Glory

(x = space)

x

x

Glory

x

It’s a Sunday feeling

For those who have a Sunday

To be speaking

And singing to the Lord

x

The pastor cites

The shortest psalm

As an invocation,

Which is an invitation

More so a directive

To be singing

x

Can you imagine David

Dancing first

Before the ark

When it was brought into

Jerusalem?

There was singing then

And all the instruments

We’ve heard about

That played

x

Today is Mission Sunday at this church

So there are connections to the world

x

Everyone’s invited

Everywhere

Not as a number

But as you,

You are invited

To meet Jesus

Through us

Not because we are messiahs

But because

We can quote him

Tell his story

Show you something of his love

For everyone

And the hope that the whole human world

Might be saved,

x

Which is God’s wish

But not God’s will

For God has mitigated God

In favoring our will

And our decisions

Yes, it’s the reason why

The world is so flawed

And screws up so badly

x

That according to the story

Has made us

The silent planet in the universe

Burning other planets

With what happened in the garden

And then

Going quiet

While the planet’s fate is determined

Of itself

x

Then there will be noise

x

But here is David

In Jerusalem

And there is great noise

Locally

That celebrates

That helps to consecrate

The presence and the symbol

And our rendering of faith

In holy God

And in each other

As neighbors

And a nation

x

The world will not know you, Lord;

And nations will fall

x

We could wish it were not so,

And we do

x

But not everyone will be there

In the sky

The circle won’t be broken

But our hearts,

Well,

They are other matters

x

It’s a Sunday feeling

For those who have a Sunday

And take one

Or on another day

x

We have been ransomed

From kidnapping,

From the prisons

Huge or small—all intimate

When they should not

Have to be

x

The world violates our souls

And yet we believe

And from the ashes

Of all sins consumed

At last,

We shall rise

Who choose to rise

x

The glory of the Lord

In homely ways

Inside the heart

We do not understand

x

How something so

Cosmically grand

Can live in something

So small

As our souls,

One soul by one

x

Then there is the glory

That we read about

And then imagine:

The universe made straight

While also bending low,

We with that

And all the Earth

That knows at last

This is it,

The certainty of God

In blinding presence

That will not hurt our eyes

And the song of angels,

Unbinded song

That should destroy

But will not touch eardrums

Adversely

x

The glory of the Lord

Clearly

All there is,

Compelling

As to break our souls

Though it will not—in fact,

We’ll never had been

Better,

Freer,

Then to get

Our next assignments

x

C L Couch

x

x

Photo by Christian Cagni on Unsplash

x

Prized

(x = space)

x

x

Prized

x

God’s will

I treat it like a puzzle

A mystery

A riddle

x

The prize

For being smart enough

For endurance

For cleverness I don’t really possess

Is success and later on

Salvation

I win at last

x

Except I think, liturgically,

That the truth is not in me

Or anyone who thinks and contrives

Philosophy this way

x

God is not a puzzle

(I like puzzles

and I hope you do)

There is a clarity

Like the still waters

God takes us beside

Willing

To point out the deep parts

x

Skywriting isn’t necessary

(relief for Dorothy)

Read the code for life inside the books

Or listen

Listen, anyway

It’s easy

As it’s easy

x

There are commandments

There are two prioritized

There is a parable of sheep and goats

(poor goats)

x

These are enough

To take us through the day

A season

A life

And should we like to choose

Life after

x

Mysticism, symbolism

Are for other verses

So to coin a phrase

That serves the here and now

x

That’s all, folks

x

C L Couch

x

x

Photo by dylan nolte on Unsplash

x

If God Then God, If Not

If God Then God, If Not

 

If God is good

Why is the world so bad?

This is not a child’s question

Only in simplicity

And it has taken faith from many

Over time

There will be some number today

 

There are two things, as is

God and the world

And while we eschew puppetry

We take it right in judging

God by what we do in freedom

 

Nature’s indifference

I can chalk up to a fallen world

That fell with us

Depravity a Calvinist discretion,

How widespread

(the narrator had it slice through Jupiter

Out of the Silent Planet)

So it’s the need to fall

The interest to

That is decided

 

Have faith because

The world is falling

Henny Penny, Chicken Little

All the birds that find they cannot fly

By nature or by nurture

(Chomsky, Skinner)

Or by how thick the sky

Has become

 

We are not the world

And we are

We take it with us

Into our decisions

Which is to say are we at the root of evil

More than the devil?

I don’t know

I cannot notebook hell

But we are pretty bad

And can be pretty good

And, if to be allowed

Either say or way,

Then discretion is not valor but

Needful as air

 

We don’t make heaven or of hell

But I think we can contribute

And each essence must matter

While we do

Come home to one or the other

The invitations must be that dire

Life must be that real

Real choices

We know

Real consequences

 

Choose faith

Sometimes in something

Or release it

Take something or walk on

Must be breathing as an option and

Have muscles

No excuses but our own

 

C L Couch

 

 

Photo by Paul Carroll on Unsplash

 

Recollect

Recollect

 

Sometimes the spirit isn’t there

The pressure of zeitgeist,

Although, maintaining

Sometimes it’s just a mortal day

With bread that burns and

Coffee spills,

Liquid things that stain

It’s a day for paying money that

Might or might not exist

(such is the way of penury

to make us all impoverished

mischiefs), though we have to

Try something

 

But then

The spirit’s always there

Always here

God is inclined to stay

Underneath the window sill

Or in the corner where

We pushed the table

(insert a cartoon image)

Ready to intrude

But staying everything

For reason and for love

Until we scrape the bread

And remember that in many places

Still

We can always raise the sash

Or make space in the corner

 

C L Couch

 

 

Photo by Nadia Valko on Unsplash

 

Better

Better

 

I don’t know much about the world

It seems

I wish it were better

 

I’m offended

And I’m angry

Who really wants to care?

 

We have other things to do, less

Pandering to moods

Chosen when something more promising

Could be selected

 

Another code pressed on the emotion

Vending machine

I wonder maybe we have a number of tokens

And then the rest are gone

For deciding badly

 

For too-small convictions

When being noble in an un-ranked way

Would make the difference

 

Would light the factories

Would illuminate

Pockets and portals of prosperity

Nether (never) world

Intentions hide

 

Give it a chance

A two-step beneath the table

Smiling for no reason

Than

The joy in dawn-split morning

Or romantic night

The splendid times when

In spite of rusted gags and

Chains

Joy breaks free

Fall into Night

Fall into Night

 

Having slept late,

Perforce,

To my condition

 

It’s too soon

Now, the three-o’clock

Time when

The day turns

As it must

Toward autumnal

Night

 

And we notice,

If subcutaneous,

The knowing

Sense of

This;

 

Inside autumn leaves

We face

Alternatives:

 

To go dry-wilting

Into brown days

Or to

 

Flame like novae

 

In glory of

Expiring red,

Yellow tears or

Tears,*

Last bright orange

Bleeding

 

Dwindling into

Joyful or stressed

Evenings

Of our

Distinctive seasons

 

 

*reader’s choice

Two Hundred Fifty Dead

Two Hundred Fifty Dead

two hundred fifty dead in Chennai
a rounded number while the
counting of the dead goes on

rains and flood that’s what did
it now hopefully not so much
because of human design in
placing buildings and the populace

Chennai so you know is a city
of the world not that that should
matter for the death of one
native inhabitant anywhere is

a loss that makes a difference I
know you know this

but international technology
companies have invested in
Chennai with their presence their
companies are closed there now

worst killing flood in a century it’s
said and the rain keeps falling there

the part of all that’s drowned and
so given up which might be of natural
design has me wonder about a

fallen world did everything fall
that was created first would even
storms and floods that for now
cut off life would they run true and

right if renewed into the first and
given state makes me wonder if
free will then was worth the cost

sometimes I wonder this at other
times I don’t question for I know

that a fallen world is not worth the
cost of discretion and of choice

Who Loves Life? (based on the shootings at Planned Parenthood in Colorado Springs)

Who Loves Life?

(based on the shootings at Planned
Parenthood in Colorado Springs)

Pro-Life should not kill
People who exercise choice
Do not hate life

Planned Parenthood should make
Sure all options are given; there are
Good people who are Pro-Life

But the debate is over once
Guns are used, and
It has failed

Can we talk again? Let’s
Hope so; otherwise, what’s left
Is to kill again