It struck me while brushing my teeth yesterday. Why yesterday, I am not sure. It was right there, right there in the mirror, but hasn’t it always been? There, each and every morning dance of personal hygiene, yet I certainly never gave it any notice before.
It wasn’t the thing, really. But what it’s attached to. It’s true: I have never laid eyes on my heart, that powerhouse of muscle in the chest cavity that pumps warm coursing blood through veins. But yesterday, waking up—for real– I set down my toothbrush, reached in past gleamy white dentures and touched what is known as the tail of the heart.
Writhing, fleshy thing, it was. Hard to still. Thick and awkward… fat enough for someone to stumble over. (I do, too often.) And yet, somehow, a bit sharp, prickly. I tugged it a bit. Who knew the heart had a tail that worked its way up past the tonsils, and every time a mouth opens– there it is!
But it is not an unusual tail, the more I think of it. Tail wags: dog is happy. Tail sags: dog is sad. Dog’s afraid? Tail slips between legs and flees… or stiffens, steely, ready for attack. No, I can’t see a heart. But tail betrays the heart. A marionette, this tongue is nothing but an appendage, one that moves in precise synchrony with the emotions of the heart. It’s pain. Fear. Selfishness.
I listen to my tongue. Its tone. And think of Ruth Bell Graham who wrote, “Someone once said, ‘Most of the tensions of everyday life are caused by tone of voice.’ I know it’s true with me.” Ah, yes. And me, too. Countless times a day, I hear that pitch and remind self: Retune heart: Let go. Love is patient. Give thanks for now, just as it is. Intensity of tail ebbs, eases, slows. Tension fades.
I listen to my tongue. Its words. Scratching ones, like, “I just wish…” or “It’s so frustrating when…” Or edgier, sharper ones. Ones that make listeners draw back, hurt. And I can’t scurry about quick enough, gathering all the words up quickly, stuffing them back in my heart, then gently smoothing out all the claw marks, nice and tidy like. I have known: like the tail of a whale, a tongue wields powerfully, dangerously: “Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof.” ~Proverbs 18:21
Those words sit propped in the Proverbs box of Wisdom by the sink. A child, drying dishes, questions its literal truth. “A tongue never killed anyone though, did it?”
I think of tongues I’ve known. Tails I’ve ducked. Tails that have cracked, whipped, slapped, shattering hearts. I nod, “Yes. Tongues can kill.” Because a heart seeps with poison.
I listen to my tongue. Its purpose. Self-inflating or God-inflating? God-deflating or self-deflating? Too often I think I am God-glorifying, think my heart swells with gratitude, think, in a general sense, that yes, I bubble with the joy of the abundant life. But watch the tail. Listen to the tail. The tail betrays the heart. Grace or grumbling? Gratitude or complaining? Joy or disappointment? What comes out of a man makes him unclean—manifests the oozing infection of his own heart. I cannot see my heart. But watching its tail, I can see what passages are blocked, what heart arteries require immediate surgery. What valves pump strong, healthy, joyously. The tail reveals.
These weeks before Passover, Easter, is a time to look within, to prepare hearts for the cleansing Blood of the Lamb. So begins forty days of tail watching, of heart monitoring. All eight of us have slipped bracelets on wrists, like bands on a tail. I grumble? Switch bracelet to other wrist. I complain? Switch back again. A heart angiogram, this bracelet tracks the tongue, a tongue tied to the heart. Can I go more than a day without harsh words, grumbling words? Why is my heart afraid of joy? Of exuberant praise?
It’s a 40 Day Expedition into Radical Gratitude.
Into a heart that wags with Joy.
Lord, it’s Day One of the expedition into the wilderness across everyday life, into radical gratitude. Change my heart. I am watching the tail.
For a tail band for an Expedition into Radical Gratitude
Psalm 19:14 May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD…
