Flesh Word straddles the interface between idea and action. It’s a kind of language game. In my head and heart are heavy, violent, dark things, as well as hopeful things. And to explain/express them, I’m limited when I resort to frameworks of language. But the free-flowing advantages of digital tapestry extend also to written work. I can be both honest and open-ended, when meanings flow like this: connected ambigiuously, but placed in stark playful juxtaposition. It may not be accurate in every sense, but when I metaphor-mesh in word and (pixel) flesh, the results challenge and surprise me every time.
Of course there’s an analytical element. "Flesh word" is a derivative of the typical incarnation story "Word became Flesh". These meandering reflections owe whatever stability they have to that story as it’s traditionally told. So when I follow the story into another space altogether… when I see the dance between matter and spirit going onward, beyond the embodiment of God into human form… when I see our actions, our flesh, in turn become the raw materials for our ideas: our theology, our philosophy, our headspace, our heartspace … then I need Jesus to bring all that heaven back down to earth.
When violence permeates both our words and actions, I find irony and hope in discovering the language of a "Mooring Point" on the fuselage of a fighterplane at the airshow, along with a "Refueling"… It’s disconcerting to have to refuel (even spiritually) if the whole process is geared towards enabling a bombing mission. It is, of course, possible that there are legitimate targets / wars / enemies. I’d rather not have to invent their justification. And yet my own heart (engaging with its place and tradition) has managed plenty such inventions. By putting it all out there, I hope I can focus on the the light, on the solution, even the cosmic humour of it all.
Christmas reminds me of a kind of letting go. The Lamb of God takes away the sins of the world. The the veil of the drama involving oversized stars and sheep keepers, we’ve got a little glint of green amid the metal and flesh, the word and the flesh, the flesh wound beneath the gleam of gold-leaf. Flesh Word.