Last Night's Reverie

Last Night’s Reverie

(“Naaman walked down to the Jordan; he waded out into the water and stooped down in it seven times, just as Elisha had told him. Right away, he was cured, and his skin became as smooth as a child’s.” 2 Kings 5:14)

I know you said your dreams never live up to their billing,
promising you neon and pastels well into October;
I heard you describe the him and the her who stroked your forehead
at just the right time.

I know you awoke with no hand on your brow,
I know you remembered only the introduction to
words that spun silk around the span from your hands
to the offers of help.
By the time the last act opened, the moments just before
your eyes made it morning,
the offer was withheld and someone was pulling you from behind,
grabbing the loop on the back of your favorite denim jacket.

Waiting to understand the meaning of the dream,
I remember you couldn’t decide to cry or arise to
wash your face. So you wasted the morning (your words, not mine)
on the couch and holding last night’s dream
wishing the hand that touched your nighttime would
knock on the door and offer something more than
you’ve been waiting inside and outside for.

I know you think it’s creased and masked,
a latex buffoon of who you used to be. A caricature
with a bigger nose and open pores, while you spent your morning
wishing for the relief that dreams recited like
serenades on a back porch summer.

So here are words to tell you, after last night’s reverie,
I am here, always; late or early, smooth or wrinkle,
some or every; to say or silent the time when
waking seems sadder than last night’s dream.

Doctor Please

Doctor Please

(“But the wisdom from above is first of all pure, then peaceable, courteous, congenial, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and unpretentious.” James 3:17)

I leaned over to hope the source was evident
in the etchings scratched like question marks
on the tile at the foot of my chair.

He carried all my complaints, aches and pains
in the manila folder, tattered and dog-eared;
triplicate sheets with the back page barely legible,
history and templates, blood drawn from my arms and legs,
radio waves knocking around my brain,
and every answer to every test
that left no answer, gave me no rest.

I sat up to beg for a well-ordered friend who
had time (is $100 per hour enough) to stop talking
and put his hand on my head. I know he would feel nothing;

But I would.

Coffee at Holly's Corner

Coffee at Holly’s Corner
(“Jesus replied, ‘What is impossible with man is possible with God.’” Luke 18:27)

“A trip would certainly do me good,
along the rails watching winter coast to coast.
Life isn’t too quiet, and the noise needs not abate,
it’s children and friends too far away that have caused
my heart to feel cornered in such a beautiful place.”

She nearly finished her conversation with the customer before me,
nodding “cappuccino 2%” my way. I nodded too, and she took a cup
empty from its stack
and landed it with a question on the counter.

“I shouldn’t feel this way,” she whispered and asked,
tick-tocking between the first customer and me,
“Life is balanced now and the river runs silent,
so why am I
unnerved like lonely, unsure like the last child upon the playground.”

I couldn’t help her, no magic wands can chase the blues,
(it was my snap-diagnosis; it may have been the weather or
a song on the radio, or a latent early morning dream).
I couldn’t help her, no magic words can change the moves
(there are no transplant drugs for geographic upheavals,
loving one place so long and landing new a little).

It might pay to wait, defer the hope,
wait out the winter, visit the kids,
or offer conversation to the barista
who never meant to bend an ear so personal.

For all the children, happy and 80, who played together
on summer swings; it is hard to explain, this tedium that
looks so sad when the birds are a-wing on a late October sky.
But I’ve looked for friends I loved (did you get my call)
before I knew to be blue over no one left to talk to.

Last week two 85 year old school girls giggled about
looking for boys in sixth grade at the Grange.

I couldn’t help her, our brand-new barista,
but the sky turned bright by noon today and rain
was suspended while the editor, artist and daughter
sipped like a family at the front table where the morning shafts
always fell.

On the Bus

“…and you pay attention to the one well-dressed and say, ‘Have a good seat here!’ and to the poor one you say, ‘You stand there’ or, ‘Sit down on the floor by my feet.’” James 2:3

Did you ever ride a bus to school or an event when you were a teenager? I’m not sure what the appeal was, but the seats of choice were the two in the very back of the bus. (I’m being fake naïve, by the way, I know very well what the allure was.) You could just about chart the pecking order of any group by observing where they sat on the bus.

Some People Never See

Some People Never See

(“God will bless you, if you don’t give up when your faith is being tested. He will reward you with a glorious life, just as he rewards everyone who loves him.” James 1:12)

Some people never see the figure, blurry gray,
that trudges against the bluster like an eerie wraith
pacing itself through the wind, the snow, the
blizzard begun well after the final thaw of spring.

Caught unaware, and without fellows to chat away the
bellow each open-mouthed gust, he must plod alone,
blinded by a new storm that refuses to relent.

If someone caught a glimpse of him, they would be certain
he was running…from something…seeing his determination that
seemed to take him away from every visible tie,
leaving convenience stores behind,
and headed, (judging by his current direction)
somewhere out of town.

All he knew (though few others did), was his orders expected him
to follow the trail he started a sunnier and younger year ago.
He was not lost, he could follow the course, and facedown to
avoid the screaming dusts of ice, he walked straight ahead,
the only path he knew.

Days without sun, weeks like the days, months at a time with no
change, no long range outlook to restore the way he used to walk
imbibing the sky.

What was the shame that made him change his name,
why was a single cup of coffee and a smile enough,
when did he start, and didn’t the blizzard hurt him more,
and thinking again, maybe his depression made his plod,
a hidden sin made this walk his epilogue.

Some people noticed him, and more talked about what
others said must have been in his head to make him
walk when he should be safe indoors.

It was not apparent,
was not clear, but here and there you could swear you heard
someone say he walked this way, and started the same, out of
love.

Stutter at Jewel

Stutter at Jewel

(“Don’t forget about your leaders who taught you God’s message. Remember what kind of lives they lived and try to have faith like theirs.” Hebrews 13:7)

How many tags can adhere to one life,
notecarded a word at a time;
capitalized for punctuation,
handwritten for affirmation
that our opinions are true
(not me, you, in the background, trying to silence the
sounds of your own name broadcast too loud).

Where do we place the labels after
the lapels, threadbare, can carry the adhesive no more?
How do we write the names that never blamed
forgotten appointments on feeble and constant
distractions, or fractions of duty less than whole?

Some definitions do only justice to one word at a time,
some words cannot contain their meanings, adding syllable to
syllable,
suffixes appended like a trainful of cabooses.

Some stutter at jewel brilliance and hue,
while others babble, sputtering around the helix
like a vine repeating its circle up a frontporch
pole.

We repeat the dictionary and still starve for more to
serve guests gathered who wonder how we got so far.
We could repeat the name, him or them, her or those,
and a few closely following the local news from day
dawn until near dusk
could nod as we file the gratitude where it
fairly belongs.

A Great Chasm

 “Besides, in all these matters there is a huge chasm set between us so that no one can go from us to you even if he wanted to, nor can anyone cross over from you to us.” Luke 16:26

Jesus tells about Lazarus, a poor man who used to sit begging outside a rich man’s gates. Both of them died; Lazarus going to “Abraham’s bosom” and the rich man to “Hades”. Abraham speaks these words to the rich man after he asks if Lazarus would simply dip his finger in water and place them upon his scorched tongue. “For I am in torment in this flame” the rich man says.