Category: Receiving

What Artists Reveal (WAR)

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There’s a war happening
There’s a war happening 
In the Artist’s heart in All Ways
There’s a War Happening 
War of the worlds 
War inside
Collateral damage 
Even if no one dies
There’s an internal battle
When a baby cries
Hunger and no food
Creates a world of lies
Open your eyes
It’s not just me that’s singing
It’s an entire Universe 
Of controlled screaming
Destroying ourselves 
Just to find meaning
I defy meaning
With my dreaming
Because there’s a war happening
There’s a war happening
In the Artist’s heart in All Ways
There’s a War Happening
Artists exist
To control the chaos
But the irony is 
They don’t want to pay us
When tyranny comes 
First thing they do is take us
But we just keep creating
As they all forsake us
We’re springs of creation
They cannot remake us
Transmitting love
To even those who hate us
There’s no argument 
They cannot debate us
Proof of God’s Love
Is that God creates us
We just surrendered to the fact
That we can’t create ourselves
Then miraculously
We can create ourselves
Given the authority 
To transform our hells
These prison walls 
Are no more our cells
Our presence is the secret
That no one tells
The holes in our hearts 
Have become our wells
And it’s from these wells
That your soul’s drinking
Thoughts become things
So we’re not thinking 
We live by inspiration
We only move when still
Translating silence
To express our will
Channeling frustrations
So the truth’s revealed 
And we’ll keep on creating
Until the world is healed

© Copyright 2024 Pedro Senhorinha Silva

In an upcoming article for the People Are Not Things Linkedin Newsletter, in reflection on a training I was just a part of in DC, I will examine the role art plays in creating new models for human compatibility and flourishing even in the face what could appear to be imminent institutional collapse. In addition to the folks present at the convening, I was inspired by Asha Romeo (https://www.asharomeo.com/) to write this piece and use AI to create this image. Asha sang the hook on my rap single, Take This Life (Make It Light) and sang for several services when I was a pastor to include the final song on my last Sunday. She is a singular talent with amazing musical range. She will soon be relocating from our neighborhood to LA to pursue her music career.

When I thought about her journey as a child from a small town named Gondar in Ethiopia to Boulder, CO and how because of that journey this community has been filled with music that would have not otherwise been here, I realized something about art that I had never considered before. Artist transmute chaos into culture. Even when I think of my own artistic expressions, I know them to be the result of wrestling with a lifetime of polarizing tensions that through inner struggle show up in the word as–at least semi-coherent–expressions of the underlying harmony that I believe turns potential danger into a potent dance with what could be considered conflicting loyalties.

Mindful of this, in this poem, I wanted to celebrate what she and other artists bring to our spaces by bending chaos to their creative will. Without them, where would we be? And more than that, I want to encourage each of us to tap into the artist that lives in each of us. I hypothesize that much of the challenges that we are experiencing in many of our social landscapes is because of unmetabolized traumatic experiences that work themselves out in our interactions with others on every level from interpersonal to international. But, it doesn’t have to be that way. With artistry, we can choose to create systems that works better for more people.

Take This Life (Make It Light) [https://youtu.be/pMVTFt5cYk4?si=KtoVSqVXh0-u4Z13]

Embracing Nothing

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I just want to be defeated
And no longer have a care
Let this last battle have me
And sink into despair
Raise the white flag
Settle into the abyss
Deleted from the world’s memory
So that I won’t even be missed
Get absorbed into the Void
Go from I was to now I wasn’t
Undo whatever it seems I’ve ever done
So that what I do becomes a doesn’t
Utterly erased
Even from anyone’s imagination
An unmanifest impossibility
Not even a consideration
I don’t want heaven and don’t want hell
Nor any concept in between
No good or bad illusions
Nor awakening in the dream
I only want to be empty
Completely uncontained
I’ve given everything I have
I just want to rest in being drained
But this doesn’t mean I’m giving up
I’m just finally seeing clearly
To be who only I can be
I cannot let earthly desires near me
They function how they’re supposed to
They promise what they cannot give
So wanting anything in this life
Never shows us how to live
It is only in wanting nothing
That I can receive everything and more
It’s only in surrendering everything I thought I had
That I can be what I came here for

© Copyright 2024 Pedro Senhorinha Silva II

Listen Once and For All

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Listen
Without words
To what can only be spoken
With Silence
There is no loss
There is no gain
In the Place where Love is Home
Like the top of the inhale
And the bottom of the exhale
Where in and out are One
And coming and going cease to be
There resides the thought
That tells you what you already know
You are more than enough
And worthy of all Creation
Here is where
In Silence you hear
The Voice of the voiceless
Noiselessly shouting
Everything I Am
Is Communicating
To Everything You Are
Telling You
Once and for All
We have Everything We need
When We have each Other

Am I Confessing?

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If I worry when I don’t have to,
What does it really say
About how much it is I trust in You?
Are my words empty when I pray?

If I’m jealous of another
Is it a denial of Your Creation?
If I want what was never meant for me,
Have I led me into temptation?

If I refuse to forgive my neighbor
Who slapped me on my cheek
Have I forgotten I’m eternally safe in You
Whose strength’s revealed when I am weak?

If I try to get attention
That was really meant for You
By pretending I know the answers
Do I make a lie of what is true?

If I worship at the altar
Of things that are bought and sold
Have a made a sham of what Freedom truly is
For a little piece of false control?

If I don’t see me as You see me
Do I make the whole world blind
By denying what’s in all of us
And impressing limits on Your Mind?

If I refuse to receive redemption
Without the words to understand
Simply because I can’t explain it to other folks
Do I let go of Your Hand?

If I’m attached to what will never last
Am I missing Your biggest lessons?
If these thoughts are really on my mind
Are my questions my confessions?

Image by I.am_nah

Miss You While You’re Here

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Lately I’ve been thinking about
All the moments that we missed
When we’re younger we think we have plenty of time
And don’t think about stuff like this

We put so much off until later
But what if later never comes?
All tomorrows repeats of yesterdays
The future setting like the sun

I’m not ready yet to miss you
When I know that you’re right here
There’s so much I wanted to give you
Before my chances disappeared

Now it hurts that we talk almost everyday
And yet we never talk at all
Or that I battle with all these tempting thoughts
Not to answer when you call

Of course I want to be here for you
But it seems this is always where we’ve been
You telling me about how hard it is
While I listen on the other end

I look back and feel like a failure
I wish I could’ve spared you from some pain
But the best I can do is be a witness
And pray for something else to change

I still have hope that you’ll get better
That perfect love will cast out fear
But for now I’ll be grateful for what we have
Because I don’t want to miss you while you’re here
© Copyright 2020 Pedro S. Silva II

I wrote this poem as I started to think about how many conversations I have with my mom are about how to make it from month to month. We talk everyday. Sometimes multiple times a day. But rarely are our conversations about thing that I would like us to talk about. Because of all of the stress over the past few years, there has been a strain on the relationship. I’ll be honest and say that often I am acting like I am her parent rather than the other way around. I want her to be safe and make decisions for her well-being. I know how hard she tried to be whatever and whoever she felt she needed to be to make sure we survived growing up. That took a toll on her. And I know that she had huge dreams–most of which never got fulfilled. This is a wound in her heart.

She always told me that she wanted to leave my brothers and I with a legacy. What she meant was money. That hasn’t happened and it saddens her. She apologizes for not being in a better financial situation and asks me to believe in her that she can still pull it off. I want to believe, but… And now that I am witnessing her forgetting so much and yet still holding out hope for a miracle or for her “ship to come in” as she says, I feel a twinge of regret.  I ask myself, “If I knew we were going to end up here anyway, what would I have done differently?”

At first, I told myself I would’ve stayed in the military so that I would have my retirement right now and I could be working another job to provide for her. But then I look at my wife and kids and know that I had to take the course I did.  I then think that I should’ve chosen a more lucrative profession than being a pastor. But then, I was having a conversation with a guest at the church who is experiencing homelessness and watching members of the congregation–to include children–serving food and sitting with our homeless neighbors and I thought, “I am glad to be in this moment.” And then I thought, well maybe I was called to be a pastor for a season, but now that my mom needs me, I need to move on and do something else because my responsibilities demand it. And then I prayed and I felt the spirit moving me to be honest about how hard this is and to tell my friends. And so I did. And they stepped in and blessed my family and gave me room to breathe so I could figure out how to make the next best move for my mom. They showed me the truth of the teaching that says, “[God’s] strength is made perfect in our weakness.”

And so then in that space, I asked God what I could do differently for my mom. And in my soul’s language I heard, “Don’t miss her while she is still here. Because that’s what you’ve been doing. If you want to have different conversations with her, change the subject. Talk about the things that you wish you could talk to her about. If she misses it and repeats something else she just said, tell her you love her. Tell her your dreams and maybe she’ll get joy in knowing that she is a part of them. Have an unreasonable belief in miracles because you never know what might happen. And don’t forget, you are not in this alone.”

So if you are reading this, what my soul spoke into my life, I speak into yours. There are so many things in life that can distract us from the moments we are in–something to tempt us to forget that there is always the possibility of great beauty around the corner. In my weakness, I found strength in hitting my limits and reaching out. My hope is that in sharing what I am learning, it is blessing you all too.

With true love,

Pedro

A Friend In Need

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They say a friend in need is a friend indeed
Or is it a friend in deed
Meaning a friend is one who acts as one
When another friend’s in need

Or maybe it’s the former one
We’re friends when we’re in want
But otherwise we give no others thought
Just to make it blunt

But perhaps it is more gray than that
Which makes it difficult to name
Because where self-sufficiency is idolized
To be in need is to be shamed

It’s really hard to put my finger on
As I examine my condition
When I’m aware enough to know I should ask for help
But won’t fully give myself permission

On one side, it’s because I don’t want help
I have learned so much from all my failing
But on the other side, I know that there’s sufficient grace
For those of us prone to self-assailing

Furthermore when I’m on the giving end
I always do what I can do
But when I’m on the receiving end
I do my best to just push through

But presently I am torn
This uphill battle seems unending
I could keep on trying to handle this
But in reality I’m pretending

I’ve always been good at holding burdens
But now my burdens are holding me
As I consider that I’m just a request away
From a space that feels more free

Well, if anything, there’s a lesson
These constraints I feel won’t last
And it matters little if I hear “yes” or “no”
Things will get better because I asked

© Copyright 2020 Pedro S. Silva II

I wrote this poem after wrestling with my thoughts about whether or not I should share a fundraiser I created for my mother to help ease some of the financial impact of her pending move.  This season has been really tender for me for a lot of reasons. Besides watching my mother succumb to the effects of a lifetime of stress and anxiety, trying to keep this pressure to myself has taken its toll on me and my family, both emotionally and financially. But it’s not all bad. This also has been a very creative season for me as I’ve tried to make sense of my own anxieties in light of my faith that when we are open, there is a solution to every concern. I’ve written poems that I never would’ve been able to write were I not translating, what at times felt like, overwhelming emotion. I completed a rap that I’m really proud of despite the fact that it has not yet brought in any of the money I’d naively thought it would. And in my social justice and community building work, knowing that I am personally impacted by so much of the challenges that we’re trying to ameliorate, has shaped my preaching and public speaking in a way that perhaps it would not if my family was more shielded. And finally, by putting this out here, I feel that it is on the path of healing the ill effects of the negative type of pride. And so here we are.