Father’s Day

Years have passed in this same position,
two people sitting across from one another
a bowl before each.  The table is silent.  
The familiar suspension of words in the air,
superseded by clanging against porcelain bowls.

Those are easier sounds, compared to the ones
I am not prepared to form with my lips.  
Between gulps of air and food, there breathes
a void I cannot fill, as I normally do;
easy conversation bubbling with the

Fullness of expression in thoughts and dreams,
joys and sorrows, words orchestrated with
such precision, almost lyrical - a steady flow
of careful control.   The tongue reigns supreme.
But here, I am not its maestro.

Dammed by half formed stutters,
limited by the lines of childhood left undeveloped.  
No matter how I contort the words in my mind,
I am simply left gulping, soundless, mindless
an appearance of a goldfish – mute, dumb.

He gestures for my bowl and places
inside what remnants there are of the dishes.
I would utter words of thanks but I know
it is not needed.  I eat silently.  
Swallow.  Digest.

He has learnt to survive without words,
for more years than I have lived.  
His hands weathered, arms darkened so that
I could speak and read and sing and write,
but I remain illiterate. 

| by Jessica Xie

Jesus and Green Beans

It’s moments like these that I enjoy the most,
when I remember you are here even in
the mundane, every day things 
like washing green beans or the laundry.

I remember this lady in Mozambique said;
“Even when I sweep the floor,
it’s holy, holy holy." 
And I thought today, how could you ever 
accept my washing as worship?

They visited frequently today -
the familiar pressure on the chest,
the squeeze of my sternum 
rattling me and saying;
"How can you be like this…”

But this is all I can do.
I can wash beans and do my homework.
Some days, neither of those things can be done. 
Some days, I can barely reach over
for your promises of life and hold on. 

But I do want your Kingdom,
I do, I do a million times over -
but the morning commute
does not feel like a mission trip,
my readings advance nothing but sleep. 

You’ve known me through all those
desperate, wide eye moments - 
often brimming over in despair
and today over the beans in the sink. 

And you remind me that;
you accept all of this -
anything and everything I offer,
whether it be the washing of beans,
the hours spent hunched over a table,
my attempts to love people
as worship - because of Him
who made it enough.

And I am glad- that you would take these rags, 
even when I know it will never be enough
and put them up next to the glory of Christ
knowing you would say;
“Well done.”

| by Jessica Xie

So basically I was glad today to wash the beans and know that even in that, I can worship and delight in God and know that He loves me - without me being some awesome mega-preacher, without me doing all the crazy mission trip things, saving all the people and healing all the sickness.  Those things are important and good, but it’s okay if I’m not doing them now and I don’t have to expect myself to be anything like that in this season. 

I had been feeling today particularly as if everything I was doing wasn’t enough, wasn’t right, wasn’t worth it…but He is pleased with me as I am- a poor, little and often anxious university student trying her best with what little she has. 

Golden

Gentle seeds from Heaven,
a golden array like rain;
they sway and sing 
of mercy, mercy, mercy. 

Sweetness,
how these dew drop moments taste,
your refreshing whisper through the eaves
and finger painting shadows across the walls.

Here with you, I am at peace. 
Peace that persists beyond
the changing foliage,the rain of seeds, 
the ocean of faces and the buildings that will one day crumble. 

My solid rock and foundation,
you bolden my steps into
days of blue sky and of grey,
of storms and blinding brightness. 

So like the seeds, make me gold -
a little reflection of the one makes the leaves dance.
A small tribute, to my great King,
my Beloved. 

| by Jessica Xie

On the shore

You and I stand 
with the sand beneath our toes,
staring out beyond 
into the deep expanse of blue.

I can almost taste the salt spray,
its tangy, white aroma.   
Our feet graze the ever shifting divide
between sand and water.

It’s the early morning
and we’ve stood here for a while
wondering, contemplating, almost wishing
if we should venture further.

A few other people have swum out,
figures dancing in dazzling cerulean.
A few come back in to the shore,
thrown back by the arms of the strong current.

They sometimes ask if we’d like to join
but we kindly decline; at least for now.
“We’ll wait until the tide is right,” 
I quietly nod in my heart.

Sometimes, I am overcome by the longing
to feel the refreshing crash of the waves
against my sun-weary skin,
for indeed, I have always loved the ocean.
 
But I know, that if we had swum out now
my arms would not have been strong enough
to bear the crash, the drag, the rip;
My weak little heart would give out.

I remind myself that
I would much rather wait out here,
then be left to drown out there
for there were no lifeguards on that beach.

So we stand, each watching the sun’s dance
across nature’s mirror, iridescent
like the marvel in our eyes
at the sheer array of the Artist’s work.  

We should not forget 
that the horizon rests not far off but
for now, I am content,  I am thankful
for you, my dear friend. 

| by Jessica Xie 

Mother | 世上只有妈妈好

There is a famous Chinese folk song that goes:
世上只有妈妈好
有妈的孩子像个宝
投进了妈妈的怀抱
幸福享不了

Roughly translated it means:
In the whole world, only mother is good
A child with a mother is like a treasure.
Within a mother’s arms
happiness will never end.

This song was sung to me as a child,
almost as an assurance that my mother
would always be there
even when no one else was.

I spent most of my childhood
waiting…
waiting…
waiting…
inside a doctor’s clinic.

My mother would ask me:
“If I jumped, would you jump too?”
That wasn’t a titanic reference,
she was not Jack neither was I Rose.
High ledges often prompted this question,
but most of the time
they came seemingly out of thin air
to my eight year old mind.

Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
What was I to respond to such a question?

“No,” I would reply in the negative,
not understanding what she meant
and moved on to the next thing
in my childish bubble of a world.

How can an eight year old 
be expected to understand
the demands of a woman
taking meds she did not need
for a condition beyond her physical command?

One time I was eating breakfast,
and my mother was in the bedroom.
She screamed, I ran.
She was on the floor
convulsing, crying, inconsolable.

Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
“Mum…please stop.”

She asked me to slap her,
tear stained, head shaking, wailing
I refused do it.
That was the first time I was late for school.

It was announced we would be going to China.
“Why?” I asked, and my father said
there were better doctors there.
So we went.

Relatives grinned, cousins entertained
and I continued in my world,
of bike rides and picking up street slang,
calling my mother 痴線
not understanding until later
the absolute irony of what I’d just said.

In April, I woke up
my mother was not beside me.
I checked the rooftop balcony,
there were no jumping questions that day.
We waited until midday.

Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
We waited until the next day.

Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
The second day. 

My little lungs had given out.
I had no more tears to shed.
I took up my bike and went back out to play.
My uncles took up theirs,
to search for her across the city and
even broadcast her face on local television.
They never found her.

My little lungs had given out.
I had no more tears to shed.
Should I feel bad -
That I only cried for two days
in my entire life
for my own mother,
the last and the only of my flesh and blood?

Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
The truth was: I didn’t feel bad.

When I was fifteen,
I went back to the same house
she had left.
They gave me her photos.
I had forgotten what she looked like
and it struck me
that we looked so alike.
The same creases by the mouth,
the same fold in the eyes,
the same smile.

I couldn’t show those photos to anyone.
I was too scared.
I hadn’t seen her in so long,
I hadn’t seen someone who looked like me
in so long.
How could I show her to anyone else?

Waiting…
Waiting…
Waiting…
I couldn’t wait for you any longer

When I was younger,
I still had dreams
about you coming back and
I never knew what to expect.
Sometimes you would embrace me,
other times you would run away.
You told me that in the whole world,
only mother was good
yet the resounding truth was that:
you left me.

But I realised mother’s like to tell their children
little white lies to get them by.
You could have never lived up
to your promise
in that state you were in.
You were trapped in your own mind.

The rest of the folk song goes:
世上只有妈妈好
没妈的孩子像根草
离开妈妈的怀抱
幸福哪里找

In the whole world, only mother is good
A child without a mother is like a blade of grass
Away from the mother’s arms
Where will you find happiness?

Was I to keep
waiting…
waiting… 
waiting?
No.  

If you’ve read this far,
There is no need to pity.
I’m not some blade of grass. 
No longer an orphan, lost child or outcast
because the pain of the narrow road will not last.
Instead I stumble in to find that indeed,
the Father’s arms have found me. 

| by Jessica Xie 

One year ago today

Today marks a nostalgic moment for me:  it’s been one year since my HSC results have been released.  

Was it a life-defining moment?  

The numbers on the screen, not really.  The moments after, profoundly so. 

I remember sitting in the lounge room with my dear house mate and friend, who also was receiving her results for the HSC.  I had just checked mine and was reasonably happy with them.  I guessed my friend was more nervous about her marks than I was and so I watched her nervously, on emotional stand-by just in case.  The numbers came up. There was a very dramatic moment of silence.  And then, she burst into tears.  Oh no, were they that bad?  And then through her sobbing, she said something to my utter surprise: "Aren’t we so blessed that our biggest worry is a HSC mark?“

Indeed, in light of recent tragic events such as the Martin Place siege and the Peshawar school attack we cannot compare the release of some numbers on a screen to the deaths and loss of those victims and their loved.  Our lives are not in peril.  Our survival is not threatened.  Our futures, hopes and dreams are not abruptly cut short.   It is with this perspective: one remembering the reality of life and death that we should attend to our lives with sobriety, thankfulness and gratitude for everything we have is a beautiful, grace-filled gift from God. 

Glory

We walk along as two silhouettes, 
the grass grazing our knees.
Light cascades over the river 
turning it into a glitter of dazzling topaz
and drapes your shoulders in red 
like the cape of a centurion.

I follow as the smaller shadow,
feeling the warm descent of the sun’s dance. 
It’s not so much living in it, 
as it is basking in it, I think. 
Footsteps into an impending twilight
aren’t all that bad when you know,
rest is near.  

| by Jessica Xie 

A father who loves

A father who loves gives over the best
parts of the dish to take what she detests. 
The yolk of the egg, the boneless fish,
he says take it all, all that you wish.  

A Father who loves gives over His son,
to take that which separates them as one:
The burden of sin, the guilt and the shame,
one could say, a beautiful exchange.   

A father who loves waits in the car,
for many hours whilst his child, not far
enjoys herself and takes her time,
at a party he doesn’t dare to chime.

A Father who loves waits patiently,
for the child who has disobeyed blatantly.
He sits on the porch and ready, He runs,
to His beloved, His lost younger son.

A father who loves spends the precious time,
to talk to a daughter who can only rhyme
in one language, but not his mother tongue
and decipher whatever weird sentence she has wrung.

A Father who loves spends His all,
to redeem His children from the fall.
Despite their babble and empty words,
all their prayers have indeed been heard.

A father who loves bears the load,
of another to whom nothing is owed.
A child that could have been left by the road,
instead taken in and given a home.

A Father who loves bears the cross,
on His back as He carries the loss
inflicted by the one that He loves the most,
in order that He may bring them close.

A father who loves mirrors the other,
a glimpse into the world of another
Father who loved them both so well,
made apparent through the Spirit that dwells.

A Father who loves mirrors the pain,
to deflect its agony instead into gain.
Through the storm and the rain,
wait for dawn, in glory He will reign.  

| by Jessica Xie 

Keep reading

If you ever feel discontent because of how your life compares to others, especially on the internet where it seems as though we’ve been given bragging rights through Facebook statuses and archive our accolades through our blogs, just remember: life is so much more than aesthetics.

A perfectly positioned, bordered and filtered picture can encapsulate a moment but it cannot embody a lifetime.  The human experience is inherently messy, unpredictable and terrible in all of it’s glory.  Things like failure, stress, loneliness, grief, depression, addiction, illness and death may not get as much likes as beautiful shots of cute couples, amazing holidays and endless amounts of other cool stuff but they are still just as part, if not even more definitive of who we are as humans. 

The saying goes: “Never compare someone’s highlight reel with your behind the scenes footage.”  Life may not look as good in this specific season, but because of now, those instagrammable moments will be even sweeter when they do come. Nothing can be highlighted unless there are shadows. 

Your life is more than just a pretty picture: it’s a whole story that is being written right this very moment.  Laugh, cry, rejoice and struggle through it all, knowing that the Author has a greater story line in mind than you could ever imagine. 

Keep reading