Thank you...

10:14 PM - Nov. 8, 2006 - Add to the Wildness

....to Julie, Dierdre, Pamela, for your kind words.

I guess if there's a reason to it all, it's a first-person chance to make it clear that abortion really is about women's rights. Nobody tells you that you can raise your child, or else raise your grief. It's called post-abortion stress, and both sides of the debate now acknowledge it as a form of post-traumatic stress disorder. "Pro-lifers" need to know they are women's-rights advocates and arm themselves with the info to support that stance.

The most common reaction among church-raised people is, "If you know you're forgiven, then what's the problem?" The religious culture at large has a ways to go to give us the tools to deal with sin's collateral. Even the smallest sins against our created nature have ripple effects -- how much more those which more grossly transgress the design of the human heart. Yes, all sin is sin; but some actions are less human than others.

The problem is, there's a huge, invisible swath of destruction across the lives of everyone involved. My parents, who encouraged me to abort, went through agonies of grief. The sister who, at the age of eleven, wanted to be an auntie and was horrified to find out she wouldn't be. I don't know what happened to the twenty-year-old man who couldn't save his child, but wanted to.

I caused that. Frighteningly, though, I'm no different than anyone else. It's just that my personal swath of destruction is easier for me to spot. And so, at certain times, I feel more deeply the realities of being born of Adam's race.

The Right To Remain Silent

I take a worn-out paper bag from the store
of religional correctness, where the Goods
and the Decents savor darkening the door
to purchase Blessed Life Enhancements.

I cut holes for head and hands, and go to church.
A meditative bath in living water
and a robe of purest linen, with no price
will never be considered proper dress.

Pastor Meeker greets with bag over face
(as warts are frowned upon among the beautiful).
He’s too concerned with mirror revelations
to espy his suit wrinkles; hear them whisper.

Praise and Prayer.  Mr. Pointer’s voice is raised
against the immoral orgying Out There.
Mrs. Galling clucks and pecks at murdered unborns.   
It seems Meeker, with kazoolike inflections
and self-prophetic, shaky-kneed reflections
should do more to show Those People what sin is–

I want         to     scream.

I want to tear off ill-fitting, dried-pulp pretext,
brandish the blood on the robe I retain beneath:
Blood of Jesus Christ, poured over stains I spilled
the blood of my daughter, covered....
Ohhhh, Miranda in heaven!

My heart beats its bomb shelter door –
do they even know Who they serve?
Do they know Who saw suction snap swimming limbs,
gorge on new-formed fingerprints?
Do they know Who saw steel stab tunnelled hand
(created to be a mother’s caress)
– death-tools twist and scrape, the secret shredding
of trembling dreams gone up in flames?

In one horrific struggle of awareness,
peaceful waking and sleeping ceased.
Who can understand the Armageddon of two souls in one womb?
Now my Miranda lives in eternal awakening;
I continue my sleepless tears.
Do they know what I see –

I see what indignation inflamed eternity
the world washed by tears for our unrepentance
none spared but Noah
of all God conceived in love – 
infinite fury for sin, if my calloused core
abominated ending one life, unwanted:
For God is not willing that any should perish...

Altar call.   We are eyeing up the Joneses,
who clearly have misplaced their Life Enhancements;
and who am I, to stand in the face of such tradition?
When they see who I am not, things may not change.

I consider the taking of my Miranda’s rights.

(The Right to Remain Silent won a merit award in the 2005 Utmost Christian Writers Poetry contest. My heartfelt thanks to the judges for listening and providing an outlet of expression.)

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Wow...

...dear Kat, the poem is utterly tearmaking. I am so sorry for your pain but thankful for your salvation and the grace He's allowed you to see and share. I hope these winter months pass lightly and you will see His peace. Don't listen to the accusations. They are from the pit. DeniseB Homesteadblogger

Anonymous - 11:14 AM - Jan. 5, 2007

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