My Father in Unfolding Story

My father in unfolding story…
The word, the cup of coffee he sips instead.
With coke bottle glasses, he read and read.
Five-thirty A.M., uncovered, still uncovering
My Father. Before candles, before
The dawn, before this space, before
My needs. And without speed, no haste
In a fast and steady hand.
Waste not the day, redeem the morning,
Alone and unclothed, before
And below, my God, my Father.
Dad, you sewed my favorite sweater,
The one that is so warm in winter.
You never knew you knit,
And yet, you never really quit weaving,
Weaving, pushing, leaving, giving.
And now that it is well worn: receiving.
I remember folder fingers. Around one
Another like two needles together.
How each stitch, morning and evening,
Unseen and foreseeing
Reason and intent, and I would be content,
To sit on my daughter’s bed and pray.
To hold my wife’s hand,
To now understand
To graft heavy plans into spirited vines
And when the light of delight declines
Breathe joyous ones into more somber sons.
My father, how you wrapped that family
Around my shoulders, around our shoulders,
Around my heart.
Of my Father, the growing glory
Of my father in unfolding story…

The Tide

Rinsed in commerce, wings of gold and silver
Carved into rings are rarely worn.
Rarely guarded as expressions – barely recognized
Inscription diminished and scorned:
“Pull me o’er your heart in heavy rains.”
Rolls mournfully round a rusted,
Vanity sink and rattles regretfully through the drain.
Heaven falls so heavy these days.

Union

At it’s holiest, this communion…
The body and (Oh!) the body!
How I eat of it everywhere but here,
Here at this silken altar,
Here I lay resigned, sacrificed before,
But no more. Brought bread to bartar
For water, for survival, not at all for
Remembrance. I used to dance like a child,
I used to run like one too…
Slow but imagining speed, desire imagining need,
The body and (Oh!) my broke down dream.
This table of intimacy, laid out for me,
The bride and the only.
A soft confessional for unity,
For the holiest of holies to meet.
So close now but so long between.
I tend to stay away.

Refreshed by the tint of the wine,
The lingering sting on the tongue.
Convening my fears, my vanities.
Away blood, alcohol and nudity,
Away chance to live one honestly.
(The chance to live with honesty.)
Perhaps always flowing penance
Prevents a growing celebration flood.
What good is commemoration that doesn’t cleanse?
Wine that doesn’t ease?
A story that doesn’t hold memory?
Anticipation that does not tease?

Swirl that glass, pull back those covers.
Cease distant confessions, become a lover.
Become one who does not leave the Tent,
One who is not hesitant…
(Oh!) The body, oh so smooth to call.
(Oh!) The blood still so gritty to tell
The realness of a life in salvation,
The texture of an invitation,
To a holy table of lived communion,
To my God, my One, this sweet reunion.

September 3

The promise of the honey poured
And pulled across my tentative lips...

It’s turning fairly sour and a bit sticky,
Words that smack of such
Passion and Pain...I let them lay
Bound and untasted, sweet but wasted
A tongue talking is too busy to lick lips.

Honey and coffee, maybe…

What holy words of me?
Speak like a fragrance
And long listening would leave
Incense burning, stomachs churning
And golden brown layers under snow.

But what holy words of me!
(I am undeniably impatient to see…)

Come now, come now, move.
Write with a pressure, words with purpose,
Yes! Motivate with scrawled signs,
All dots and lines, all symbols divine,
All pointing the path of my mind to…

You, please! Touch my tragedy…

Your breath my pulse, my motivation.
That feel, that beat, my full emotion.
Breathless when without,
My fingers stretching out,
For rain to end my drought, none falls.

Sit inside a windowless room
And wait for the wind to blow through…

This text tells a promise
Of conversation sweet and leading.
Through which closed door? (I’m pleading…)
Give weight to a movement, give conviction to a thought,
Give flavor to it fullest, and substance to what’s sought!

Be more quiet now…

Quiet

Train and skin and sin and I am sleeping,
Out of routine, splashed with caffeine
And the repeating and more repeating.
Blow through open windows, backyards, broken doors,
Empty streets, O Lord, blow.
Wind and horn, wind and rain, and explain
The difference between the light of night
And the light of day…
It’s only night is a little further away…
Like the difference of the clock and the train.
And the noise of the twilight is fear.
A droaning fear that Phinehas’ spear
Will slide through me and my thoughts.
I fear, I stand, I walk, I fear,
I sit, I turn all the lights on.
I fear: my thoughts. I walk.
If she knew she would not be sleeping.

Power in Silence

Eyes silent, room closed
Off ensuring solitude as certain
As an arctic seashore,
With my rash of shivers
From brash icy blasts
Matching the mood.

No breaks in this fast
From sound and social sin.
Only a speaker serving as a
Coffee table for a plate
That offers three slices
And a knife that can't cut them.

The wide-open window never closes,
Like Your ears that alway
Receive daylight shouts of praise
And by the night light the
Prayers of harrowed hearts,
Paranoid and penitent.

What I want to do I do not do,
Even in prayerful mood.
Holy half-hearted contemplation
Can't take thoughts I own
From the 2nd circle of hell
To highest heaven's throne.

So as my hands tear
This crumbling French bread
You must tear my heart too.
So in my search for Your will
I have only this bread to consume
And with all I am pray
To be consumed by all of You.