The Diner Up the Road

 

The Diner Up the Road

(“I am a debtor both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish.” Romans 1:14)

The times have dictated their letters to me and
left me on my own to affix the signature.
Rolling over snow drifts melting in the warming rain
I move from yesterday to noon,
from leftward to soon,
from literature to mixology,
from my wicker chair to the indented couch.

I would thrust my hand through the dimensions if
I could.
I would reach behind me before you died and ask
for one more time at Denny’s or a ride on the back of your
Honda.

I would read the books again, in the same edition,
of my favorite authors. I would smell the chalk and
greasepaint
in the rehearsal space where we used to eat our lunches,
run our lines, rehearse our plays, and make dates for
the weekend; mud football or a day wandering the
basement shops in Berkely. I discovered Tom Rush
that way.

The days are much too quiet while I am still alive,
and you, and them, and cousins, and friends, and parents,
and sisters, have flown from this orb while I lose track
of the living.

I would adjust the tuner if I could, ensure a better reception.
I would place my heart in your ears, not my words,
for you to hear the aching inflection. We made mistakes
nearly every minute in those days, but friendships never swayed.
How could they, and where would we go?

Now the same, the beloved, the laughter, the root beer mugs in the freezer,
are forgotten joys since we’ve learned to play with adulting toys.
And yet, you; the circle of prayer cross-legged on the floor,
the study group I skipped too often,
the gang of three that always included me
when we met for lunch in the quad just to see
if the pie-eating contest was still going ahead as scheduled.

And I am sandpaper, and I am silk. And I am crepe paper,
and I am cardboard. And I would sit at this table,
the diner up the road, ordering hash and eggs
and setting out a second cup of coffee in the hopes
that you would take the seat next to me
and discover that

My tears and my laughter are both still the same.

We Will Rise Up

 

We Will Rise Up

(“But when Jesus heard this, he said, ‘Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing!’” Mark 5:36)

Arise, shine;
We will rise up.
Arise, shine;
We will meet the day.
Arise, shine;
We will rise up.
Arise shine;
Hear the people say.

She is not dead, but living,
she has not stopped her breathing,
do not fear, but be believing,
the dead are only sleeping.

Life arise;
We will greet you.
Life arise,
We will welcome joy.
Life arise,
We will greet you.
Life arise,
Make a joyful noise.

Christ is here now, he is seeking,
for those who felt the sun setting.
Do not fear, the sun is rising,
the day is only beginning.

Arise, shine;
We will follow.
Arise, shine;
We will mount with wings.
Arise, shine;
We will follow.
Arise, shine;
Hear the people sing.

We are not dead, but living,
we have finished our grieving.
Not afraid, we are believing,
the day will soon be dawning.

Arise, arise, arise.
We will arise.

You Have Not Disappointed Me

 

You Have Not Disappointed Me

 

(“My dove, in the clefts of the rock, in the crevices of the cliff, let me see your face, let me hear your voice; for your voice is sweet, and your face is lovely.” Song of Song 2:14)

 

Today I hear the Spirit saying to those who are weary in the mission of loving others deeply, of loving as you are loved, of loving your enemy, and of doing good to all:

You fear you have disappointed me, have let me down, have been misunderstood, have spoken out of turn, have made no progress. You are frightened as a dove hiding in the clefts of the rock. You have shielded yourself because you have been hurt in the attempt to love others. You have shielded yourself because you fear you have failed. You have shielded yourself because you feel you no longer are useful. You have shielded yourself, alone, and fear the tools of love have been misused in your hands. 

The Spirit say, Come. Let me see your face. Speak and I will hear. Speak, though your words are clumsy and awkward. Speak, for to me your voice is always sweet. Have I not chosen to reside within you? Have I not hidden myself within your heart? So, do not hide from me, my love, but come, rest, and find the gentleness of my yoke. Let me shield you as a mother hen does her chicks.  

The Spirit says, you have not disappointed me, how could you? I have made you; I have seen your beginning and your end, I walk with you in front and behind, above and below. You can never disappoint me because I am acquainted with all your ways. Did the Father tell the prodigal how disappointed he was? No, he welcomed that weary child into his arms, into his home, and fully into family love. 

So, dearest, you will mature in your mission. You will learn the struggles that come from the same suffering as Jesus the Son. You will learn that those who are angry are only children with hearts as fearful as your own. Forgive them, they don’t always know what they are doing. Don’t be afraid to examine your own heart, but only with the light of my love and acceptance leading the way. 

Come away for a time and let me speak sweetly. Let me give you the enhanced vocabulary of the Word, the One who loved even those who were against him. And when you fail, you will never disappoint me, you will continue with the lamp of love guiding your footsteps. 

My dove, let me see your face. And, having seen it, let me send you back into the world renewed in my love, to show my love.

Violets of Joy

 
Violets of Joy

(“And they came to Jesus and saw the demon-possessed man, the one who had had the legion, sitting there, clothed and in his right mind, and they were afraid.” Mark 5:15)

Once accustomed to the madness that fights
mongrels in the cemetery,
we pass the fences without fear,
walk by at night. It is customary
to tell the children there is no haunting there.
Just an old man with drool in his beard and
toes shaped like rocks from scraping against
the headstones.

But watch the violets of joy emerge from
deep within the healed soul,
hear the voice once screeching like iron
now
quieted as a weaned child
and we have no answer

But to fear what we do not know.

Let the day come easy now,
let the morning open like drops of sunlight,
let the streams whisper background calm.
Let the neighbors stop in wonder
and offer ears to hear the new song
sung from an old man’s throat that
makes the blue jays gather. The melody is
childlike,
the lyric repeatable. Free is a word
that even the townspeople

Need to learn.

Silver Shimmer

Silver Shimmer

(“You cheat the poor and needy and rob widows and orphans.” Isaiah 10:2b)

Seduced by silver shimmer and
drawing the edges so close to home
you miss the earthen treasures and
annul the pleasures of the masses who,
with upturned faces only want their glasses filled
with new wine for this one day
of the year.

Your gold means nothing to them,
your stocks and bonds might as well be
broken shells dropped by seagulls on the pavement.
When will you come out of hiding,
when will your glimmering lights be turned down low
to let the lesser gleam of
oil lamps and candles

Pass through the streets, walk through the boulevards,
sing as the silent stars go by?

Your baubles and rings,
your gilded staircases,
your mansions compounded by
layers of fences will not change
the gravel roads just a half a mile
from your girders and concrete.

Exchange your breath for a moment with
the words of unrest from the homeless.
Barely living,
edging between darkness and darker,
they cannot eat your rubies and diamonds,
nor wish for decadent cakes at the tables they
cannot afford the rest of the year.

May the light that holds us all like silhouettes
scatter our presumptions, sweep away our privilege,
and help us see
through the eyes
of those whose hope is one sandwich or an extra
blanket for the bed.

Everywhere I See Him

     

Everywhere I See Him

(“But Paul claimed that Jesus is alive.” Acts 25:19b)

Everywhere I see him;
it once was not so. I could not see
the connections, the instruments were
untuned
and I could not discern the key.

But every cloud holds him now,
every raindrop transports me now
to beats and tones where the divine
is hidden. Up day. Out night. Up beat.
Sing light. Even the
blue notes
move me to cry tears along with him.

I followed, I know that you know,
but the world was divided, music and
spirit
collided
and footsteps were either dung or mud.

But now the world is one,
the most dangerous of places, beauty is seldom
found in the safest faces. The edge of the precipice,
and one foot more,
there I will explore the joy that steps outside of tombs
into gardens where doves sit on branches to greet the sun.

Could it rain any harder? Could my heart feel any dryer?
Yet the agony abates because
the demons I thought once feasted on my defeats
were birth pangs instead. Misery drove me to
break my knees on concrete floors setting a course for
all night prayers that lasted twenty minutes. I was
deflated.

I was not. I was embraced and did not feel it until
the day opened, the fog lifted, the noise drifted into
the dark lake swallowed whole. And I could hear the bells toll
from a half mile over the hill. I hear them still

In jazz and blues, in mother and child, in lemons and apples,
in novels and poetry, in elders and babies. I hear them even
in the voices just as frightened as I once was. But now,

I see him everywhere.

She Earned Her Living from Art

 

She Earned Her Living from Art

(“The light is pleasant, and it is good for the eyes to see the sun.” Ecclesiastes 11:7)

 

The sky was creamsicle orange late on a December afternoon;
haze and long rays from between the hills lit the early evening dimly.
It did not seem a night for reverie,
the day had crushed even the lowest expectations
and sleep seemed a distant and uncertain relief.

I met her only briefly,
truth be told, it was a dream,
hair black as youth,
cheeks like candle-glow,
skin the color of Arizona stucco.
I knew her,
and did not.
She said she earned her living from art.
I said I did not.

I did not see her entire gallery,
but misty frames in the background hung on gray concrete.
They drew me in as certainly as her raven eyes.
She was oil and acrylic, digital graphite and
fashion design.
She stood eye to eye with me,
invited me without words to join her collective,
to share my oeuvre of writing with her.

She stood straight and I slid to my knees;
not a faint and not a bow,
but a balloon without air; I was still an
unpublished poet. And she earned her living
from art.

The morning was neapolitan; I am sure of it. Though
I woke after dawn, the colors of the sun and the
face of the girl remained until the afternoon rains
washed them
mostly away.

Except For This Poetry

 

Except For This Poetry

Nothing exists except for this poetry,
these perfect words with lines and curls
I once would have written with pen.
I do now and again
but I fear they will be misread
or
others misled by their
meaning.

Look into my spiral notebooks or the
first journal I carried on a plane in 1972
and you will likely conclude
I was a teenage boy with long hair and
sad eyes.

And yet
if you read the files on my computer today
you might conclude much the same except my
age is nearly reversed. I wrote better 60
years ago.
I colored well outside the lines and if I
could not find the words
I invented them.
Now I just write about what I did back then.

What I know for sure, the molten elements at my core
have not changed in half a century. The tectonic plates
have shifted,
the tides have lifted driftwood from islands I will
never visit.
But magnetic north has not slipped far enough
to matter.
Liquids, gasses, and solids play the dance we try to
solve instead of romancing the turning of the hours.

Everything exists except for this poetry,
these scribbled words never green, but blue or black
between the lines without a pencil or eraser.
I do not fear another misreading. The last thing I write
will only be misleading

If you have not taken the time to scribble some
of your own.

The Setting of Autumn

 

The Setting of Autumn

(“God has made everything fitting in its time, but has also placed eternity in their hearts…” Ecclesiastes 3:11a)

This is the kind of town where
you can watch Autumn set slowly behind the hills
while
an easy wind exhales with Winter rain.
And yet,
and yet,
I was not ready for the next season nor
expected that harsh pellets of heaven descending
would add to the darkness that remained
well past the rising of the sun.

For all the ice, for all the floods,
for all the harsh north that blew in through
the windows’ thin panes,
there was still waiting to do.
There was still waiting to do
well into the arms of heavy afternoons.
There was still one more word to hear
before the clouds obscured the sun that
had warmed the land. There were no
magic wands,
but there were words that broke through
sleet and raindrops,
sleep and pain.

It was time to listen again.

The Waves Broke Like Concrete

The Waves Broke Like Concrete

The ocean waves broke like concrete on the
boarders in the sand who
dug in for the ride;
a modest place to rent.

Never wanting to hide, but a helmet would be nice
to protect the hard-shell thoughts that pinged like
billiard balls through the felt and slate mind. It
was high tide again
and the swim to safety
was beyond the reach of tenants
who had no claim to stake.

Was there a suction that would hold them in place,
a tentacle strong enough to grab a neighbor who
also could not swim
and stick it out long enough to
watch the sea back away again?

Is this the way families are made,
the way babies survive?
Is this the advent or the resurrection,
is this the tick tock at the art gallery,
have we run out of time?

Fascinating rhythm, strange syncopation,
days and nights,
weeks and months,
high tide, low tide,
neap tide and rip tide.

One look at the moon or sun
has a way of explaining everything.

Ashes and Snow

Ashes and Snow

(“Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves; defend the rights of all those who have nothing.” Proverbs 31:8)

While we debate who pays to
school our kids in the rules of God
adopted
by many or a few

There are still too many who cannot speak
because there are boots upon their necks.

Reimburse the vouchers,
but loosen the restraints on the mouths
of those we
stopped listening to long ago.

While we are at it, if we still have ears to hear,
why not turn in our receipts on the last judgment
and spend them on the
lion, the lamb, and the little child
who will lead them all?

The divine does not need our permission,
does not dote on our legislations,
but asks us to scatter hope, ocean to ocean,
nation to nation.

Oral arguments were heard in the marble chambers
while silent voices of ravaged concrete
did not waste a crumble of crusted bread. Stand tall

They said.

Which only made for larger targets with
fear etched on their heads.

While we debated whose Christ is the best
the few who knew we are all related
trudged through ashes and snow
to find the next forgotten memory
struggling for breath.

An Experiment: More Than I Intended

 

An Experiment: More Than I Intended

(“And now I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up…” Acts 20:32a)

He was waiting for the bars to open,
or maybe for the churches to close. It didn’t
matter much, the sounds were all the same.

He was watching the saxophone cry,
or maybe heard the sitar hum. It didn’t
matter much, the clouds all sang the same.

He had edited his life well, only his shadow
knew every line. He couldn’t shake the memory
that taunted him. His crimes were his own.

He laughed well when appropriate,
cried more often when alone. He would have
hugged more often, but his arms had slipped. He
stayed within the lines.

His mind and time ever reminded him of
the eyes that stared him down like he had stolen
the ice cream cone he
was licking on the bench while cast iron monks
sang hymns he knew by heart. The splinters and
cries of heresy
kept him captive for decades too long.
He only wanted to be known as
someone who needed people as much
as they seemed to need him.

He shivered every time the specters of back
alleys
and sandpaper pillows blew his disguise. He only
knew what he knew (which was nothing new)
but everyone else seemed to know so much more.

He never blamed the words or the music,
he never thought the fault fell at the feet of sparsity.
He knew he could grow into the shoes that hurt his
feet every step up the street or down the aisles of
fading carpet stained by old knees and new tears.

I would sign this short missive, verify it is about me,
but I fear you already know, and those who do not
will learn it from you who do. I once counted upon
the favor of friends (and some still embrace the slight
darkness they know of me)
but I cannot disclose any more than these
few verses and parables. If you knew

It would be only the slightest smile
from the one
and few
who knew more than the sum of my parts

That keeps me sane this long, this lonely and
winding style. I have

Written more than I intended. I have

Lived so secretly in my rented spaces
that, for the life of me,
I would be a hermit

If not for the tiniest flicker of grace that
studies me, feet to heart to face,
and leaves the doors open inside the taverns,
the churches, the schools where
we all gather blindly enraptured. Where
the grass grows and the stars utter the
Name

Full of holy erasure
and ragged embrace.

Did You Sanitize Your Sword?

 

Did You Sanitize Your Sword?

(“Then Jesus said to him, 'Put your sword back into its place, for all those who take the sword will die by the sword.’” Matthew 26:52)

Did you sanitize your sword this morning,
freshly sharpen it on the grinding wheel?
Did you study the better ways to draw blood
and go in for the kill?
Did you point your tongue at someone’s heart today,
target the spot already bleeding?
Did you rehearse your words to stick like barbs
hidden away in your opponent’s story?

“I would never” is
ever the thing I would.
“I would not deny” is the setup for
fresh self-protection.

Someone sectioned off the lies that
let me pull the trigger and claim it was
still well-holstered. Ever since an emperor took the
Cross
into battle
we edit peace and name them missiles,
we hate the lamb and
bare the teeth of the lion.

Legions of angels could subdue
every weapon formed against you,
so why polish your handgun
when the Lord of all the earth is
cruciform?

Unrelenting love, persistent songs of protest
for the
weaker ones seem so frail to some. But
not to the one who bids us sheath our swords
and walk with the suffering instead.
The collateral damage is not just in our heads
but on the dusty streets where bombs hit their targets
and stick like barbs in the occupants of dirt
and land and history and memory.

The rhetoric and armaments have stored enough
violence. When will we sing “peace on earth,
goodwill toward men” and mean it first and again?

Family Portrait/Advent

 

Family Portrait/Advent

(“The rich and the poor meet together. The Lord is the maker of them all.” Proverbs 22:2)

Do your ears hear the same carols
floating from the trees as winged birds sing
in air grown crisp toward the end of the year?
Do your eyes see the same sunlight
creeping over the hills, the same fog
opening to reveal the day?

Do your babies cry like rain,
your children play ball until sunset,
your thoughts fill your mind like winter champagne?
Do you visit your muse to find the silence you seek?

I remember the blue slate siding with a dozen layers
of paint beneath the cracks.
I remember the first time I walked to school in the snow,
plastic bags over my little tennis shoes,
and I was late. A couple of inches of snow in
west Texas
will always slow a six-year-old. My
hand-me-down pants were cold and wet.

The children raced to the feasting table first
but had learned through instruction and habit
to wait for the elders to be served. Bright eyes
looked up to meet some eyes sad, some flittering,
some distant, some weary, and others gladly receiving
a place in line saved by little mouths. One time
an elder placed two deviled eggs on each child’s
plate.

Do you sit across from a little not your own,
next to a neighbor who lost everything that made them
well-known in town?
Did you hear the stories of sweaty days repainting a house
where the sun snuck through the cracks?
Did you find the place that eases suffering by the
simple touch of hand and face? Did you walk
the dirt road until everyone’s feet ached the same?