By Allis Trauffer
Featured in Caesura 2020: Imago
Father,
I don’t fear your judgement
“There is no condemnation in Christ”
I don’t fear your hatred
“You do not despise a broken heart”
I don’t fear your wrath
“Slow to anger, abounding in steadfast lovingkindness”
So why am I afraid?
You were sorry you made humankind
Are you sorry you made me?
But see, to be sorry you made me
You’d first have to see me
And feel something because of my existence
We ask for your face to shine on us
So can that face be turned away?
You knit me together in my mother’s womb
Can you knit mindlessly?
You chose, select, and adopt us
Was I somehow merely tossed in with the rest?
I fear that you made without knowing
That you created without loving
I fear that you stand far off
That this distance I sense is real
I fear that your eyes roam the earth
But they pass right over me
I know you’re perfect
I know you’re good
Omniscient, omnipresent, unchanging
So if there’s a flaw
It has to be me
Me, the One Broken Thing
I don’t fear you; I fear my ugliness
I am unlovable—
But you are love
And love is not dependent on me
Love, the antithesis of the apathy I fear
Proven, sacrificial, active
You wouldn’t sacrifice mindlessly
You have to know and see
But what is love
When I am blind
To those demonstrated acts
To your presence and your caring
I see your blessings
But somehow don’t see you
So I must be ungrateful
I see your people
Sometimes as if through your eyes
And I see their love to me
But such expressions of love confuse me
And when I name them as such
They somehow morph into such piercing pain
How, if you love me
Can I still believe you are distant?
How can I still believe you don’t see me?
You are my father
Aren’t you?
You see me and know me and love me
Don’t you?
You will not leave me alone
In battling any circumstance
So please don’t leave me alone
In battling my unbelief!
I don’t know what it’s like to feel safe
I don’t know how close you are
You are love, and I am made in your image
But do I know the basic meaning of love?
Let me know
Let me know your embrace
In the deepest part of my being
Let me feel
Let me rest
Let me cry, heart-wrenched, on your shoulder
As you rock me in the night to comfort me
Let me tremble, terrified, in your strong arms
As you tighten your hold to quiet me
Let me curl, broken, to your chest
As the undeniable closeness of your heartbeat drums my shame away
I want to feel you hold me
Please
Allis Trauffer is a computer science major at Indiana Wesleyan University in her third year. She loves her courses and her job at the Jackson Library but also loves putting that aside at the end of the day to play with her two pet rats, Shina and Tilly. She loves winter, biking, and writing songs and poetry.