x = space)
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While I Was Writing
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On the news just now,
A hypersonic missile
Purportedly in China
China denies it
We want the same thing
China isn’t evil
Though sometimes
Sometimes we are evil
We all should know better
And we do
We do what we hate
Give it a name,
Security
Secure would be
Not to have these things
In Xanadu,
Kublai Khan decreed
An extraordinary place
And I hope everyone was fed
There
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C L Couch
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Alhambra de Granada
Photo by Jorge Fernández Salas on Unsplash
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Prayer for Angry Neighbor
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I’m going to ignore you
And pray for you
That you find what you want
Not as you want it
(sorry, that’s a spiritual rub)
But as one perfectly
Provides
And you are happy
As you’ve never known
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I guess that’s not
So much ignoring,
After all
It’s the other stuff
The stuff that you throw
Down as if to say,
Challenge me
I’ll take you on
Though what you want
Is brittle
And could shatter
With what is left
Call them fragments
Call them splinters
Call it defeat
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That’s probably too much
To pray for now
To keep it simple,
Pray for peace
On the inside for you
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Photo by Siarhei Plashchynski on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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Robby
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God, I pray
The shots go well today
And the check after
At the cardiologist’s
Making sure machinery
Is operative
And optimal
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A robot lubricated
Taken through the list
Before launching
Into new missions
Into the
Ordinary beyond
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C L Couch
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Robby the Robot in a poster for the original release of The Invisible Boy.
[image provided by] Reynold Brown – http://wrongsideoftheart.com/wp-content/gallery/posters-i/invisible_boy_poster_01.jpg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=25167466
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Grace Is Free
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You tell me the process
That lets out grace
Into the world
I can’t begin to say
Because it is not up to me
While my knowledge says
It’s free and freely given
By one who could
Have charged a lot
Rather made it free
Who releases grace
No one but one
Who does not keep it in a jar
To be dispensed with tickets
Shining and uncornered
But ready through unnailed openings
To give it without reason
Save for an abiding, relentless
Always hoping interest
In love and salvation
Grace is free
It’s freedom
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Photo by Thomas Millot on Unsplash
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Untimely
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I want to sense
The world around me
I suppose most of us do
Even if the world
Has been
An awful place
From time to time
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It is our home
It’s what we have
And should we leave
Before it’s time
Our absence will be
Missed
By angels in the cosmos
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There will be keening
As the rings of heaven
Move against
Each other
In a way
They’re not supposed to
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C L Couch
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for all the children killed in schools
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Kids hopscotch game in playground.
Photo by Eric Tompkins on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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Unwind
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Unlike unraveled,
Unwinding is good
The keeper of the maze
Has rested
Restrung her thread
And we are ready
For a puzzle
We are ready for adventure
On the smaller side
A kind to enjoy
From chairs
With drinks on small tables
To one side or the other
Simple games
With easy rules
Something to rest into
If we doze, it doesn’t matter
This is an easy day
A gift
From the graces
While the muses play
And otherwise shut out
Shut off
The noise we do not need
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a kind of companion piece to yesterday’s posting
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Colorful Fabrics
Photo by Kayvan Mazhar on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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Unwound
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After conflict
There’s thinking
It should have never
Happened
Cooler, take indifferent
Heads should have prevailed
At the start
Before
Before the mess
The knotted
And unraveling,
Twisted the way that
Things twine now
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Not in the midst of
What’s going on
There’s getting by
Day to day
Hoping to wake somehow
Into something new
Something
Miraculous, so filled
With grace
That penitence
Weeps for relief
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Somehow with
An uncertain thread
From Ariadne
Now betrayed,
The maze
Should be resolved
And we
Regain
The air outside
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Photo by Terri Bleeker on Unsplash
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Wake-Up Gospel
(John 10:25)
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My works I do
Show God
They testify of me
Jesus did that
And says it every time
We read or hear it
He shows
And says it again
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Works righteousness
Alone,
Some say
Indulgences for sin
Is close
When works as
Polity and practice go wrong
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Indulgence on a decorated paper
Certified
Purchased
Ahead of time for sin
This doesn’t happen anymore
Reformation
Counterreformation
Timing keeps them apart
Though unity
Should bring them near
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Then there are
The Evangelicals
The siblings
The independents
They are seen
And heard
Close in doctrine
But there is the edifice
The cathedrals
The state churches
The republic in the Vatican
What shall be done
With these?
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Still, there could be
A table
‘Round whose delegates
Might bring a gift
For conversation
Each thing distinct,
Each thing to say
We are here
And we have something
To make it better
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Then everyone could talk
And everyone could listen
The works of God
That show God
Could be manifest
Together rise
Against decline
Against blooded
Or bloodless war
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There could be peace on Earth
Well, some of it
Bless-ed assurance,
All that’s needed
In God
In each other
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SOURDOUGH
Photo by Conor Brown on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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Nos Temps Perdu
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Bad memories
Shameful
We wince
But it’s okay
Freudianism aside
(which I guess
we cannot do,
not entirely)
They are over now
We don’t have to
Live them
There should be
Some knee-jerk
Relief in this
We don’t have to live them
More than once,
The once that lived them
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There’s much to do,
Of course
Therapy and such
And telling those
Who must be told
While learning
Not to tell it again and again
To ourselves
Or live them
Many times more
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Enough ownership
To say
That happened
It’s made a difference
Here it is
A thing that
Doesn’t have to rule
My nerves
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Then there are
The good parts:
Learning
Or sometimes simply pleasure
Recalled from
Good things that have happened
If we’re going to live in memory
From time to time,
There are
The good parts, too
And, oh yeah, there is today
Where we are now
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Hello
Doctor
Name
Continue
Yesterday
Tomorrow
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Machine memory
Human memory
Both have glitches
Both can be recollected
Let go or kept in health
With clarity
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C L Couch
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National Parc of Tassili n’Ajjer, Algerian Sahara, near Djanet, rock engravings (7000 years old)
Photo by Azzedine Rouichi on Unsplash
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