Songwriting
Here is where I document the various skills, developments, and exercises I work on as part of my Worship Arts studies. These exercises are meant to expand my creativity and hone certain skills whether that be musical or lyrical. Object writing is an example of gaining language skills.
Object Writing 1
Sidewalk
The sidewalk is where you become friends. The cracks in the pavement house life. Blades of grass poking through to show their fresh new green coating. Some even sprinkled with flowers of all colors, yellow, white, purple, pink. The sidewalk is where you get to see beauty. Whether you are walking through the fog but always have a path to stay on, or lost in the grander of a sunset your feet almost trip off the elevated pavement. You kick up the occasional dust from a left over muddy puddle, breathing in the dry particles of salty clay. On the sidewalk is where you gain perspective for the world. You are just a simple being walking on this great big floating ball of land and water. You also get to be accompanied by another being who is far deeper, far richer, far more complex, far more precious than the giant ball you’re walking on or even the shining glory you walk by. You hear their story. You know their voice, their laugh, they breathe. You become bonded, you become friends. It may just start on the sidewalk, but it carries through life. Your pebble-covered, dusty, cracked yet smooth, gray sidewalk is now an avenue for beauty. The crunch of the side walk become the sound of new beginning and establishing inside jokes. You can thank the space that sidewalks provide for your new friend, for the new wonder you experience. When you hear the footsteps, rather than looking down, look up, look around, see the dots the sidewalk is connecting.
Object Writing 2
M&Ms
These little pellets of neon colors were never my thing. The tapping and rattling that comes from holding these in your hands was never something I really enjoyed. I wanted to like it so bad. I wanted to taste the sweet and satisfactory bite. But something about my tongue was just different from the rest of the world’s. I could not like these neon pellets with musty colored brown cores. Maybe if it wasn’t just the solid orb, maybe something else inside. Something salty that made it all double in size from the inside out. Not even that could make me as happy as everyone else when they threw these in their mouths. I struggled to put one in while all my friends were chugging handfuls, laughing and enjoying themselves as they did. This seemed like fun, it doesn’t’ seem like my fault that I can’t like it. Maybe that’s a question for God, is there a reason for me to be like this? Did I, Josiah Gonzales, have to be so different? Why couldn’t I just be like the rest of the world and simply enjoy an innocent M&M.
Over the years, I have grown accustomed to these treats. The solid exterior that makes a small crisp sound when you close your jaw was growing on me. I could hold them in my hand and fully experience the colors melting and fusing on to my fingertips. Was it worth the wait? Who can really say. Do I get the instant joy from every kid who lays eyes on the M marked pellets? In concept.
Object Writing 3
Music Stand
The music stand stands like the eiffel tower. It is made to be an aid. But, I have never been partial to the music stand. The music stand is where I hide when I am in conflict. When I am being watched I go to the hollow home. It is not the most comforting place to be but it is better than the alternative. It is better to have the nearness of a familiar face than the question marks of another’s eyes. This may be born out of unhealth, pettiness, distaste, and most dramatically regret. But this aid is also restricting. It confines and says “you are safer here.” When really there’s a message to be given, a gift to be shared, a connection that needs to be made. It may just be for the one question-marked pair of eyes, or it could be for a spectrum of stories. I think the music stand was made to help, but like all things can be distorted in order to hide in doubt. Maybe I just need to get rid of this stand, maybe it’s fine to be in the hollow home, maybe I don’t have to like what happens when I look up, but why discredit all the opportunities? Who knows what will become of our relationship.
Object Writing 4
Converse (Shoes)
My most distinct memory of these shoes is at a small indie concert with about 50 people in the audience. I soon realized I was the only person in the room who did not have some sort of personal relationship with the artist. Maybe I was the random friend of the second-cousin at a family reunion, but I was going to embrace it. Well, I did in the typical Josiah way. I sat in the back and journaled and observed, smiling at the familial chaos of the whole event. I watched as more people came in dancing, shouting, singing, hugging, conversing with the artist on stage. I felt like I was the fly on the wall of a high school reunion. It was just nostalgic joy. There was something familiar yet fresh in the air. The reason shoes were involved was at the end I saw a shoe fly by my face. This black, well-worn, Converse sneaker came from behind and almost knocked the guitar out of his hand. I was so confused, but everyone was laughing like I missed the joke. The artist went along with it as soon everyone’s shoes ended up on stage. At his feet, on a light, in a plant, in between his legs, there were varying shoes flying and landing not so gracefully. What I missed amidst the cheers of the projectile shoes was that the song he was singing was called “Old Shoes.” The chorus said, “Kicking off my old shoes…” so everyone just did as he said. I was about to take off my shoes when I remembered I was the only stranger.
Object Writing 5
Boston
Home. History. Hemingway. Brick. Broken. Boston. What looks like the start is really the development. What seems like chaos is really just culture. What appears to be aggression is merely friendship. This is what I had always known. This is what I thought was normal. Like this is just how beautiful and diverse and exciting things are for everyone. Everyone knows that Italian man with the one-liners. Everyone knows the orange letters and the steaming to-go coffee cup. Everyone has rivers, just maybe not the same kinds. The rivers of people marching in protest, the rivers of students flooding the culture, the rivers of metal and lights, the rivers of colors melding together, and then there’s the Charles.
Object Writing 6
Burning Fast
A deep passion rising and falling within you. In the practice of fasting, there is a burning. The burning is the anticipation for the climax. It is the burning of developing the story line. The fast is what lets you focus that your heart naturally wants to burn. The burning is the feeling inside of you when you consider the cross. But is also the burning that purifies your heart as you fast. Burning off the sins that so easily entangle, burning off the habits that would distance you emotionally from the suffering and victory, burning off the lies that this holiday is routine and normal and not worth intentionally celebrating. But a burning fast reminds us of the value. Like a burning fast may we wait with expectance, vulnerability, and refinement. As his heart was moved by compassion and forgiveness on the cross, may we be more like him to give past our sufferings. A fast is a loss for a gain. It is a habit of loss. It is a routine of humility. It can be done passively, but that is even more of a loss. Active suffering. Leaning in to the thorns. Letting yourself sweat the blood. If active suffering takes me to Jesus, I want more.
Object Writing 7
Tired Snow
It’s holding on for dear life but doesn’t have much more to give. Its community has moved away and changed. What was normal, welcomed, cultivated for a season suddenly was revoked. It is trying to lot lose itself, to not lose its beauty. But the longer it holds on, the more and more unattractive it becomes. It becomes a stumbling block, a splatter of neon green paint on the Mona Lisa. It doesn’t understand that if it just lets go, is willing to change, it is actually better for everyone involved. They don’t have to stay in the sludge of gray and a tangible lump of transparency. They also could have preserved the beauty of a short life, in purity and stillness, but that is robbed when they are so lazy that they stay still. They get trampled, become bitter and slick, being more harmful than delightful. This tired snow is lingering on the grass. It is wanting to keep us in the cold season, not maliciously. It’s like it doesn’t want to say goodbye to a friend they have gotten to know so well. Is it worth it to leave? How can you make leaving beautiful? Does leaving have to change you?
Object Writing 8
Limitless Lament
A limitless lament does not stay in one place. A limitless lament reaches the deepest parts of your soul. It surfaces sorrow and grief and pain and questions, but it keeps bringing you deeper. It searches for the root. It both never ending question with never ending hope. You can’t actually lament without trust. You have to have some element of faith. You are lamenting to something or someone. It may feel like an inward spiral of confusion and injustices, but it is also an upward swirl of a fragrance to the One who listens. Limitless lament is matched by limitless listening. There’s room to vent because someone actually cares to hear. There’s also someone who did the same. In the garden a Man was in so much chaos, he couldn’t sleep, intensely lost himself, and gave himself to the Listener. The Listener and now the Man in the garden not only hear but sympathize. They suffering with you. They are willing to enter in to your limitless laments, but they are the ones that offer the hope, assure your trust, and give you faith. So whether the lament is 40 days of lent, the mourning of a loss, or the grief of world, a limitless lament only looks limitless from the finite, but the infinite sees is and tells you, “there is an end, you can keep going because there is an end.”
Verse:
What you invite us into is complex
“Join me in death but it’s really your life”
We kneel for the limitless lament
If that’s what it takes to be at your side
This is a rough first draft of a song a wrote as a reflection of Good Friday
Would I try as hard as that woman?
Could I believe that there was something there?
Some sort of mystery woven in the hem of his garment?
Would I risk all I ever knew and thought was right and throw myself towards his smile?
A curious prophet
A quiet preacher
But he had zeal, so we kept following
The disliked rabbi
The reserved healer
The Son of Man, our Jewish King
Would I be John or the 11?
Would I be able to look at him?
Did I love him so much I could see him forsaken?
Could I still believe that my promised life was true as I looked him in the eye?
A slaughtered Savior
A mocked Messiah
But he is God, so he saw it coming
A rejected sacrifice
A despised brother
The Lamb of God, a Shepherd King
To fully know you
And to fully love you
That’s all I’m really wanting
Have faith in questions
And hope in every word
To be found unwavering
So in the presence of God and Man you say I knew you and I can say it back :)
A tender Father
A gentle Friend
Who you are, ever since the beginning
Eyes of compassion
Head of victory
The Great I AM, my risen King
This is a special song written as a prayer to the LORD. It is a combination of melodies and lyrics that have been complied over the past year and writing techniques learned from the Musical Leadership in the Church course this semester.
Lyrics:
I come here often
I’m tired of being tired
My heart has been softened
I’ve just seemed to have lost the fire
Holy Spirit bring me close
Take me to the heart
Take me into holy places
Please, I want to feel his hand
A touch of life, a thread
I want to catch a glimpse of my Beloved
I think it’s quite simple
But for some reason I’m stuck
I’m not waiting for a temple
I’m just waiting for my love
Holy Spirit bring me close
Take me to the heart
Take me into holy places
Please, I want to feel his hand
A touch of life, a thread
I want to catch a glimpse of my Beloved
Just to look at you and see your beauty
Is the deepest cry of my heart
To simply rest and know how much you love me
Oh how I long to be
Sitting at your feet
Holy Spirit bring me close
Take me to the heart
Take me into holy places
Please, I want to feel his hand
A touch of life, a thread
I want to catch a glimpse of my Beloved