The Reason Why We Keep Records

I was looking on the hard drive of the computer that we had from about 1999 till 2004 to find a talk for my brother. In the process I found a whole bunch of poetry that I thought I'd lost. I had a fertile poetic period in 2002-3 and wrote about 40 poems. Here are two for your perusal. I was serving as a stake missionary at first and then was called to teach seminary in late 2002 and the necessity arose of studying the gospel for about 2 hours each day. Writing about my gospel study really helps me ponder things instead of just inhaling information then exhaling it as a lesson after one quick circluation around my brain. Poetry is just one of the ways I process what I learn.

Diamonds

As God’s most precious jewel,
We must be like diamonds.
But I wonder at the simile.
Natural diamonds are born of chance.
They can only sit and wait, purified to be sure,
But a bit random.

I do not feel that
God scattered us in haphazard caverns;
To reach our shining potential
Only if found by luck
Then finished at the whim of some earthly stonecutter’s
Crude knife.

I wonder if perhaps
We are more like diamonds from the scientist’s measured hand.
More common in the world’s view;
Perhaps not even beautiful.
Created, instead for a purpose,
In a crucible of God’s own design.

I do not believe that
We are random treasures of chance
Destined to reflect mere vanity.
With a two-edged blade of infinite hone,
We are being faceted for clarity of a different sort:
We will reflect eternity

Kellie Nuss 2002




John 16:33

An injunction offered
At the junction of
Circumstance and will
A simple plea to Be
In the very moment we
Would abandon hope to fear
He offers Good Cheer
Will we take the opportunity
Or claim we are not free?

Kellie Nuss
May 2003

(here's the text of John 16:33: These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.)