The Glass No Longer Darkly

(x = space)

x

x

The Glass No Longer Darkly

(for All Souls’ Day)

x

I’ve been too busy

With the living,

Not to praise that

Habit

x

The dead have frightened me

When they are active

With the living

Like the Twilight Zone episode

That used to scare me,

The one with the telephone line

Fallen against the grave

And the dead calling

A living relative

Or the one in the Old West

With the peddler selling

Magic to bring back

The family members

To the living

In a town

And then charged more

To keep the dead, dead

And they return,

Anyway

x

That sounds comic, I suppose

But the dead used to scare me

Not so much now

Experience, I guess

And a constructive belief

In afterlife

And the agenda of their own;

They will be busy,

After

x

The sacred and the secular

All Saints’ comes ‘round

It doesn’t have to be so somber

In fact, there will be picnics

By the graves

In Mexico

And elsewhere

Commemoration

Remembrance

By the families

Who know how to love

On either side

x

C L Couch

x

x

Fotografía de una calavera de azúcar, típica en México.

By Pedro Moga – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22536159

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

Please Pass the Pray

(x = space)

x

x

Please Pass the Pray

x

Welcome home the victims

Heal the victims here

x

Quick prayer for those who died

And those who are wounded

And still here

x

Something in the house

Or in the car

Aloud or silently

It counts

The most basic ask of intercession

x

Like asking God

Be with whoever’s involved

In that emergency

Who are these people?

Someone knows

x

What is needed by way of comfort

Or of sutures

Or of passage?

Someone knows

We don’t know

Maybe we don’t have to

x

Prayer is involvement

Even anonymous

That works

We may not know the outcomes

That is faith

x

C L Couch

x

x

Photo by Mikhail Volkov on Unsplash

x

Photo by YANGHONG YU on Unsplash

x

Starts with a Story

(x = space)

x

x

Starts with a Story

x

On a hazy

Saturday,

We talk about

The past

Long past

How the human genius

And the genius of creation

All ancient

Partnerships

Ask better of us

x

Look at the red curve

In Altimira

I think

An arch that goes much further

Than a count

A quota

Even for life

The lives of

Ancient companions

x

Red and black

Lines

So much more than

Counting

That have ancient majesty

A thinking of high places

x

Pointed Notre-Dame

Or round Saint Paul’s

May rise in tandem with

Ancient siblinghood

Reasons for the hunt

For the migration

After meals

For living

x

For living

x

C L Couch

x

x

The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber, David Wengrow

x

Bison in the cave of Altamira.

(image) By Daniel Villafruela. – Own work, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22778033

x

Haunted

Haunted

 

I’ve been dealing with a ghost story

It’s on television

But it has me thinking

No wonder Ibsen wrote that play

The ghosts, they come to get us

And they live right here

 

C L Couch

 

 

PanAmericana 2017 – the image was taken on an overlanding travel from Ushuaia to Anchorage – taken by Thomas Fuhrmann, SnowmanStudios – see more pictures on / mehr Aufnahmen auf www.snowmanstudios.de

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=78892499

 

Ashen

Ashen

 

In a corner of

Winter-quiet

I have borrowed,

Since everything

Is lent from God

Even the words

 

Note what we take with us

Nothing but some spirit

And flesh, which will need renewing

 

I wonder here

In the great gray sky

Or underneath the ashen earth

Or in refugee molecules of

Water, trying to escape

Once the desert rain is done

 

About what quickens everything

Who decides

How and why

 

In what is my hope today

My reason

Validation for my purpose

For anyone’s

Anyone who seeks the truth in light

 

For the darker reasons

Tread another path

They disappear

I do want to go with them

 

My hope must be in

God who has arrived

Bringing a longer day

And promise of green seasons

 

coda

 

I am impatient and unknowing

Unknowing and still impatient

Insight comes in parts

In fits

In gold-hot coals

That want to touch the tongue

 

There is a price for growth

Sometimes only for

Having another day

 

Sad assessing,

There it is

It does not count for grace

And considers nothing of

Another’s mercy

 

We have the day

We have the moment

What shall we do

 

Why not live

Uncertain of the defining

But having it

A spark if not a prophecy

 

Is having life reason enough,

You know, it is

 

C L Couch

 

 

Wikimedia Commons (image)