We Might Learn a Language

We Might Learn a Language

(“The goal of this command is love that comes from a pure heart, from a good conscience, and from a sincere faith.” 1 Timothy 1:5)

Let me share a secret most preachers will never tell you.
Let me unshroud a mystery that only poets and prophets see.
Take a seat, hold on tight;
I won’t ask you to repeat anything too gritty for your grain.
I’ve got 20 minutes of your time,
I’ve got 300 words and not a rhyme.

When it comes to the end of days
the earth
will breathe a sigh of relief again.
Why do you nearly beg for blood,
for battles, for generals, for warhorses
apocalyptically advancing?
Do you want the world to blaze?
Do you think hell is reserved for the latecomers
who forgot to charge their batteries? Did you make your
wifi
free
for the teen who is homeless (or so it seems).

If you look in the back of my coat closet,
under the luggage and bath towels
you will find a dozen journals. Some with
cardboard binding, one with leather and
a silvery pen, another made out in verses
about the girls I loved in high school; another about
the one who stole me away from them all.

Read them slowly. They are my heart: fear and wildly.

Now, if you can decipher them,
analyze them and untangle them,
you are well on your way to renewed words
out of their usual order.
If you can make out the scratched vowels and consonants,
and remember my name when you are done,
we might be friends. We might learn a language
that holds the heavens in its words, that releases us
from the bromide and potions we sopped up from
study after study of biblical proportions.

For me, the secret must be a mystery until
you can read me without redacting a thing.
If it helps, we can walk by the lake at the end of days
and celebrate the blues and greens and geese and grays,
and leave our sharpened wit buried behind us.

We Sanitized the Whole Place

 

We Sanitized the Whole Place

(“Uphold justice and righteousness. Deliver from their oppressor those who have been robbed. Don’t mistreat or do violence to the alien, the orphan, or the widow, or shed the blood of innocent people in this place.” Jeremiah 22:3)

We sanitized the whole place before you came,
scrubbed the pews,
resewed the red-white-and-blue,
and made certain the aisles were clear of the
gum the children bring in on their shoes.

We never knew exactly how you wanted us to keep up the place,
dark wood, ancient tongues, plenty of parking, words projected on the wall.
We never completely understood how to control the masses,
the untrained, the languages, the odors and the hoodies,
the certain and the rookies.

Believe me, we made sure the alcoholics found their place,
the dealers too, and the genders that would not keep their
assigned designations. We know what to do with
alcohol and drugs and sex.

But, I hate to confess this, we never mentioned the immigrants
(only to tell those Vietnamese hairdressers they ought to learn
our language).
We stopped for the homeless like we stopped on Route 66
for a handful of curios and sticks of jerky. We pulled away
quickly before they identified us and asked for a ride.
(We would be glad to bring them for church if only that had
a street address.)

Where would you have us hide our halo? We keep it shiny
to make the world know we are wholly different than
the domestic violence we watch on tv. God bless America
and leave the rest of the losers out of it,
John 3:16 notwithstanding, the world is our world
and we will love it as we desire.

We do hand out candy at Christmas,
deliver turkeys on Thanksgiving eve.
But to bleed for a user who lost his keys
and locked himself out of his car during our November feast;
that is an interruption, that is going too far. (Here,
have some mashed potatoes please.)

And one last thing, our carpets are stained from
coffee we allowed in the sanctuary. Would it be okay,
Would you mind very much, if we spent a few thousand dollars
to clean it up? (We might even hire an undocumented or two,
if we can convince them they would be happier worshiping
up the road somewhere.)

Excuse me please, but I need to watch my favorite evangelist
tell me I could be a millionaire and that Jesus was the richest
guy to walk the face of the earth. I’ll have coffee with someone
at McDonald’s and do my penance just before lunch.

When We Were Homeless

When We Were Homeless

(“We struggled along the coast with great difficulty and finally arrived at Fair Havens.” Acts 27:8)

The ocean sounded like a broken banjo,
and the beach struck every chord.
The wind was turning in ¾ time
around the rocks, opening and closing the
grey theater curtain clouds.

And the entire time memory burned;
not yesterday,
nor the hours before the millennium,
but of days when buskers played flute
on Huntington Beach.

I would love to sing with you again my friend,
or dance like we knew what we were doing.
I would love to stop and stay the afternoon,
and into the evening to listen to
the seals barking in the distance.

But I’m indigent (did I mention that?) I’m upended,
sometimes laid flat. We used to bury each other in the beach,
and make
mermaid tails or
weightlifter forearms,
our heads barely above the sand.

But I am homeless (did you notice that?) not for long,
but not short enough. Did it occur to anyone roaming with us,
to ask
how to keep us
nearer the beaches?
Were their heads below the trembling

Sand?

Today the ocean is like an empty orchestra hall,
chairs askew, black curtains framed by sleepy fog.
Today the beach is cross-continent, and the piano sits silent
with a lock upon the keyboard cover.
I am the audience and not a player. There are too few to
perform for anymore.

But the ocean may call me back from the how close I’ve come
to composing destitution; to the tide pools, the schools of children
scatting the sweetest jazz at the closing bell.

There are still others whose only memory of occupied beaches
is a brittle sand dollar and a piece of grey driftwood that looks like
a broken trombone.

Defense

Defense

(“Be fair to the poor and to orphans. Defend the helpless and everyone in need.” Psalm 82:3)

I heard another story, a friend and a bully;
the bully may win, she wants to exit, stage west,
to another town she knows better than stay
where she must dress to avoid attraction,
find the right friends to get the right reaction,
and refrain from ever being herself best,
herself first, herself created to

Light the places that bullies walk
in the dark.

I took my wife to a show, and my daughter,
and her friend; $50 a seat for orchestra seats
underneath the balcony. “Wicked!” entertained,
richly entertaining a night when we felt, for
two or three hours
that at last we owned the world.

Walking, lightly, chattering and comparing
songs and acting, twists and pairings;
I think I got my bearings just two blocks down:
homeless he sat and barely met my eye. I saw him,
considered his clothing, and walked on. Not without caring,
but what could I do, having my car-full of company and
nothing left after a wellspent birthday out of town.

I heard another story, maybe the same bully, maybe the same girl;
and I would make it safe, a shelter, a red carpet with cameras popping,
interviews stopping her procession while bullies were not allowed to enter
without an invitation. She, and students like her, need to receive their
awards up front with stage lights blaring. This time, after
penciling a mental notation..I would rise

And she would receive, what I know she would earn…

A standing ovation.