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He Knows Our Hearts
The Sunday flocks who sing as glory pours
Through fancy glass as lusty organs play,
The loner bowed in prayer behind closed doors,
The lonely who have lost their will and way—
__He knows our hearts
____He hears our call
______He loves us one and all.
The worrywarts, the woebegone, the weak,
The black sheep at the stormy family feast,
The voiceless and the vocal and the meek,
Those battling the dazzle of the Beast—
__He knows our hearts
____He hears our call
______He loves us one and all.
The forceful and the fretful and the frail,
The huddled homeless, frozen to the bone,
The fallen in a sunless, starless jail,
The fearful in a prison of their own—
__He knows our hearts
____He hears our call
______He loves us one and all.
Those living near and far and in between,
The tribes of every color and belief,
The merry and the maudlin and the mean,
The giver and the beggar and the thief—
__He knows our hearts
____He hears our call
______He loves us one and all.
Those who seek in peace and those who fight
For truth when tales are trumpeting and rife,
The grand, the green, those greedy for the light,
Each soul from every high and low in life—
__He knows our hearts
____He hears our call
______His Son died for us all.
.
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The Hymn Within
My lettered betters lectured as they led
Me on a journey through a thorny world—
A tangle of taut testaments and dread
That strangled fledgling dreams as they unfurled.
They dazed me with their Pharisaic ease
Then whipped me witless with their expertise.
I withered till an anthem rose inside
In joyous tones my tethered spirit heard.
Notes spread throughout my head. My gift. My guide.
The might of mercy shone from every word
Of wonder in a song that led to You
On paths that blessed my soul with Heaven’s view.
.
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An Eastertide Tip
Our Savior lived and died for us.
He suffered for our sins.
So quit the fisticuffs and fuss
Since His love always wins.
.
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Susan Jarvis Bryant has poetry published on Lighten Up Online, Snakeskin, Light, Sparks of Calliope, and Expansive Poetry Online. She also has poetry published in TRINACRIA, Beth Houston’s Extreme Formal Poems anthology, and in Openings (anthologies of poems by Open University Poets in the UK). Susan is the winner of the 2020 International SCP Poetry Competition, and has been nominated for the 2022 Pushcart Prize.
Thank you so much, for these, Susan. Absolutely gorgeous, absolutely wonderful, every single word.
A blessed Easter to you.
Jeffrey, your beautiful words of appreciation and encouragement have made my heart (and my face) smile. Thank you! Wishing you a blessed Easter too.
Really the right words at the right time for me. I’m so filled with rage at trans visibility day being placed on Easter Sunday while children play with Easter Eggs forbidden to have Easter themes at the White House. So angry. Thinking Maccabees.
Your poems help me think of Peter in Gethsemane
Daniel, thank you very much for your comment. It resonates with me. In fact, I wrote an anger-fueled triolet last night in response to the trans visibility day… as if this “protected class” isn’t visible enough 24/7 on every media outlet, in our schools, in the sports arena, in women’s prisons, in women’s loos, in our military, and in the top echelons of power… and still the list goes on. It’s a pity there wasn’t a day devoted to the voices of the victims of this cruel ideology. Those who were indoctrinated, drugged, and butchered as children in the name of ‘social justice’, now living with lifelong physical and mental health issues. Below is my protest poem for Easter:
Transgender Day of Visibility
a triolet
Never mind the resurrection –
Mustached maidens crave your gaze.
Cast your eyes in their direction.
Never mind the resurrection –
Bosomed blokes who feel rejection
Seek your Easter Sunday praise.
Never mind the resurrection –
Mustached maidens crave your gaze.
Great triolet! I laughed out loud!
The phrase “mustached maidens” reminds me of a Brassens song: http://brassenswithenglish.blogspot.com/2010/01/putain-de-toi.html
My translation of the relevant stanza:
Almond-shaped eyes colored like a pistachio,
And my heart, you have placed your velvet paws upon.
Oh, how lucky for me that you had no mustachio
And your virtue didn’t weigh a ton…
This was recorded on an album in 1953. We’ve gone from men expressing gratitude for women not having facial hair to praising “mustached maidens,” in about 70 years.
First, Susan, your poems are beautiful and perfectly capture the message and the purpose of the glorious resurrection of Christ.
It is ridiculous that the President of the United States of America felt that the most visible small group in history needs even more visibility!
And, yes President Biden actually recognized March 31st, Easter Sunday, as “Transgender Day of Visibility.” He has also banned religious imagery in submissions from children of military families taking part in the traditional Easter Egg Roll event.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2024/03/29/a-proclamation-on-transgender-day-of-visibility-2024/
His move. is more about raw power and money than love or compassion.
No matter what we feel, as Daniel said above, Jesus will not tolerate our Maccabean tendencies!
Biggest fan, thank you for the lovely comment and for the link… it tells us all we need to know about the powers that be. They are (by admission) godless.
Hmmmm
https://www.wnd.com/2024/04/risen/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=risen
Thanks for “The Hymn Within” – eloquent and encouraging – I’ll take it with me as I go through the week!
Thank you, Jeremiah. I’m thrilled you like this poem. In an age where our inner voice is crushed by those who insist they know better, we need to be reminded of God’s gift to each individual. He knows best.
Thank you for the Easter gifts. Instead of the Pharisees and Sadducees, we now have the Fallacies and the Sapsyousee. “He Knows Our Hearts” is a wonderfully inclusive poem of diversity to be accepted into the Kingdom of Heaven in which the believers will share and “social justice” will be replaced by future reality. “The Hymn Within” is often where I must retreat from this world of madness and blasphemy. Have a blessed Easter!
Roy, I just love your “Fallacies and the Sapsyousee” observation – an apt linguistic Easter gift. I hope you had a beautiful one. Thank you very much indeed!
Impressive, as always, Susan. You consistently express my and so many others’ thoughts so succinctly and in a way I really should more often join you in doing. As you may remember, one I shared with you privately – of this sort – was, we agreed, just a tad too spicy for public consumption – 🙂 – but I’m not one to accept editing so it never made the site – 🙁 . Happy Easter 2 the 2 of U.
Thank you, Mark and a happy Easter to you. I don’t recall your spicy poem. I can’t even imagine a spicy poem that would make my point. Please post it in the comments – the worst that can happen is it will be deleted… and I feel sure that won’t happen. I look forward to reading it (again?).
He knows our hearts, amen.
He is Risen
He is risen indeed, Wayne. Thank you for reading and for commenting. Happy Easter to you!
If anyone needs proof that the Biden administration is a coven of the sickest perverts and traitors, just consider the idea of cancelling the celebration of Easter to make way for “Transgender Day of Visibility.” Just sit down and think about what kind of minds come up with something that disgusting.
Joe, I’ve sat down, and I’ve thought about the philanthropaths governing us and their useful-idiot puppets, and for someone of my age who’s pretty much seen it all, it’s beyond my comprehension. It won’t, however, leave me speechless. Everyone needs to know exactly what sick perverts and traitors look like, and I intend to point it out… in poetry, of course.
Susan – your poetry seems to me to just keep getting better and better, if that’s even possible. It’s several categories above amazing now. “He Knows Our Hearts” deserves a place in homes and churches and numerous schools across the globe!
Russel, what a beautiful and encouraging comment. It means a lot to me.
He Knows Our Hearts. I cannot imagine a more appropriate poem for this Easter Sunday. Thank You, Susan.
Phil, thank you very much indeed!
Thank you for the lovely Easter poems Susan. Happy Easter to you and Mike and everyone else here on the SCP.
Yael, it’s always great to hear from you and you are most welcome. Thank you for your lovely Easter greeting. Mike and I hope you had a beautiful Easter Sunday.
Susan, these are great, especially “The Hymn Within.” The speaker hears God’s call despite being “educated” away from it, an experience very familiar to me, and I thought these internal rhymes were even more creative than usual. But I laughed out loud at “Transgender Day of Visibility,” especially the alliterative “mustached maidens” and “bosomed blokes.” Keep up the good work!
Josh, thank you very much for reading and for commenting. I especially like your translation of the relevant stanza of a Brassens song that had me laughing out loud. One has to laugh… life would be far too grim without a snigger. We are living in one helluva warped world… to slip into the misery of it is lethal.
Dear Susan,
Just when I thought you couldn’t possibly surpass what you have written so far, you give us, He Knows our Hearts. It does, if you will pardon the pun, get to the heart of the human condition. I particularly love worrywarts (which is me), but every alliterative phrase, every line and all the descriptions of the human condition that you include, are so apt and so poetically executed, in all this poem is a precious gift.
Mia, thank you very much indeed for your beautiful comment. It’s always lovely to hear your point of view. You have made many great contributions in the comments section – a place I owe great thanks to for inspiring some of my poems. I hope you had a lovely Easter.
He knows our hearts is a wonderful, and dare I say, heart-felt poem, Susan, really great to hear it at this time of year. Thank you.
James, it’s always lovely to hear from you, and thank you! You’re spot on when you say it’s a heartfelt poem… it really is.
Susan, I’ve read through these poems several times and think that they’re wonderful — particularly “He Knows Our Hearts” the theme of which is so true. But what you’ve presented is not just a poem — it’s a lyric which already has a chorus and which absolutely ought be set to music! It is easy to forget that God is only a whisper away and your tender words remind us of that fact. There is a simplicity and symmetry to your poem that makes me think of “All Things Bright and Beautiful.” Even though your second poem is described as a “hymn” I rather think between the two that it is this one!
“The Hymn Within” also provides a powerful first-person testimony of finding God not from the pulpit but in the heart, and in spite of rather than because of authoritarian figures in your speaker’s life. It’s a profoundly important message — people are fallible. God alone is perfect and we must be free to find Him where He wills. Revelation comes from an amazing array of sources, whether it be Job’s whirlwind, Paul’s being struck blind on the road to Damascus or in Moses’s burning bush. A powerful reminder to pay attention to what’s going on inside as well as out.
Brian, thank you very much indeed for your perspicacious and beautiful observations. I love your idea of setting the first poem to music – this poem sort of spilled out of me in song-like form. God really is “only a whisper away” – and I’m thrilled this came across. Sadly, we live in a society where belief in God is either not tolerated or exploited for nefarious ends. Hatred is at an all-time high in my lifetime. When judgment of a fellow human being is made on skin-color, gender, origin of birth, and sexuality there’s no room left for the contents of character… that’s where God comes in. He knows our hearts and that in itself is a great comfort to many mistreated and misunderstood souls. This Easter, I needed to say it.
Your observations on ‘The Hymn Within’ are spot on. I especially like the words “finding God not from the pulpit but in the heart, and in spite of rather than because of authoritarian figures in your speaker’s life” – it is for this reason I wrote this poem. I’m done with indoctrination from institutions bought and paid for by propagandist pagans. I’m more than ready to “pay attention to what’s going on inside as well as out.” Thank you!
Shall not God search out these things?
Indeed, He knoweth the secrets of the heart!
From the Psalms. Happy Easter, Susan!
A person may think their own ways are right,
but the Lord weighs the heart.
From Proverbs. Happy Easter, Margaret!
Susan, everything today is propaganda, and the government leads the way. How can our government create such a travesty on Easter Sunday, of all the sacred days?
They tried it at Christmas (no red and green, carols or other ancient and traditional delights).
The Jews are easier for them, as they are a smaller group. But they are after all of us. Evil fools, every one. Happy Easter to all.
Sally, there is much wisdom in your comment. It seems many are turning a blind eye to what we are facing in a society whose government is telling we the people that invasion is immigration, eating bugs is a culinary delight, men are women, right is wrong, war is peace, two plus two equals five, and we will own nothing and be happy… by God! What happened in Israel on 10/7 should be a lesson to us all. Sally, happy Easter, and thank you for your keen eye and sanity.
Oops! Now I know the true meaning of, “Be careful what you wish for”. Wow!! I just remembered why I couldn’t remember this one. It packs one a helluva punch… one that sends a shiver. On a serious note, I believe as poets we tread a fine line between engaging and disturbing our readership… and I think you’re right at the edge with this one. I did ask for it, and I thank you for obliging.
Talk about disturbing language! My brother-in-law, who is one of the kindest, most empathetic and gentle guys I know, regularly uses most every 4-letter word you rarely hear in synagogues, yet makes as fine a friend as one could ever have! Despite his very spicy speech, he always manages to make his point in a way that exposes, to those that know him well, his tender side. My mom’s father was the same way. Stay safe, Mark.