We Put Out the Coffee

We Put Out the Coffee

(“Let’s not become discouraged in doing good, for in due time we will reap, if we do not become weary. Galatians 6:9)

The evening came wavering like a
toddling baby boy. We knew it was pending
and kept working anyway.
We saw how the moon grew as it rose from
behind the bare winter branches of a walnut tree.
We had been serving the survivors the
food they deserved.
We had been playing with their children
on the die-cut lawn and listened to their
laughter while the pizzas warmed in the
double ovens. We put out coffee,
we poured the lemonade,
we unstacked the dishes for the families
who stayed. We had counted on half as many,
we had planned to be home before nightfall.
But these were our friends, though many we had never met.
These were our family, though this was the first time we knew their names.

We understood each other,
they knew we would stay as long as the food held out.
We knew we could sit with the silence,
or we could sing as the meal began.
We washed dishes and then we put them out again
for the next friends in line and for the next ones after them.
We sweat as the ovens heated,
we laughed as the children raised their Styrofoam cups
like goblets making a toast.
It was always “cheers”; it was always just a moment’s
wink of a day.
Though we worked well into the evening, we only felt
the time was a fraction of what we had to give.
We knew the play, the conversation, the coffee,
the elastic answers to powdered questions; we knew
there was more to do and we would meet again,
we would meet again, like tonight.

We
memorized the conversations and
learned the vocabulary everyone needed.
We invited the foreign language to share our
chat around tables of perspiration, around
lampposts of contentment.
We learned more than we knew,
we listened happily and silent,
we gave food and attention to assuage
the starving. And we went home, weary and
grateful someone had invited us to work
that was rewarded with new names written
on our tongues.

Open Their Hearths

Open Their Hearths

(“I will seek the lost, bring back the strays, bandage the injured, and strengthen the weak, but I will destroy the fat and the strong. I will shepherd them with justice.” Ezekiel 34:16)

Did you deeply believe you pulled the strings?
Did you think you could pull the rug out from under them?
Did you think they were blindfolded and could not see
the machinations and motives in your published screeds?

Where did you come up with such ill-advised plans?
Where did you find the words to push them down the
throats of those who waited for directions home?
Somewhere you decided to cut bait and run,
and leave the consequences to courts you thought
you controlled.

Once you closed your eyes, once you were out of view,
once you were alone, no one but you, only you; once
there was no one to perform for,
once the cameras shut down for the night, did you
allow the cries to reach your ears of all
those you stole from? Did you account for all you stole?

You called them strays, but they were herded away by
your incongruous religion. You called them animals while
you foamed at the mouth and lacerated compassion like
a butcher’s cleaver.

There is a day, indeed it is here,
there is a way that the weak will travel
that takes them inside the heart of all creation.
Your time is up,
your rule is over,
your words are zed,
you’re not so clever.
There is a moment decreed when
all the injured will find alternate phrases
to the ones fed from pompous and penal
pulpits.

You lit the fire, but they will open their
hearths to the sojourners of solace.

Better Than You Think

Better Than You Think

(“Restore all that was hers, together with all the revenue of the fields from the day that she left the land until now.” 2 Kings 8:6b)

Afternoon. The tunes were irresistible, the
thoughts coming sooner than expected. She
had learned how little changes when change is
all you want. Afternoon.

Midnight. The candles were extinguished,
the dreams came thinner than desired. She
went to bed later but was too weary to distinguish
reality and visions. All she wanted was a winter
moon to lure her to slumber. Midnight.

Morning. The warming was unreliable, the
thoughts from the night came swarming. She
had placed an order for peace. All she desired was
a space within where it could all begin. But storming
had taken her best thoughts hostage. Morning.

Annual. And ten times over the trip around the sun
tripped her up again. She prayed, she groaned, she
wrote it factual and substandard. There was nothing
left to do
that she hadn’t
done before. The shore kept receding from the sea.
Annually.

Infinite. And it all feels like it will never end. It was
once all innocence and expectations. Now it is
cold nights and restless days. Her mind stayed
ever vigilant while she wished for contentment.
Infinite.

Invitation. There was one place, one pleasant conversation,
that made a few moments easier. Together was a road
walked late in the day with nothing to say but
you
are
better
than
you
think. They always met at the same location.
Invitation.

The Sane Walked Away

The Sane Walked Away

(“False messiahs and false prophets will have arisen and will produce signs and omens intending to deceive, if possible, the elect.” Mark 13:22)

You had them convinced, you had them in the palm of your hand,
you had them believing you could cast out demons with
just three notes of your song.
The proof was in your words;
the demons were invisible,
you waved your feet like they were swords,
you proclaimed defeat while the crowd
watched in silent appreciation.

Your profit was enormous, your houses a dozen palaces,
you scolded the few who could not sing
the words you wrote that dug into the ears
of the unsuspecting.

You were not enormous but pretended to defeat
every malady, to browbeat the darkness as if
you had invented the sun. The day gave way to
innuendoes and deceptions. You feigned sanity
while handing out madness like candy. Where

Did you learn

To package it slightly, stuffed within your black coat
baying at the moon.

The sane walked away, went downtown,
and bought lunch for the hundred who were not
taken in.

I Belong

I Belong

(“It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. This life that I live now, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave his life for me.” Galatians 2:20)

I spent too many hours drowsy like
a wintertime bear. I waited for a knock on the door
or someone to pour me another cup of coffee.
I could have seen the hills where frozen fog had
decorated them like buttercream frosting. As the
day went on they melted like a cat licking cake.

My failures had piled up higher than I could reach;
my hallway narrowed in my sleep until I only saw
right and left directly in front of me.
I try to remember my dreams, but I fall back asleep
and they are gone.

I try to understand the words I’ve heard every day,
and they swirl past me like the mists that the haze laid
across the rolling field. I don’t ask for pity,
I never ask for money,
I only want to know I’ll make it through the
next decade older than I have become.

Haply, though, the chances were in my favor,
the changes like dusky diamonds on the road
were within the very breaths of my sighs and indignation.
I regretted more than I had forgotten
and ached more than the storms had gotten out of control.
I gave up and when I did

The mountains did not fall, the sidewalk did not trip,
the ice did not make me slip, the time took me no time at all;
I listened to your voice, and for once I knew
all I had been through
led me here. Where else could it have been.

My days begin and no longer wait for a mysterious guest.
Instead I find, more than bread, more than wine,
the wilds inside that lead me like adventure down the
wider halls of wonder. I do not mind the wandering
as much,
for I am no longer lost, though often alone. I am full though
hollow as ever. I belong, from Spring to September, to the
saints who sang uncanny music in my ears.

So The Colors Ran

So The Colors Ran

(“Examine yourselves to see if your faith is genuine. Test yourselves. Surely you know that Jesus Christ is among you; if not, you have failed the test of genuine faith.” 2 Corinthians 13:5

I ran out of time to paint so the
colors ran like the snow, landing between the
trim and the foundation,
while I took a break to search for my soul.
I hadn’t lost it,
it had not vanished,
I just had misplace it while
I listened to the barking jokers
who decided, with no input of my own,
exactly what design I should be applying to
the front wall of my own home.

If someone will fetch me a glass of ice water
I’ll tell you why this west-facing wall is so important.
The first thing you see from the street, this wall
needs to be (almost unconsciously) a true portrait of me.

I took everything to heart for so long that my mind
fell apart
when I repainted paisleys over yesterday’s diamonds.
I swear I used a dozen colors based on the latest
expert opinion about what would catch people’s eyes.

Every time I applied one coat to my liking and then
an overcoat
made in the likeness of others who had so much more
expertise than me. I questioned every time my brush
hit the can.

This time the voices are muted. I swear they still ring
in my mind 50 years later and a thousand miles away.
This time I will paint what I see,
I will circle the windows like springtime cocoons,
and trim the door to appear open all the time.
This time I will paint what I know,
even though it may not grow the way I intended.
This time I may meander outside the lines, I may
hide the Name beneath the sill, just small enough to
read up close,
but not from the road.

Upside-Down Echoes

Upside-Down Echoes

(“My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” 2 Corinthians 12:9a)

Where are the words that paint as lovely as
midnight blue? Where are they that describe
the corner the young warrior sits in thinking
she will never get the chance to make up for the
losses she faced?

Not everyone signs up to fight. Failing is so much
quicker than winning. But once you’ve lost, the
rope clenches your brain, suspends your hopes,
and convinces you it will all happen again.

There are notes written on each snowflake
lightly falling like white autumn leaves.
It is cold there in the corner, it is lonesome and
unavoidable.

If you’ll allow, I’ll climb in the corner with you,
we can count to three while we rehearse our losses,
our bottomless ability to flee from nothing.
Did you bring your ammunition? Let’s disarm
ourselves
from the echo that reverbs, wall to wall,
and turns us upside down.

I know you have a voice, you have a word,
you have a sentence, you have a book.
Are you afraid you’ve betrayed your oath?
Are you sitting here while we both rehearse
our failures?

I’ll see in you if you’ll see in me
just one more win than we have losses.