A QUAKER POEM

 I AM A QUAKER

BY DIANE FAISON MCKINZIE

It is loud, the silence that I hear, 

I am a Quaker and in my silence, I draw God near.

 

Respect for other religions is always in my sight, 

I am a Quaker and know the different paths to God are alright.

 

Bear witness to the humanity of all people, no matter if they are White Black, Tan, or Brown. 

I am a Quaker, and I know and respect that all the different people make the world go round.

 

Plain in our dress is no more, I am a Quaker and wear clothes of today 

but this modern attire does not steer me from my “Quaker Way”.

 

A gun, a sword, a lynching rope of death, a vile of poison to end a life these are all venues that I cannot use or understand. 

I am a Quaker, and using these tools of violence is not what I want to hold in my hand.

 

My meditation and my “still” minutes in my every day, 

help me to hear what God has to say. 

I am a Quaker, and we are just that way.

 

Some say our faith is strange. Some say “We are not Christians”. Some say our meeting houses are too plain.

I say “Yes, we are Christians”, and say “I’m sorry you didn’t know”. If
our faith seems strange, it’s because their search for Quaker facts truly
lacks.

 

Meeting houses stand in beautiful “plain” sites so the spiritual mind won't stray, 

so we can keep focus, and pray.

 

  I am a human, I am a woman, I am a Christian, and all of these are me.

THAT MAKES ME A QUAKER YOU SEE.

 

I and the Dragonfly

I and the Dragonfly

Indian-style, I sit by the lake,                                                                                                                                                            with no more movement than the tall grass that barely stirs in the breeze.                                                 The trees shade my still form on the path,                                                                                                    but on the lake, the reflected sun shimmers unchecked.

The water is almost still on the surface                                                                                                        and from its depth, earth colors mirror land and sky and clouds precisely.                                                     I look closely and see small circles all across the skin of the water;                                                                                     tiny water insects gliding noiselessly.

Across, on the far shore, the sun runs yellow down the hill between the tall pines,                                 spilling into the water just where the red earth joins it.                                                                                      As I sit longer, an. audible splash to my left signals the feeding one of the fish on the surface riders; another on my right signals the quick return of a frog into the water from whence he came.  

Time slips slowly away, and I become part of this natural world,  an interlude in life that does not often occur.                                                                                                                                                                 Then a fairy comes to light in front of me on a long, pale green frond.                                                       Not a real fairy, lest you think I have sat too long in that enchanted spot, but it might have been, the beautiful dragonfly that sways there.                                                                                                            His body is long and slender, and his double wings are iridescent, catching all of the sun's warmth and radiating the blues, pinks, greens, and silver of the sky as he sways.

He stayed only a short time, sharing his world with me, before he moved quickly away to other grasses on the far edges of the lake.  I remain behind him, unable to move as gracefully or as fast, but with a renewed spirit in the magic of the moment.