The Scarlet Thread

Winter Solstice

2006-12-30T22:38:00.000-06:00

The sun hides beneath the Southern hemisphere,

and the darkness weighs upon us early and long today.

A cold, wet breeze swirls memories like flurries

in your mind. You speak to Susan,

dead twenty-two years, so matter-of-factly,

“Susan, get your father his paper.”

Your white brow rests there like a snowdrift,

and the furrows digging at the corners of your eyes,

like plowed fields, sit fallow and frozen.

It's the winter in your eyes

that makes me look away.

You say you're cold and want a blanket:

I rise to give you one, but you damn me

and call Susan. I tell you she's gone out for the paper.

You are quiet again, and grab the blanket

and pull it to your chin. Beneath the white

blanket your breathing is heavy, thick, and slow.

You close your eyes like an early sunset, and the nameless

dark shuts you inside earlier tonight than ever I remember.

Darfur

2006-12-12T19:56:00.000-06:00

When the village lies in ashes--
cold, black and silent--three hundred thousand die
and smoke rises like a prayer:
Rachael weeps for her firstborn.

When the bodies lie ashen, too,
the wounds speak into the abyss
and Able's blood cries out from the dust.
Ache, howl, and wail for those who remain!

When a child's form lies in the heap
grasping hollow death and a gash in his head
with small thin fingers,
there is no Phoenix, and he will not rise.

When ashes flit on the wind,
a woman sits and hugs her knees,
rocks slowly and stares distantly
wrapped in red shame like a scarf.

When an old man's tears wet his ash-colored beard,

two million walk the desert road to the refugee camp,
and the church debates the ashen-gray areas of obscure doctrine,
and remains cold, black, and silent.

http://www.phrusa.org/research/sudan/

On the Death of a Common Saint

2006-11-29T01:06:00.000-06:00

For Mrs. Mary Dale Fontenot

Tomorrow I will wake
while you're still sleeping,
if “sleep” is the right word--
a way to warm the chill death.

I'll be “here,”
and you'll be gone, You...
A slow sadness invades my soul,
because of your kind heart missing.

Tomorrow I will wake
while you're still sleeping,
if “wake” is the right word--
a way to brighten dark grief

like the make-up the mortician
will put on your cheeks,
and everyone will talk
about how good you look,
how they keep thinking you'll just start speaking.

Tomorrow I will wake
while you're still sleeping,
if “sleep” describes true Sight and Sound
first breaking upon the soul like eternal dawn:

You see All that is clear and bright and true.
And more than tears will darken these eyes
that see dimly as through a foggy glass—and dark—
mere shades and hints, shapes and shadows.

Tomorrow I will wake
while you're still sleeping,
if “wake” can express "in death, still dying,"
gasping for breath beneath the foaming waves,

But you in Life, living, now
alive, at last, to Him Who Is.
I still slumber in half-light
and but dream in phantom dimness.

Tomorrow I will sleep
while you're still waking,
If “waking” can contain ever-newness,
Free and Alive beyond our pale imagination.

Bartimaeus, Shout!

2006-11-22T20:58:00.000-06:00

Then they came to Jericho. As Jesus and his disciples, together with a large crowd, were leaving the city, a blind man, Bartimaeus (that is, the Son of Timaeus), was sitting by the roadside begging. When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!" Many rebuked him and told him to be quiet, but he shouted all the more, "Son of David, have mercy on me!"

Mark 10:46-48

The Master nears:
Cry aloud, in your blindness,
Raise your voice still louder...
Shout through your darkness.
Shout, Shout, Shout!

Don't be silent, though they grumble.
Refuse the rebuke;
Ignore their propriety:
Yell and call, shriek and holler!
Beg light from the Son of David.

And plead for us,
the lame, the mute, and the blind,
too weak to rise,
too frail to ascend,
too darkened to find our way,
Lying on the roadside.

Call, "Mercy" upon these poor.
Rise and go, the Master calls.

Poems after Reading Jesus

2006-11-16T23:37:00.000-06:00

"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another."

John 13:34

Un-Depraved

Like a lightening-struck
swaying oak,
split down its trunk,
charred, broken, and burned,
misshapen, leaning, and bare:
So am I, before your grace,
toppled--
split to the core of my waywardness--
fallenness.

Something strange rumbles in
my depraved
soul,
like the streak and rumble from cloud to tree,
and I meet this strange newness alive
to another, and Another, and myself.

Man of Dreams

2006-04-05T13:57:00.000-05:00

He is angry now, twenty years later,

for what he had only been sad,

But a man knows things

of which a child only dreams

and so the weight is greater

for the man than the lad.

The blows and belts left scars and welts

on fresh, plump skin, and the roar

defies any cries from bleeding lips.

As night begins, the child grins and sips

his tea while the ice above his eye melts.

And he dreams a familiar dream:

Of a man with a smiling face,

With children running to greet him home.

A gentle man, with arms that are wide

Where children can hide

Beneath a beard and dark eyes;

With the welcome and embrace

of a strong manly grace.

Poems After Reading Dostoevski

2006-03-11T23:38:00.000-06:00

“The more conscious I was of goodness and of all
that was 'sublime and beautiful,' the more deeply I
sank into my mire and the more ready I was to sink
in it altogether. But the chief point was that all this
was, as it were, not accidental in me, but as though it
were bound to be so. It was as though it were my
most normal condition, and not in the least disease
or depravity, so that at last all desire in me to
struggle against this depravity passed.”
-Fyodor Dostoevski, Notes from the Underground

FALLENNESS
A finger on the trigger
fires the bullet
that kills the man
who sits alone
on a park bench
feeding pigeons
whom he has named
by the names of his cousins.

TRUCE
Battle for the remains
of the carcass ends
by vultures sprawling
wings and screeching
violence, flapping
and agreeing to share
the putrid remains.
I divide
the foul plate
of a purloined pleasure
with you, a nemesis.
So flap and agree;
Rip the carrion
with your curved, sharp,
dark beak.

GOODNESS

“I am a sick man. ... I am a spiteful man. I am an
unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased.
However, I know nothing at all about my disease,
and do not know for certain what ails me.”
--Fyodor Dostoevski, Notes from the Underground

You may suppose that I am good;
your supposition may be right,
but not as you imagine.

I am foul, feckless, sick, and weak.

My goodness is a wheat field blown down
by fiercest wind and by hailstones
so large they seem as meteors
of blazing ice, and set aflame
by Samson's pack of tail-tied foxes.

I am pleasant
nonetheless, a man of passion
and of gentle conversation.
You would say of me, “He's a fine
soul.” That's what you would say, if you
should know my outward self. I'm good
in the most common sort of way.

But “good” will not do to describe
the soul of man: That's not the word
to use, and least of all of me.

All's not fair on the shores of man,
but rough jutting, jagged rocks
impose. There's no beauty here
along these barren, lifeless reefs,
only waves and stone, stone and waves;
A tide that shifts and an endless
list of the sea.

You may suppose that I am good;
or that you are good; or we, two, are;
and so we may,
but not as you imagine.

A Gift Abandoned before the Altar

2006-03-11T12:00:00.000-06:00

Matthew 5:23-24


Two friends, as you and I, should be by now
further along in matters touching heart
and mind, but here we stay behind a glass
of silence neither means nor cares to break.

A fog it seems to me has risen dark
between our better selves, to dampen minds
and veil our truer souls. I see a light
beyond your eyes inspiring hope that friends

will still be friends despite the angst we now
endure. If we are friends, then all shall pass
beneath the arch of love and grace. And I,
And I must break the years of silent strife.

So trembling, shamed and humbled, I now stand
upon your stoop. Inside I hear a low
rumble shifting across the floor and see
a smile behind the glass of an opening door.

Yahweh's Serenade

2006-03-07T11:09:00.000-06:00

"Therefore I am now going to allure her;
I will lead her into the dessert
and I wll speak tenderly to her.
There I will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope.
There she will sing as in the days of her youth,
as in the day she came up out of Egypt."
Hosea 2:14-15

"The Lord your God is with you,
He is mighty to save.
He will take great delight in you,
He will quiet you with his love,
He will rejoice over you
with singing."
Zephaniah 3:17

His tender serenade allures his love;
He speaks into her ear
of blessings rich, and hope restored,
and sings the song, the faithful promise
too long forgotten here.

He's called her out into the wilderness
alone--a desert tryst.
Seclusion strips the heart
of God's embarrassed bride; compassion
and pity beat in Christ.

With gentle hands He caresses her
and gives her back the ring.
Rejoicing over his beloved,
the LORD of all creation
with tears begins to sing.

Familiar Image You Are to Me

2006-03-03T21:54:00.000-06:00

Sweet Airoleen, Airoleen, tiny babe new
born into a world of pain. Sweet Airoleen.
Wrapped and warm upon your mother's breast
taking the first draughts of life, Sweet Airoleen.
Sweet life, sweet death, Sweet Airoleen.

Near bald and pink and dear, your mother's tears
rejoice in you, Sweet Airoleen. Tiny Sweet
Airoleen. Plump and frail, your hands still
new-born fisted, but perfect, Sweet Airoleen.
Sweet life, sweet death, Sweet Airoleen.

Universe of flesh, muscle, brain, and bone,
How tiny made, Sweet Airoleen. So small
a voice, so small a cry; so small a face
beside your mother's tender touch. Sweet Airoleen.
Sweet life, sweet death, Sweet Airoleen.

A familiar image you are to me, Sweet Airoleen,
Likeness to your father and eyes your mother's
green, but somewhere else that Image I have seen.
Somewhere else that Image I have seen, Sweet Airoleen.
Sweet life, sweet death, Sweet Airoleen.

Baptism

2006-03-02T21:33:00.000-06:00

Sunset falls from the clouds
as a neon-lighted mist.
Soft ripples call geese
to swim in the glow
of a sun-sprayed lake,
To be amidst the sacred evening
behind, above, and below.

Bobbing on the purple crest
of a sunset-wave, black shadows
honk and cajole:

Leaving socks and shoes,
I feel the cool, bare earth
beneath my feet,
then wade into the cold sunset.

A Poet's Walk

2006-03-01T20:56:00.000-06:00

All the world's aroar and speaks
and means more than I can say.
Every object--flower, cloud, or leaf--
latent in poetic voice,
shouts and snorts and croaks its metaphor.

I walk through no mortal door, but passage into time;
a broken stone, lies beside as life cast down.
Myself and you and hordes before
look back from this Narcissus' lake.

A breeze, not wind, but voice of anxious thought;
Sweet bird in winter tree, are you hope or desolation?
Black bird and crow fetch from carrion the sin-stained heart
as snow falls with its icy purity from above.

Shaking its mane, a neighing archetype gallops free.
Horizon, sky, and day tell of our tomorrow.
Dark clouds, in cliche, portend.
Windows on houses stare or blink or keep a friend apart.

Why have all the leaves now fallen like a lazy simile?
Lapping up muddy water, the hart (with pun as well)
lifts its head, darts away, and dissolves into the wood.
Where does the dark path lead?

Child, youth, bench, grass
all sing a thousand songs
of what is, what was, and Who is to come.

I choose now a "less traveled" road,
as autumn's rosy evening embraces twilight
and hurry home again, ever returning,
before black darkness falls,
and I am left alone at night
with haunting, nocturnal metaphors,
or I lose my way

and sleep the long sleep.

Corporate Branding

2006-03-01T20:50:00.000-06:00

His cardboard placard, a sign
With an adopted motto,
Is scrawled, "Will work for food,"
piece-mill, in black, felt marker.

Disheveled in brown, wrinkled
clothes, a fitting and uniform branding
with his hand-drawn billboard.
He stands at the intersection alone

With a small bundle tied
in a blanket beside him.
Silently, somehow midst engines,
sirens, radios, street noise,
and my own benumbed mental static
he speaks to me.

Silently, I reply:

You're working for this single meal;
what life is this for you?
I can give you so little,

I withhold myself.

Pity you, pray for you,
hire you, ignore you,
feed you, befriend you,
or just betray you.
What will I do?

Think no more; the light
has changed.

Barren Prayers

2006-02-27T18:02:00.000-06:00

Barren prayers lie like a crumbling edifice interrupting
a sweeping green glade--lie chipped, cracked, and echoing in abandoned emptiness
as a forgotten abbey: vine-grown, encompassed in weeds and earth,
nested with birds and mice. Walls detach from roof, roof from shingle,

A door hangs by a single hinge. The stone wall of the abbey garden crumbles,
moss-covered and grass-covered, just a tracing slope above the turf.
Beside, worn headstones, etched with a cross, mark unremembered tombs.
Quaintly pastoral to an observing eye:

Almost serene, a photo-stop to cross off the sightseer's itinerary.
But the barren prayer heaves with life
like the barren tomb, and what was dead comes alive and enters
the locked and barred room, baring its scars to show its death

and prove it's no phantom risen, but flesh and blood anew--
having passed through the darkening river of death, parted
its waters, trampled its dry and stony depths to stand
now upon the eastern shore.

And he is dead whose prayers
must always be said only on the shores of living water.

The Dark Night of Peace

2006-02-26T14:36:00.000-06:00

Take heart when darkness blinds the glowing day
Before your eyes. It is no more than night.
Be still, be still. Peace will yet guide the way.

There is no sky whose fearsome cast of gray
Can close God's eyes, or darken His Truth's light.
Take heart when darkness blinds the glowing day.

This moment comes to all who seek to stay
Close to the heart of God. In delight
Be still, be still. Peace will yet guide the way.

Your eyes grow weary and dark; watch and pray
Until your earnest prayers and faith turn sight.
Take heart when darkness blinds the glowing day.

The anguished heart lifts its voice to say,
"Enough. I'm through. I can no longer fight."
Be still, be still. Peace will yet guide the way.

Notice, now, your deepening faith's array,
And love's growing bloom, and hope's fledgling flight.
Take heart when darkness blinds the glowing day.
Be still, be still. Peace will yet guide the way.

Selah

2006-02-25T12:51:00.000-06:00

The ancient interlude, interspersed in Holy hymns
Speaks in its stillness-- in the pause--
With Sacred reverberations:
"Don't rush on. Wait--
Silence. Nothing is
lost in the hiatus
of sound."
Quiet.

Nesting

2006-02-24T17:13:00.000-06:00

I saw the swallow making her tiny straw nest
Beneath the eave of my house. She found a nook
So small and slight, that any wise soul
Would have advised against the choice. But
She didn't ask, so I didn't offer any contrary counsel.
My voice would only have frightened her, anyway.
So, instead, I watched her flit from branch,
To ground, to eave and back again. Maybe this
Is her first attempt at home-building I wonder?
She thinks only of design and follows her inborn blueprint
Perfectly. Perhaps she over-estimates her skill
Or under-estimates the wind, but I know disappointment
And can hear already her song when the egg-filled nest
Blows to the ground in the first fierce storm of spring.
Once more she returns, and I go on regretting
Advice not given and advice forsaken.

Four Poems on Love for an Infant Son

2006-02-23T19:20:00.000-06:00

I.
You are a gift
entrusted to us
from our Heavenly Father.
He has charged us with your instruction and your care:
And the first lesson you learn must be learned
in the rocking chair.

II.
Learn as I rock you, that love can be tender.
Feel as I bathe you, love can be pure.
Know as I dress you, love must provide.
Hear in our songs, love can rejoice.
Taste as I feed you, God's love is sweet.
Let your first steps instruct you,
Love will encourage and pick up and cheer.
Learn with your first words, love must speak.
See as I bandage your scrape
And kiss your fevered head that love heals.
When I leave for work, know that love sacrifices;
And when I return, that love prioritizes.
Let my punishment remind you, love corrects,
Seeks the good, and expects the best.
Let my hugs teach you, love forgives and understands.
Learn as I hold your sisters and brother and mother
that love can be multiplied
without being diminished.

III.
Do not be fooled by the imposters:
Passion and fashion and beauty:
Love is not made of such sentimental stuff.
Love is rugged and strong; willful and tough:
Chasing and embracing godly duty.

IV.
May you see in this father your Heavenly Father,
And know every morning as you climb in my bed
That it's His heart that loves you when this face is smiling.
It was He who is love who made the first man,
And you are the man He made you, my son, when you love.

Treasures Held in Earthen Keep

2006-02-13T18:39:00.002-06:00

May it not be held in scorn in heaven's eyes
If I retain one earthly prize.
Oh, I know full well--Yes, I realize
The words well-spoken still hold true,
That if you find a man's treasure,
you've found his heart, too.

I know as well the dangers of treasures
Held in earthen keep--
Of moths, of rust,
Of thieves who never sleep.

May it cause not upheaval, nor heavenly strife
Though, if I still treasure my precious wife.
Oh, I know full well--yes, I realize
The words well-spoken still hold true,
If you find a man's treasure,
You've found his heart too.

I am willing to risk the moths of sin,
Which would rend the gament from without
or from within.
I am quite ready to face the rust of time,
And I'm not so afraid of Death,
That great restless Thief,
That I would never,
For cause of some great fear,
Allow this treasure to be to me quite dear.

Oh, never for a moment once suppose
That I, a single ordinance of Yours, oppose.
I simply ask if it be fair
For me to hold one treasure here,
And all others there.

All delights I lay in full measure
Upon the stores of heaven, save this part:
On earth my wife is my treasure,
And in my treasure lay my heart.

I Am Looking for a Man Whose Thoughts Are Thunder

2006-02-13T18:36:00.000-06:00

I am looking for a man whose thoughts are thunder,
Bellowing, resounding, startling thunder;
not the peevish tinkerings of fools
echoing what they thought they heard
and have called their own.
I am looking for a man whose thoughts are thunder,
Inescapable, shuddering, sounding thunder;
not the clicking of heels echoing down a narrow corridor--
Thunder that soars to the mountains, canyons and rocky precipices
and bounds back as ferouciously.

Split Logs

2006-02-10T07:49:00.000-06:00

I went out beyond the shed
To bring the last logs in. But the snow
And ice upon the wood seemed so
Precariously poised, set there upon the pine's
Gray face by an order not seen to me,
That I didn't deserve to alter it,
Not yet. Not until I had been so weathered,
I thought. But the icy wind blows
Right through me. I shiver and twist
My head, half expecting to see winter
Standing right beside me in her best white gown,
But it's only the oak trees there and their
Brothers the fir in the stand beyond.
How did that wind sneak through you?
I think, but don't say aloud.
Then conclude, The way it just passed through me.
There we stood in a way of conversation:
The white-topped, seasoned pine; a solemn, silent oak
And I. Inside the fire's dying, and wonders whether
It’s feverish hunger will be filled.
I take the split log by the end, spill the mystery
Upon the ground, and trace my way,
Over my own tracks, backward through the snow.

A Father's Prayer

2006-02-05T22:25:00.000-06:00

I.

When stars wink and grin against the black sky, I think of you.
When I hear Falstaff’s laugh, I think of you.
When the burgeoning, yellow sunflowers nod in a golden field,
I think of you.

When dancers twirl and bend and flow to a symphony’s brassy song,
When a single violin quivers out a note,
When autumn’s breeze nuzzles my cheek, I think of you.

I think of you
When the dark silhouettes of horses gallop against the horizon;
When I hear, “The LORD is my shepherd”;
When the sweet, tart juice of peaches tingles my tongue;

I think of you,
And pray these be your joy as well.

II.

May your mother's beauty be your own;
May her peaceful, quiet spirit abide when you are grown;
May you be filled with her simple, loving grace,
And may her winsome, gentle smile charm you little face.

Lamentation

2006-02-05T22:19:00.000-06:00

I will weep tonight as I think of you
And the distance that is between us.
And I will take no wine to lighten me,
Nor any consolation while I sigh—
It is sometimes better to weep than to laugh,
     And tonight I wish to cry.

I will sit alone in darkness weeping,
As my neighbors lie restfully sleeping.
And I will take no light to lighten me,
Nor any candle to chase away the night—
For darkness is sometimes better than the sun,
     And tonight I want no light.

My heart will toll a sullen note,
As I weep for you and our brotherhood.
And I will hear no tones to lighten me,
Nor ask that any glad songs be sent—
For a dirge is sometimes all we need,
     And tonight I will lament.

Progeny

2006-02-02T08:21:00.000-06:00

O damned child,
I have given you the worst of me,
of all before me.
Conceived in sin, cursed from birth,

Now you stand beside my bed afraid:
A shadow in the darkness,
Awakened by a nightmare you can’t remember;
Haunted by a dread
Your yet unformed conscience can’t fathom.

“Daddy, I’m scared,”
Your small voice startles me awake.

Climb into the warmth of my bed.
Be safe in your father’s love,
Let your pure soul rest,
And dream of the innocence you never knew.

Category 3, Cameron, Louisiana

2006-01-31T23:25:00.000-06:00

She came home in a stranger’s clothes
To find a home that is a home no more.
Only concrete slabs and crumpled fences
Remain to remind her
Of friends’ houses on these blank
And strangely silent streets.

Her daughter's school house
Stares vacantly from hollow eyes.
And her church, where the Gospel rang so sweetly every Sunday,
sings only with the voided voice of the breeze, but
The baptistry still stands—
and the cross above the door.

The century-old live oak tree—
Marked with memories of Emily
Swinging in a tire swing
(Now unused for years)—
Lies westward;
Points the way like a dying man to his guilty attacker.
She half-laughs at the impossibility,
“If such a sound be considered a laugh”—
The Spanish moss still clings
to branches blown leaf-bare.

Brick steps climb to an empty lot where
Door and home once stood.
She climbs the steps, and stands
And shakes her head in unbelief,
Surveying wreckage not told in limb and leaf.

She walks in where the door would have been,
By memory traces down the hall,
Reaches by instinct
for a door not there,
And in the bedroom space (at least, she thinks it so)
Finds a single picture
of her husband come home from war.

First Person Plural

2006-01-27T19:00:00.000-06:00

I am the where
And the when;
I am the what—
YOU are the Why
And the How,
And We are the Who.

I am the here
And the now;
I am the old—
YOU are the There
And the Forever,
And We are the New.

I am the dusk
And the dark;
I am the night—
YOU are the Light
And the Spark,
And We are the Day.

I am the leaf
And the bough;
I am the tree.
YOU are the Wind
And the Root,
And We are the Fruit.

I am the body
And the soul;
I am the frame—
YOU are the Breath
And the Blood,
And We are the Spirit.

Koinonia

2006-01-25T17:51:00.000-06:00

A man of many companions may come to ruin,
but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.
Proverbs 18:24

He holds a place within my heart;

In four warm years,

in laughter shining,
tight-fisted, we held our bond in revelry--

a gripping comradery of war or joy,
of sorrow or pain, or hope, or aspiring together.
"Tomorrow" was such a rich, full word.
It seemed we had nothing but tomorrow,
But glancing back, we had Today!

And what dreams we made; and what plans, laid,
as we learned our virtue, our being--
our faith.

One Flesh

2006-01-24T21:14:00.000-06:00

You healed me yesterday.
In a moment,
Your antidote drew the poison from my blood.

Nuzzled against your neck,
Your arms around me--
Your voice sutured my bleeding anxiety.

Flesh of my flesh
Soul of my soul--
Heart of my heart.

Littered

2006-01-21T12:17:00.000-06:00

Swept along by the unheeding,
knocked along the road
like an aluminum can
swirling in the wake of highway traffic,
rattling and tumbling in the breeze,
dented and frail,
scratched and scathed:
Rolling to a stop in the sandy grit,
she awaits the next twist of wind.

Blueshift

2006-01-12T15:50:00.000-06:00

I know,
Love. Leave me --now--
I am lost (hearing your voice as
a misguiding echo, turning me away rather than nearer you).

Something of the Twilight Speaks to Me

2006-01-11T12:09:00.000-06:00

Something of the twilight speaks to me,

Where the candlelight of day yet fills the sky,
And an encroaching night rises on silent, silken wings.

Where ribbons of light—in muted hues—stretch out,
Somehow truer than the exulting sunset

A mystery on the horizon—
A song of light fading into an echo—
A dance of heavenward light and earthbound darkness:

Something of the twilight speaks to me.

Kindred (Audio Poem)

2006-01-09T14:47:00.000-06:00

Willowing away by the water’s edge,
Hanging our harps for the wind to play,
We are the reluctant travelers.

Pressed into the ship and taken away,
Latched in our watery coffin,
Tossed in our filth,
We writhe in disease and harken for home.

Night has fallen in these darkened souls,
Dead as the night that hallow calls
With its whispery breath
And teases with hopes of a watery death.

A Breath Held Too Long (Audio Poem)

2006-01-09T13:43:00.000-06:00

There fell a long, uncomfortable silence on them,
Like a breath held too long.
Neither spoke, neither looked at the other,
Each thought, but said nothing.
Years passed in the interlude.

Finally, the silence was broken,
Like the shattering pane of glass
The boy had put his hand through when he was five.
“Is it worth the trouble. . .the pain,
To go on like this?”

“You could have done something before now.”

“What could I do?”

“Something. . .Anything!”

“How could I?
You know I did everything I could.”

“No, I don’t know! He’s your son.
Why didn’t you make him?”

“That’s not fair!
It’s not like the boy’s a child anymore.”

His own words caught him off guard,
He saw; he realized the magnitude of the words. . .
Where had the years gone?
Why wasn’t he a child anymore?

He began again, "And...
And I’m...well…I’m not a father anymore.”

Tears fell silently down his creased cheeks,
Like the first tricklings of a stream
Down a long-dried creek bed, not sure which way to go.
His lips quivered slightly;
He was no longer strong enough to exert his will
Or fight back anymore tears.
He sighed the longest sigh,
As though he’d been holding his breath all his life.

Solace (Audio Poem)

2006-01-07T11:23:00.000-06:00

FATHER, while we toil here--

whipped though we are by life's branches
and pricked by this Forest's
thorns,

the long, pointed thorns which would hold us back,
point us away from our pursuit;

and tripped as we are by the
underbrush,
the dead, crumbling remains of yesteryear,
the year of falling, losing our leaves, being stripped

bare

by the shivering wind's taking from us all we would
hold on to, dashing our hopes to the ground in a
twirling,
twisting,
spiraling,
fluttering decent,

piling them one on the other until they have become
not the road in which we would walk,
but the barrier in our path--

I find
s o l a c e
in YOU alone.

The Pageant (Audio Poem)

2006-01-06T22:53:00.000-06:00

Parading through the City streets,
Up the hills and through the light,
Hordes of saints go up the flight
Where glowing sun meets
the waning night.

Angels greeting them for their march;
Rushing wind blowing through the air,
Paraders routing to a Chair
Beyond the blue and silver arch,
in City fair.

Adorning now our dear deceaced,
Woolen gowns of purest white,
Crimson fringed the hue of light--
Robes shorn from the Lamb's dear fleece
and God's delight.

A shining circle surrounds His throne;
Their crowns are cast before His feet.
A thund'ring praise welcomes the fleet
Of weary pilgrims now come home
to Yahweh's Seat!

Wind Storm (Audio Poem)

2006-01-03T21:25:00.000-06:00

"Make the heart of this people calloused;
make their ears dull

and close their eyes."
Isaiah 6:10

Windy prophet hushing out your secrets

Under a gray ceiling of clouds, your

Mystery--still obscured to the crowd--

Sounds only as wind through the pines to their ears.

O numbing words to deafen!

O stunning light to blind!

The breath of your message breaks

With the force of thunder

And the tenderness of a whisper; still

They do not hear. They do not see.

O numbing words! O stunning light!

Wind in their faces tousling

Their hair, rustling clothes,

And flapping beards,

They rush into the hurricane,

Bodies angled against the wind

They never see; the wind, they never hear.

O numbing words! O stunning light!

Kaleidoscope (Audio Poem)

2006-01-03T19:08:00.000-06:00

Standing on the corner of a forgotten dream

and the future,

We squint and peer long down the path

to a radiant, bustling, opportunity;

to an aszure, cheering hope--

Back the way we came, again

dawn-tinted tomorrow awaits.

Never here again,

and yet never quite able to leave

homes and childhood,

halls and haunts,

lessons and lesions of a varicolored past.

Ashen night come or the speckled, dewy morning,

the proverb still holds true:

"We never leave the home we love";

we only return

from time to time.

Gazing wide-eyed into the glass, we

imagine we peer into Providence,

but see only the kaleidoscope--

jeweled with our hopes

and mirrored with our past.

Morning Rises Gentle (Audio Poem)

2006-01-01T14:16:00.000-06:00

Morning rises gentle

like the spirit within you,

Her first beams breaking across the horizon

like a smile.

The still darkness retreats before her,

and my darkness dissolves

in your light.

Dew

beads the fields

in crystal pearls

glimmering

in morning's low light.

Shadows breathe out the morning mist.

Rose rays

like embers of your laughter

cast their joy to the sky.

And like low clouds catching the sunrise,

my heart blushes with your love.

Day has broken

from a distant Sun.

The sky blooms into its blue array,

and I wonder at this sky

God has painted

and the hue of your graces--

one into another--like the

white

of the horizon

melts into the indigo high above.

As the sun reaches its height,

the dial marks this moment:

The Noon of Our Joy

with flowers opening beside us,

and the Day yet before us.

Too soon will the golden sun

give way to amber evening,

but I will love you

until morning rises gentle

ever.

Eonia--The Timeless Moment (Audio Poem)

2005-12-31T17:39:00.000-06:00

Arise, Sun, to declare;
Awaken, Dawn, to trumpet.
Morning, send out your reddened rays.
Call rooster: The black night ends!
All the bustle and the wonder of newness spark in the air.
Crisp lies the frost on the first of January.

Arise and shine,
Birth of much anticipation.
Your gestation ended, we await your arrival--
Squall your newborn cry.
Tears in our eyes, laughter in our hearts, mouths agape:
You are here! You are here! You are here!

The Little, Epical Hero (Audio Poem)

2005-12-31T10:33:00.000-06:00

You roar with fierceness and fury
Behind those shining eyes.
You stalk and hide and hunt. . .
Beneath the trees in our yard.

Four years of wildness
expressing five thousand years of feral passion.
You are the little, epical hero--
an archetype and symbol.

You are the shaper of fortunes and maker of dreams.
God has put manhood in your heart,
and wrapped strength in your little boy arms.
You share the blessing of ages
and the curse of the Denouement.

The wilderness will open before you
like the doors of a palace.
You will sit at the table of Arthur;
Stand in presence of Alexander.
Your heart will pulse to the drums at Troy and Antietam.
Your breath will be the wind in Magellan's sails

Because God has a plan for you,
The Man He has made in His image.

Marilyn Adair (Audio Poem)

2005-12-29T21:39:00.000-06:00

Where were you when I went out to find you?

I looked..I called, but you would never answer.
You were elusive as a shadow when the light is turned out
and I am left to trace my way, by memory, to bed.

I tried to remember your face,
but I can recall only a smile or your brown-black eyes,
the color of a charred, burned-out house--
no unity can be reconstructed--
a dimple, a cheek, your hair, your laughter;
almost you are brought together,
but then the parts are repelled and refuse assimilation.

You are darkness--
sometimes everywhere, sometimes nowhere--
here when I peer inside.

I tried to remember your voice,
its lilt, its music, its note and slant;
I remember only your words and these are too few.

All your words are infused with my voice,
the one speaking to me when I think or dream or remember or imagine.

You told me once to look at a candle's flame
flickering, bending, twirling over a pool of molten wax.
You told me it looked like a skater gliding over ice;

I saw her twirl and jump and slide.
I see her now: I remember her. . . Remember the candle--red.
I remember how dark the room was with only the candle lighting it:

But you elude me, and your voice.