error.

Where, o where was my error?
Was it an invisible headpiece, like an eye-poking fascinator?
Or an extension of my smaller arm, sneakily offending your side?

Why was one's interest lost?
Was I the secret drone, the mill of exciting apperitifs---
And concluded in monotonous groan?

Were my aesthetics too bland?
Should I have worn corsetry for your seduction?
Or more mascara to murder your eyes?

Perchance it was the shape of our pegs!
I have done the additions.
And I don't understand.
Roundness and depth with a home for your end,

Reveal the void,
Allow me to know why.

Gigging again.

How Sweet The Sound, a reflection.


My favourite kind of chocolate wrapped in a map of the Ryde area. Never have I received such an originally wrapped thank you present. Thank you Nancy. :)

Thank you Jesus.

He put on my heart the need to pray before a gig. I covered anything and everything in prayer - my health, the food I ate before going on stage, my worry about my classical guitar not being heard as I'd never performed with it before, Ellie getting on the right train to Ryde from work, sound levels, anxiety about homeward bounds....

I am so, incredibly, inexplicably, blessed.

As a musician, your purpose is to play your instrument skillfully. I am a musician for the glory of my Father in Heaven. Purpose for Him:
Create a worshipful, spiritually conducive experience with your instrument.

And after every gig I've done, a blog calls to be written. Making music changes you. It makes you sensitive to certain sounds. Producing them in the way God has called me to pulls me out of melancholic self-indulgent bedroom angst. I cry with others now.

The songful voice rises. It travels emotionally. It is a language less spoken, a language that sounds different from each, uniquely made, God-designed individual.

Praise you Lord. For permitting me to use this gift and enjoy it.

May it be a platform for others to seek you, find you, know you.

Amen.

37.

a good day.


We read in the Stats folder:

"Anna was given some clothes (from the Emergency room). Said she was no longer working on the streets. Got a new job in a brothel at nights. Says she is happy about it."

I cannot convince her. Not now.

However, I can rejoice that she is one step ahead, and safer.

Love song. 1

Passion manifested as our hands intwined
Passion manifested as our hands intwined


[I miss you]


Leaving will lighten your load, so I was told
Leaving will lighten your load, so I was told.


[I'm going crazy]


Sit and wait, trust that the Lord has His hands on ours
Sit and wait, trust that the Lord has His hands on ours



[I will obey]

22.

sold.

I tried to gear myself up for this week past. First, by giving Gomer (Hosea 1:3) a fair trial in my head. Second, by borrowing Angell and Van Raay's memoirs. Third, and finally - some chunky academic lit on the idea of prostitution.

My summation line:

Please don't ever call it 'sex work'.

Once you do that, you give into the devil's schemes of normalising the commodification of my body, my soul. Ones that could very well be yours.

Add my experience of my first personal encounter with a prostituted human this week. I'll call her Shona. Beautiful and broken. Her face is colourless. She lifts up her sleeve for the other student social worker and myself to see the blood over her veins.

Five years. Now twenty two, she began selling her body to survive when her father was put into jail five years ago.

Let's return.
Angell reminisces about the glamour. Sex she enjoyed, sex she was good at giving. Sex that could sometimes verge on rape for the stated protection of other women.
Not sure about you, but I don't accept the first problem.

Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?

You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honour God with your body.
(1 Cor 6:19-20)

Sexuality was bestowed on us.
Sexuality is not a bad thing.
Sexuality is not evil.

Song of Songs 2:3-6

But Lord, what if we don't have a choice?
What then?

[But we do.]

10.

fear





Strike a match and set my soul on fire


I fear the Lord,


not the snare, with their


threats to stab three knives into my heart





Bearer of the iron-sword


You alone are worthy


Engrave your truths into my skin


A fool's art seduced me


for far too long





Set me ablaze


Fire, o'freedom


My tongue will lick these flames


To burn anew for You





Rouse the lies aslumber in my bed


Beneath my feet, Your light to


Expose the wickedness of men


With their poisoned lips





Penetrate joints and marrow


Even to dividing soul and spirit



Brand me with Your sovereignty and goodness
again

For Your word is sharper than the ink of men

(Heb 4:12)

i.

The Set-Apart Spirit: I will die pursuing You.

I need examples of Your words.

I know You simplify them for me,

No picture has lent justice

To whatever You may mean.

Uncrumple paper-faces

I, persuaded by imperatives

Was seduced by decoys, by dead-ends

But I will sit and wait instead.

Patience so I suffer long,

Aversion so I occupy,

Embracing seasons, presently:

Your teaching, of my

Submission to Your love

and grace.

You bring the Sword after the softword

Piercings to my pride--- and alas,

Hope.

Change and more chiselling

Required for transformation...

Lord, I love You

and

I will obey this time.