Duane Carter 6/21/12

The Moment

Often at sunset

when the sky is a series of colors indescribable 

But every one of them a hue of violet and rose

It is at that moment I realize

There is a greater world

There is a reality more real than the one I know

It’s not that I don’t like the skies of blue

But it’s that these colors, these phases, these hues

Are stepping stones to a more lovely place

I can almost feel the air

it is alive

These moments are the moments living is all about

These moments are the moments my heart lets out a shout

Because it sees the things that I don’t see

It feels the things that I have never felt

Nor could ever feel

And survive to relive the experience

I simply wish sometimes these moments were eternal

Because I always realize that they are

K, Duane Carter 4/21/12

Sunset Morning

Sunset Morning

I step into another sunset morning

Where my eyes are closed

And I see the dreams

The place where I don’t know what anything means

Yet I know that it means everything

I hear the rhythms of distant stars

They awake the heavens and 

Dance does meet

With the sounds of the baby’s kicking feet

Even as she is hidden in womb

The wonder calls us all from the tomb

To taste, to smell, to dance, to live

To wonder, to know, to love, to give

Then I awake to amber skies and

The sounds of sunrise

I cry out to the top of my lungs

From the very depths

Life bursts from me, and it continues on

It’s time to rise

Time to shine

The light is on my face

And it comes from His

I awake to the amber skies

The sounds of sunrise

I am truly alive

K, Duane Carter 4/8/12  Happy Easter!

Mountain of Smoke

Mountain of Smoke

I stand at the base of the mountain of smoke

No thunder, no fire, no trumpets

Just stillness, quiet, wind

In the distance soft

An ancient flute begins to sing

Just stillness, quiet, and wind

And the sound of God walking in His garden

The opportunity rises again

Once again I am given a choice

Walk in the mists

Or not

I step upward

Gasping for air

But I won’t turn around

For I want the cloud to consume me

Yet it already has

I step onward

Gasping for air

I cannot turn around

I want the cloud to consume me

For it already has

K, Duane Carter 4-7-12

Reclining

Reclining

I could sit here in this chair all day

Pondering the mysteries and wonders before me

And when the day is over and done

I am deeper into the struggle than ever before

Knowing less but feeling more

Closer to You than ever before

Closer to me

I can watch the sweeps dance across the waters

I can see the ducks resting in the rain

As I sit here in this recliner seeing it all

Writing out a simple refrain

I sense I am walking to something deeper

Something beyond the dark and the pain

Though I am more still than I have ever been

The rain keeps on falling and falling

The water keeps on accepting the earth

The sound of its music brings laughter

Its moisture brings clouds in the mirth

Heightening mirth more than ever before

Changing the sounds of the earth

Closer to You than ever before, still even closer to me

The wind has joined in with the laughter

The grasses now see they are green

It reminds me that my heart is a flower

It blooms in the realms that aren’t seen

Changing the sounds of the earth

Closer to You than ever before

Ever closer, even closer to free

I see

K, Duane Carter 3/24/12