Every rare once in a while I write a poem that I don’t despise. Rarely are they whimsical, but… this one is. Thanks for stopping by RoP today.
Lie down and flap,
flailing arms and legs.
Look up into a sunburn.
Hear the girl fly
beside you.
Dreams up in gray cotton
spread into wings.
Because I was feeling all goo-ey from visiting my good friends in Utah, I thought I’d share one morning’s thoughts with you. I woke up on Saturday needing to need and desiring to desire. It felt a lot like… being alive; and being alive for just that purpose. In SLC, Utah you get to sleep in a little because the sun takes a few extra minutes to climb the eastern mountain range. Or you can wake up early and stand outside stupefied by the sights. I chose the latter.
This one is for my SLC friends who sleep in… Get up!
Forgotten chunk of paintless sky softening violent peaks
And dreaming of the color-kiss when the sun will rise
An extra half-spin of the clock-face to sleep or to watch
- whichever
Both divine in their own needful right
saying good bye to last night
The Pause. The Pause.
A demi-hour of deep
Daring me to live in the open
- exposed
And to live for just one blazing day
Until day’s death.
Prediction: Tomorrow’s Ream of Paper post will resume the theme of contentment, featuring a parable.
Easter blooms each morning.
A day does not pass, when it does not try to force its way up.
Up through yesterday’s soot.
Up, just taller than expected.
A medicine to salve the wounds.
“I’ll take one of these
and I’ll call you in the morning.”
Springing up without permission,
Without so much as a query toward my needs.
It recesses in the men given charge
to make sure it doesn’t happen.
It happens and it happens.
Night lights are set as reminders
that Easter blooms each morning.
I happened upon a blog the other day where the author’s theme was, I’ll sum it up, “Lent, and celebrations like it, are the reason for American Christianity’s ineffectiveness.” I found all sorts of things I wanted to say to the blogger, none of which I will share. Instead I wrote the briefest story about the man, and am offering it to you today…
“A construct of man,” wailed the man, who would have none of it. Now, here I must pause to state the obvious in case you, dear reader, have missed it already: the wailing man, wailing about other men was himself, in fact a man. This man would not move to the dancing music that played all about him. Others danced according to the music that was piped, hammered and strummed in seemingly endless fashion from one end of the earth to the other.
Rather he damned the dancers for their dancing, deeming them “followers of pithy traditions.” But the dancers heard him not as they called for him to join them in their movements.
The man could not hear their invitation, his ears having been frozen by the words that raced from him icy mouth, located much too close to his ears. He was the sort of fellow who refused a winter’s cap and disbelieved those who propped themselves up as weathermen. For the man, “Seasons were but a state-of-mind.”
The dancers clapped.
The man sat on his hands.
They wept.
He mocked them.
They rejoiced.
Ignored.
As Vonnegut said, “So it goes.” As the man forfeited his option to participate. His corpse was the rightest corpse in the morgue on the day of his passing.
The dancers wept.
For the man did never join
their ever-changing parade.
“Raca,” screamed the man from the here-after, “foolish dancers, I’ve proven thee all wrong. It seems I was right this whole time, as I (how he did emphasize his “I’s”) am the only man present now.” He was right. He would never have to dance. And finally the god-forsaken music was shut down. He was right and alone.
In the dark of one Good Friday
All the dancers paused
With quietest invitation
Whispered from their tongues
Begging the world to cease from dancing
And for its heads to bow.
The music rests but for a second
resuming just after now.
I have but one tiny slice of advice to offer, a moral, if you will. The music starts and it rests. Starts. Rests. Careful that you pay attention. The brightest crescendo comes to a close. The fool sings alone through crescendo’s wake.
Have a meaningful, grace-filled Good Friday, my friends.