Second Sunday in Lent

“How lovely is your dwelling place,
O LORD of hosts!” Psalm 84:1

in my childhood church
where i could wander unafraid
knowing i was with a family
that accepted me,
in that rural clapboard building
where i heard sweet voices
harmonizing hymns in
shape note singing,
in that restored abbey
where new songs and voices
were heard, and among the
stone ruins of the nunnery
which had heard prayers for centuries,
i discovered that you refuse
to be confined to one place
one people, one ideology,
our God

© 2022 Thom M. Shuman