Monday’s Children

(x = space)

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Monday’s Children

(coffee then reading, watching, hearing the news)

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It’s a Monday,

Blue and green

It’s Stephen King’s birthday

And tomorrow is the birthday of

Bilbo Baggins

And Frodo Baggins

The anniversary of

The big party underneath the big tree

Thank goodness for

Big trees

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Zendaya won the Emmy for lead actress

(though she is an actor)

On TV this past year

Since it’s a kind of peer review

And a mutual admiration

Society of a

Society I am neither in nor out,

I stay up with these things

Tangentially,

Though I’m glad for her

And her

Accomplishment

She must be well-supported

And did I squeeze a bitter grape just now?

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To all those who accomplish much,

I’m thankful

For those who have helped them,

More so

And for those who accrued

Through

No effort but the virtue of their own,

I am impressed as well as

Pleased, though it’s not about me

And it needn’t be

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Now, I read today that  women make up

Fifty-one percent of my society,

While thirty-one percent are white men

Is this why we’re so

Frightened?

Fear leading to anger

Leading to sin

We burn the crosses, rig elections

Cheat the press to make the case

That we should be in charge

The new majority, by the way,

If we must count

In this fashion

We’ve known for a while will be

Hispanic or Latino,

Going as Latin-x these days

In spite of brimstone efforts

At the border, in the cities

This will happen

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I’m looking forward to the changes

And when the cap is taken off

Am I a traitor to my kind?

No, my kind

Is homo sapiens—

I can say for myself

That pinkish-pale or whatever

My skin is is interesting enough

But the color wheel is vast

And extraordinary (for being

ordinary)

And it is there

Or here—even the color blind

Know the textures change

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We are in this variegated world

In the flora

We are the fauna

We don’t need secret knowledge

Except as an exercise,

And bent has always been

The hiding of agenda

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Join me in the world

All the colors of the senses

(in this way,

synesthetes rule)

Patricians, even partisans

Let go

With everyone, take hold

Of what is good

What is love

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C L Couch

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Photo by Roman Bozhko on Unsplash

The Wheelhouse, Los Angeles, United States

Handlebar Tape at Wheelhouse Coffee

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Hearting R.B.G.

(x = space)

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Hearting R.B.G.

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Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Has died

And we should be sad

Not clawing over each other

Rending into politics

For her replacement

On the bench

She died

At the end of the last year

It being Rosh Hashanah

Now

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The thing that lurks

In the swamps of Washington, D.C.

Has not praised her

As much as it

Can only praise itself

Older, white, male, fat, ugly

She was slender and knew

How

To live her age

And beyond her age

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A person for the ages

And for agelessness

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I hope for the court in heaven

She is excused

Having served already

An eternity on Earth for

All pre-heaven people,

Though God and she could

Talk about

All the thorny cases

Here on Earth

Two old, wise, strong, gentle souls

Who understand

Each day’s re-creation of

Love, justice

Love for justice

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C L Couch

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Photo by Casey Clingan on Unsplash

Purvis, United States

This is a shot that I took from my front yard of the Great American Eclipse of 2017.

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Easygoing Hallucinations

(x = space)

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Easygoing Hallucinations

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Thanks to the medicine

And exhaustion,

There are movements

To the side and over there

That I impulsively

Give shape and reason

Some kind of small

Creature interloping,

Though I should know by now

Is nothing there

It is a gray feeling

To go through this so often

Not nightmares

Or reason for

The intervention of an institution

Small things I see

That are not there,

The first intrusion in a

Hospital after two days

Of sleeplessness

And drugs

And afterward,

My chest having been opened

With inside parts set

To the side so that

Parts of the heart

Could be cleaned out

It worked

It was trauma

There is legacy

For the time there is

I do not complain

For having days and days

Since then

And maybe many more

If there are new challenges,

I’d say it’s gratitude

That campaigns

For quotidian victory

Brings me to the river,

Though we don’t

Cross over yet

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C L Couch

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Photo by Rene Böhmer on Unsplash

Graz, Austria

Moody Reflections

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Good Signals

(x = space)

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Good Signals

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I had the extra headache

Yesterday

Today, eyelids are heavy

(really are)

So with the tranq

That puppy dogs at veterinarians’

Get,

I could stand to sleep

For twelve hours or so

There was the time

When it was so bad

I got taken to the emergency room

At night,

Where I waited a long while

To be told to leave

Without assist

(except to be told to leave)

Six months I had slept

Maybe an hour a night

I was falling apart

Inside,

Which might be the kind of thing

That leads people

To scream in emergency rooms,

Which I didn’t

But didn’t sleep that night,

Either

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Finally, nothing kept happening

And sometimes

I could get more sleep,

Though it took

 A heart attack to move me forward

With the world

If we wore signs,

Would that make it better?

The signs would have to

Talk as well

Maybe give off scents

And have a taste

So that the senses become

Part of the message

(sending and receiving),

Too

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Well, I have this day

(clearly, so do you)

The headache band is eased

Somewhat—and one might not believe

That I’m thankful

For all this

If so (if not), maybe it takes

Appreciating the knock on the gate

To be told in silence

Not time yet

And in reaction

Gratitude

For day-to-day mortality

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C L Couch

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The Grounds of Alexandria, Alexandria, Australia

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Exegete the Rocket Ship

(x = space)

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Exegete the Rocket Ship

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The shortest verse

Is Jesus wept

My favorite one is Help my unbelief

And then the verses about

A heart created clean

By God,

Presuming that means re-cleaned

As well

Doubt and renewal

Sorry, they’re important

I think we need them

Though, yes, I’ll speak mostly

For myself

When it comes to meeting means

For spirit and or in the flesh

The realms where we dwell

Without preference

Or will

We simply are in these

And must do our best,

Which can be exciting

On our planet buzzing through the universe

Of lithesome opportunity

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C L Couch

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“Axel Tschentscher,” CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=83143301

Church of the Holy Ghost in Bern. This is the spire in evening light with a clear view of the 4000-meter peaks of the mountains Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau.

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Demand the Gospel

(x = space)

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Demand the Gospel

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We are loved,

Which might be the hardest thing

To know at times

Because it’s so abstract

We are loved by something

In the air

Or so far inside

We have to wonder why it’s hiding

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Call it something

Spirit friend

The machine in which is God

Call us something

“Star stuff,” he used to say

Or maybe

Renegade from grace

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Fit for a book

Or a one-way conversation

Sunday morning

But really we need something

We need someone

In the flesh

Or whose magic

Makes a miracle of something

We need fixed

Or to have it

(define it)

Feel better

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No phantoms, please

There are enough in hiding

Speaking of which,

Where are you hiding and

Why do you hide?

Is there a base I should run to

As in a child’s game?

Enough, we need something real

Into which we shouldn’t

Have to plumb,

Imaginary depths

There shouldn’t be

A question

You should be here

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C L Couch

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Photo by Laith Abushaar on Unsplash

La Machine Dragon, Ottawa 2017

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A Race for Prophecy

(x = space)

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A Race for Prophecy

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The headaches have decreased

Somewhat

There’s a band of pain around my head,

But it is less severe

Shall I tell you of all my other pains,

Maybe adding sad stories as I go?

No, you’ve borne with enough so far, and I

Am grateful

It is a blue day outside and on the tress

The last of summer green

Now is the race for colder air, the kind that

Will render brilliance to the dying leaves

Before the new season earns its

Name

And on the ground a greater mass of

Wilted monochrome than the riot in diversity

I and so many cherish

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C L Couch

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Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

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Liturgy in Blue

(x = space)

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Liturgy in Blue

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A pleasant-looking day

In September

It’s been a while

Not that unattractive days

Are unattractive

They also have the wonder of

Inhale and exhale

Libation to the senses

For the God who made them

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Inside this

In here,

What else is there

To say beyond

Praise plus supplication for

Another such as this?

Another gift we’ll think

We’re due

We are—with the caretaker’s

Responsibility as well

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C L Couch

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photo by Kae Anderson on Unsplash

Nashville, TN, USA

trees with changing leaves under a bright blue sky

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A Devotion

(x = space)

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A Devotion

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Read the third letter of John.

Think about love, as in

the interest it took to make us

and to keep us

with our will intact.  To withhold

legions of angels in

scouring the evil from

our hearts and actions.  Now

it’s time to pray, which as you may

understand as necessary.

After acknowledgement, confession,

remember to ask for

what you want.  God is not a leprechaun,

but God will be hearing

and there’s a guarantee

of a response.

The last thing, then,

singly and together,

is to listen.  Amen.

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C L Couch

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Photo by Micheile Henderson on Unsplash

Dordrecht, The Netherlands

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