God = Not a Sadist

(x = space)

x

x

God = Not a Sadist

(read God equals not a sadist)

x

Pain is good

It teaches us

It tempers us

We come out wholer people

Better for it

Pain is the megaphone

Says Lewis

Pain is loud

Ginsberg might say

(might say)

Pain howls

x

But it doesn’t howl

Because it’s good:

Pain is bad

It hurts

Great pain hurts

Great

After great pain

The formal feeling comes

Does God allow pain?

Does God wish it?

I don’t know

Christ in the garden

Asked not to feel hurt

And he was

Severely

Bloody

Hurt

Until he died

We say he had to die

Well and good

For theology

And there was real joy

In his returning

Perhaps he felt it first

x

I don’t like to hurt

I hope you don’t

I’m in pain now

My neck, my lower back

My eyes from lack of sleep

I have heart disease

And it seems my heart and lungs

Work against me

When it hurts to breathe

Though they are not the source

They are victimized

By fluid

That should not be flowing,

Pressing there

x

Worse, my brother dies from cancer

And it hurts

The medicine might help

It also creates new trials

A passing between pain

And something like sedation

And somehow in the middle

Is what’s living

x

And you hurt

I don’t know how

And the world hurts

In every fracture

x

So where is God?

Where is the love of God?

Where is God is love?

God is there

Love’s there

If God allows

Much less or much more

Created pain

Then there is love as well

Also created

And I think

Preferred

x

But pain is hard

It’s not good

We say pain is gain

But it isn’t

Pain is a signal that

Something’s wrong

And we’ll find out

Everyone finds out

The world dissembles, but

Pain is true

Pain sometimes teaches

Usually after the fact

Or in someone else’s story

x

I think if pain

Could not be real

If we couldn’t have it

That would be

Better

We might say we’d

De-evolve without it

Maybe so

But then

The world would have to change

And would be changed

We don’t know how

We live with pain

We even bear it

When it won’t

Go away,

x

Which doesn’t mean

We should like it

That God should like it

Wish it

Before the fall,

We might well guess

There was no pain

x

Sorry

There’s pain now

I don’t wish for you

Your pain means

A great deal to me

I cannot make it

Magic

Go away

Or mine

We’re stuck

And while we’re stuck

Comes all the learning

All the tempering like

Metal fired

And then struck

At least we’re not the ashes

At least we’re here

For everything

Imagined,

More so

Realized

And that’s what we have to say

Pain is real

x

C L Couch

x

x

(a Sunday School discussion from James 1, an epistle in the Christian New Testament)

x

notes (references)

Mere Christianity

“Howl”

“After Grean Pain, a Formal Feeling Comes”

x

[photographer’s narration] When we visited Utö, the most outer island of this beautiful archipelago in the place we call Finland, I allowed myself to be guided by the incredible energy of Inca, the daughter of the family we were visiting there. She took me to a series of abandoned bunkers from the times this island was a military strategic point and there I found this graffiti that represent very well the feeling of all that has to do with military, war, conflict and drama. With love from Korpo.

Photo by Aarón Blanco Tejedor on Unsplash

x

Late Cancer

(x = space)

x

x

Late Cancer

(diagnosed, lived out)

x

My brother

Might have to be moved

Again

He is frustrated

Wants to be home

Before he wanted to be

Elsewhere

But elsewhere isn’t working out

I understand

The purpose of a medical setting

Is not to settle in

But to leave

When well

Stay is contraindicated

Home

As it cannot be managed

Still remains the prize

x

He’s in pain

Palliation only goes so far

Before the pain

Folds in again

He’s also frightened

I would be

I am in contemplation

Though these are his days

And shall the cancer

Diagnosed too late

A year ago

Take him to another home

Prepared

At last

To last

x

But there’s today’s pain

I don’t know how to wish

The pain to go away

Without invoking

The scary, heavenly alternative

But prayers aren’t magic

We aren’t dealing with a genie

Waiting to misstep

Our hopes

In misspoken entreaties

Heal my brother

Still

Is every prayer’s day

That might make nothing happen

‘Til the pain-releasing thing

Must happen

Tragically for us remaining

For him who suffers

Most of all

x

It is late December

I agree it is a magic season

How much amazing

Might be borrowed

From days

Of extra stars and circles

Green and all the other colors

Only for him

x

C L Couch

x

x

Photo by Kalle Kortelainen on Unsplash

[photographer’s narrative]

A crisp afternoon around 3pm in Dalsjöfors, Sweden these incredible snowflakes appeared on the hood of our car. You can almost hear the crisp snow creaking under the soles of the winter boots by just looking at them. Pure natural magic.

Dalsjöfors, Sweden

x

Ow

(x = space)

x

x

Ow

x

I rock my back

My back says ow

My mouth forgets to say

x

I fell down some stairs

Last night

It’s still a curiosity

x

I didn’t have to sacrifice

The plate that I was holding

Ow, I’m learning

x

C L Couch

x

x

Photo by Szabo Viktor on Unsplash

x

What Number Pain Today

(x = space)

x

x

What Number Pain Today

x

I don’t know

Or recall

Who came up with

Quiet desperation

Perhaps a modern poet

I hope you

Don’t have to live that way

Something inside

That found its way

A sidling kind of thing

That won’t let go

It could be memory

Or money

The potential for a  scandal

Or simply a lot of pain

Not the kind that

Inspires a statue

And who needs that?

x

Pain is a reaction

A response

Also a signal

Can keep in the inner workings

Working

It should have an end

Not simply a measure

But that’s what

Therapy

Or medication’s for

x

Or simply bearing

Old body pains

A place of wounding

In the spirit

We can keep

Except sometimes we can’t

Then the therapy

Or medication’s needed

Prayer

Companionship

Companionship in prayer

x

Aquarius bears water

The libation bearers, well,

Libation

As offerings

Atlas

Or the elephant

Bears the world

And there’s the story of Saint Christopher

Who carried Christ, not knowing

It was Christ, through water

And a storm

And the child’s weight increasing

Until the one who carried him must say

He bore the weight

Of the world

And did bear

x

Carry weights

And pains

And as pains are signals

Pay attention

Carry,

I mean carry,

Carry on

x

C L Couch

x

x

Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

x

the phrase “quiet desperation” is by Thoreau in Walden

x

When Great Pain

(x = space)

x

x

When Great Pain

x

If God exists

And God does exist

And if God loves

And God does love

And if God has power

And God has the most

Then how

Then why

I don’t know,

Why are things so messed up

So screwed up

So damnably awful?

We could ask this and these

On calmer days as well

It’s fair

x

All things of substance are good

Really

You move toward evil and the devil

Then you move toward nothingness

And nothing

These will increase, day by day,

Until that’s all

(so much worse than Porky Pig)

There is nothing

Not black

(black is good)

But a void

Out of which God has created

But not us

Nothing we have will last

Except as legacy

Then memory

Then

(let a couple of beats go by)

x

We are on the side of flesh

Who value flesh

(I am ignorant about

mortification)

And what’s inside

Flesh is not bad

It is ours and was made for us

By the true owner

Of the universe

Who keeps with perfection

From the smallest moment that we know

And smaller

To the next

x

And what of pain?

Why is there pain?

How can there be a God of pain?

Well, there is

Who is the God of love

Who promises alleviation

And for you

Family

And friends and neighbors, too

For a broken

And a splitting-further world

x

Pain is a stake

(and stake)

It is on the table of the world

It is not ours

Though we can wield it

The way we can

Wield healing and solutions,

Too

These are realities and means

And we have so much to do with them

For now

We can move with

Pretty much anything we want

Inside

Outside

Toward ourselves

Toward our neighbors

Toward the world

x

Persist

Sometimes is all there is

When pain is great

The next moment

And the next

One moment

Two moments

Enough accomplishment

Until everything’s incorporated

And we stand up

And move

Not move on as in forget

Move on as in everything’s a part

Of us now

x

And I know

It’s hard

To say we’re not alone

When we are alone

Without the peace of it

But we’re not

A lesson for the speaker, too

We’re not

There is companionship

And company

For life

x

C L Couch

x

x

Photo by Conor Sexton on Unsplash

Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, United States

x

In an Anodyne Moment

(x = space)

x

x

In an Anodyne Moment

x

Before the heat returns

And the noise

Before senses assaulted

Once again,

Taking hits against reason

And the cool of insight

May I say

While I can see

That there are good things

Happening

There are good people

Everywhere

And I am glad to be on Earth

Part, party, and partner

To all this

x

C L Couch

x

x

Photo by Eskil Helgesen on Unsplash

x

Pollock Shock

(x = space)

x

x

Pollock Shock

x

What is honest,

Anymore?

(people might ask

they might)

Is it when we cry in pain

From suffering?

Is suffering so honest?

No great art

Without suffering

Speaking to the vision,

I suppose

Michelangelo before

The chapel ceiling

Pollock

Before the floor

Art that changes everyone

Born from the pain of one

Or more

And what about beholders?

Do I understand,

Bring it close to heart/

To home

Because I hurt before

I see above/

Below,

Hear the music,

Touch the statue,

Walk the garden,

Smell the cooking?

A world of pain, they say

No other way to

Know magnificence

But through agony

Small pain

Great pain

Small art

Great art

I want to fight the premises

Argue them for

Ordinary time

Sigh

Maybe we have to hurt

Before even plain beauty’s

(leaf’s magnificence,

soup in the pot)

Understood

x

C L Couch

x

x

Photo by Jené Stephaniuk on Unsplash

Part of the painting “Day Trip” from Jene Gallery.

Austin, TX, USA

x

Killing a Bee

(x = space)

x

x

Killing a Bee

(that’s all)

x

Last night something happened

That hasn’t happened in a while

I was stung by a bee

It hurt

I blobbed on some ointment

On the spot,

Loosely wrapped it all,

Waited to find out what happened

Next

The last time I was stung didn’t go so well

The site swelled, and soon there was

A shot

(another

kind of sting)

I know, it is November

We weren’t outside

The finding of a bee (alive

the bee alive

I was alive)

Was a surprise

I discovered it while touching it

Picking it up, in fact,

Not knowing what it was

At first

(it was dark)

I doubt it was happy

And let me know

x

This morning, I found the bee

Where I had dropped it

When I touched it, well, it moved

And I killed it

Was it dying, anyway?

Did it let out a bee kind of scream?

Have I angered all its cousins, now?

Will they find me?

It’s an old place

There could be a colony, somewhere

I’d rather not have killed the bee

x

Now I think about

Going to church

Because it’s Sunday,

Church meeting day

As I type, the stinger still

Bites back,

A bit of pain from poison

And the barb

That I can’t see

Even though

It’s in my index finger

x

C L Couch

x

x

Was you ever bit by a dead bee?

I haven’t been

(all the bees so far

have been live)

I could be

Dead bees can hurt you

x

To Have and Have Not

(and my response)

x

x

Photo by Monica Valls on Unsplash

x

Deal-Making with the Lord

(x = space)

x

x

Deal-Making with the Lord

(sigh, didn’t work for Moses)

x

Lord,

The stomach feels

So tight

I’d like relief

Though

Really

At the source

x

All my troubles

I can’t escape

Them

Though I could

Escape a few

x

And is

Escape the answer?

Probably not

(worse the

luck)

I imagine there is

Something

By the way of

Resolution

x

But some things,

I think,

Can simply

Be made better

Call it grace or

Miracle

Or one side

Of a pledge

x

Please, Lord,

Ease

The pain

Give me days

Without

The consequences

I’ll work

On the rest,

I promise

x

C L Couch

x

x

x

Photo by Ella de Kross on Unsplash

New York, NY, USA

x