Cataracts

Waters cascading, white waves dancing over rocks

Testify, God, that we can’t confine to a box

The defining Force that propels the cataracts,

The constricting Fear that humbles before the facts.

We observe your power revealed in nature

And build statues and symbols, worship the creature

We have constructed in meager imitation

Of majesty that evoked awestruck elation.

Marble monuments record failure or victory;

We bow heads before both in solemn reverie

And scream in violent horror when ghouls deface

Our idols, our heroes, history they erase.

Ritual movements and solemn chants mark our prayers

To banners symbolic of our great nation’s affairs.

We gnash our teeth against silent protests

That abuse our symbols and defame our crests.

Waterfalls descend noisily through wooded glens;

We capture their grandeur, snapping on our smartphones

Visions of glory sullied by Creation’s groans

Under weight of trash and chemical refuse

We have anointed on it, as again we lose

Perspective of your power, memory of your love

That creates peace and your grace that renews above.

Spiritual cataracts, oddly named, so blur our sight

That we worship the symbol and ignore your light.

Wash from our eyes the blindness that obscures glory;

Free us from our box; open our ears to your story.

“What profit is an idol
when its maker has shaped it,
a metal image, a teacher of lies?
For its maker trusts in his own creation
when he makes speechless idols!
Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, Awake;
to a silent stone, Arise!
Can this teach?
Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver,
and there is no breath at all in it.
20 But the Lord is in his holy temple;
let all the earth keep silence before him.” (Habakkuk 2:18-20 ESV).