4 new poems

Atonement

'Tis the love language of God,
Evermore debated by old men,
Ruminations of theologians,
A belief running roughshod.

A ransom paid to the devil,
Liberation for Satan's captives,
Jesus dies, child of Adam lives,
And all pilgrims may revel.

or

A moral example to the lost,
Of life lived devoted and holy,
Death the moment to be solely,
Undivided when counting the cost.

or

The price for divine satisfaction,
As sin is darkness to the Holy One,
Suffering poured out, 'til it is done,
Love pays for sin's every infraction.

or

Christ Jesus wins where Adam lost,
And in loving union with our race,
Blessed in his life of perfect grace,
Recapitulates-we in paying our cost.

or

Divine Christ becomes a human being,
That human beings become divine,
God in Christ dying, the gift and sign,
Theosis— changed by he — unchanging.

so

Atonement love language, God woos,
This love moving the most moved,
This love in bloody death, most proved,
Salvation, communion.Worship and muse,

Eternal.

Trash Talk

 

Words can cut,
Words can heal,
Words can wound,
Words can peel,
Soul from skin,
Bone from marrow,
Friend from friend,
Sharp as an arrow.

Words are story,
Words are Spirit,
Words have depth,
From endless scrit.
Know the weight,
Know their levity,
Know their nature,
Centers of gravity.

As words unravel,
And words devolve,
Words lose their song,
And hearts dissolve.
Words disenchanted,
Bark of the hyena,
Noise without worship,
Without luster or patina. 

Trash talk.

Synesthesia

Maybe all things do connect,
Deeply in the the mind of God,
And sound, and color, and touch,
Each God's spoken yes, reflect.

Shapes or letters may shine a color,
And symphonies caress the skin,
Numbers may matrix into a pattern,
Knowledge that escapes the scholar.

Maybe there are ways of knowing,
That fracture normal space and time,
Where love makes all things personal,
Sight, sound, touch, taste, all flowing,

Kaleidoscopic .

Sucks 

 

Bad things happen to you,
Bad things happen to me.
It sucks,
Ah shucks.


Daily life will disappoint,
Nightly dreams will scare.
It sucks,
No luck.

Pain cannot be dodged,
Wind blows as it does,
It sucks,
Show pluck.

One too many bruises,
Too many stubbed toes,
It sucks,
What the...
 

Awake, Awake

A fresh breeze upon the brow,
Christening dew upon the breath,
Aurora softly chimes birdsong,
Awake, awake, do not be long,
Shed shades of chimeral death,
Sighing air of promise, of vow.

Foreday's colors spectral blaze,
Windows to windows of the soul
Peel -- reveal lavenders and roses,
Until this stirring self-imposes,
As if the world were painted gold,
Calls to homage meets every gaze.

In coral light, hues steadily imbue,
And chords of melancholy plucked,
And chords of rapture and transport,
Sorrow and solace cozily consort.
A soul whose affect will not obstruct,
Both will entwine through and through.

Melancholy musters unto  mourning,
Such yearning answers the comely light,
Beauty reveals, in the fabric of the world,
The fingerprint of God --traces whorled.
As King Sol hunts the guardian of night,
Skies bleed beatific, in a prism dawning.

Transport and rapture on to rejoicing,
Invoked in the magic of the morningtide,
Light unto light, for those without sight,
Aurora's purgation  of specters of night,
Declares such glories so recently denied,
Beckons creation to gather in voicing

All Praise.

Awake, awake, do not be long.

One Lady

There is a way to be in this wanting world,
Where sorrows stampede o'er every self,
In being in charity of  living 'mid dying,
Breathing a sigh in the land of the sighing,
Is the art of she who in simply being herself --
Is healing --as God's realm, flag unfurled.

There is a way to walk in this vale of tears,
Where waking so often -- a curse to survive,
A presence that graces, a balm to the broken.
And speaking words that need to be spoken,
Is the art of she who in simply being alive --
Is quietness -- as a dawn that calms all fears.

There is a way to love in this loveless place,
Where a heart can break and bleed its soul,
A tenderness --arms extend and then enfold,
And warmed the heart that had grown cold,
Is the art of she who fires, red-embered coal--
Is life -- as the loving gaze of a beloved face.

Beatific.

Slugs

Blithe to all the narratives,

The tumble of all the species,

Of all the worlds within the world.

Extruding its slime, gliding in time,

O’er leaf or stone or shower stall,

Resolved in solitary imperatives.

Writhing watery — slimy, solitaire,

Every place trailing a slick of silver.

It’s endless buffet of rot and decay,

Feeding the loam which is our home,

And none too palatable to predators,

Audacious, appearing the apparent heir.

And sometimes, in the deep midnight,

Bonds Slug to slug in coiled embrace,

Glorious, gross, bonded viscous adipose,

‘Til nestling eggs in dribbling the dregs,

And off to extend the formless legacy,

Of birth, decay, in seasonal sacral rite.

These few words are a plug,

For the oozing primal slug.

Rosie

From a broken home, and sad state,
Colonized in fleas with matted fur,
A rough mannered beast you were,
Trembling at your yet unknown fate.

But time, love, and doggy shampoo,
Once nicely groomed so snowy white,
And warming to new familiar sights,
Your wag and swag replacing your rue.

And now you greet in a liturgy of licks,
Complete with black eyed adoring stare,
Mimicking bipeds whose lives you share,
Always ready to play and up to new tricks.

Sweetly, you love to be loved and to love,
Bark your invitation to play on the floor,
A dog heart shining like the purest of ores,
Part of the healing in simply being part of,

My life.

Night Air

A hush on the breeze in a light of blue,
Whispering of Luna's cool soft reign,
And dwellers of day in dens recede.
Those attuned to night's cooler hues,
Warble and wail in pastoral strains,
Calling and crying, a longing, a need.

Each crackling branch or flutter of leaf,
Goosebump skin and pauses the nerves,
Attentive in a fear both sacral and primal.
Choral yowls and howls in ambient grief,
Pining in a canvas moonlit chef d'oeuvre,
Their longing and mine converge chiasmal.

Then, horizon blues bleed purple and pink,
Bays stifle whimpering in the blending light,
'Til sallow sunlight stretches shadows of morn.
Night air re-enchanted in birdsong and blinks,
In puffs of dew breath or in wisps of sprites,
A faunal change of the guard in a day reborn.

Sol accedes,
Luna recedes,
Melancholy.

The Sun Rose

Every born life, a feeble pushing back,
Against air, and space, and shadows,
Every whelp invites talons and teeth,
And a bleeding of light again into black.

Yet the sun rose today,
Pulsing light into the fray.

In mortal memory, I know these shades,
Picked as carrion to the hellion beaks,
Feeding on flesh and hopes, and fears,
'Til all that is beautiful feebly fades.

Yet the sun rose today,
Dew sparkled in the rays.

Where hope when the ruin of days of war,
Are liturgy marking each birth, each love?
Innocent souls are consumed by the judged,
Reversing the reversal once promised in lore.

Yet the sun rose today,
A caress of color in the gray.

Every born life, a fragile pushing back,
Form and voice facing down Thanatos,
Every cub invites fellowship and love,
And a tending to life unto its tender lack.

Yes the sun rose today,
Rocking me in gentle sway.

The sun rose today.