the time in Michigan
sigh
to cry
too much
too much
too
many
one is too many
or one building stick
torched
and a denomination wounded
as all on
Earth
should feel and think the hits
the wounds
the losses
of
God-made
(all God-made)
people
and
these faithful people
who
have heaven
and yet so many broken spirits
left behind
tragic quandary
of why
what
if
and without doubt
in all the world
what now
and should we care statistically
and maybe afterward
now
is the time
to mourn
to keen
to bury and to name
for remembrance
to apologize
and
pledge that as a species
we do better
how about asking
God make
us
better
even in challenge of perhaps
a lasting affirmation of
our free-owned
will
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At least four people were killed and eight injured when a gunman in a pickup truck smashed through the doors of a Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints chapel in [Grand Blanc Township,] Michigan during a Sunday service attended by hundreds, opened fire and set the building ablaze. Police shot and killed the suspect, authorities said.
The attack occurred at about 10:25 a.m. The gunman got out of the four-door pickup with two American flags in the truck and started shooting, Police Chief William Renye told reporters. He apparently used gas to start the fire and also had explosive devices but it wasn’t clear if he used them, said James Dier of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Authorities identified the shooter as Thomas Jacob Sanford, 40, of the neighboring small town of Burton. The FBI is leading the investigation and considered it an “act of targeted violence,” said Ruben Coleman, a special agent in charge for the bureau.
Yahoo! News
photo by Eugene Golovesov on Unsplash
the Heaneys at a christening on realizing everyone else had brought a present
write something
she said
he went in
went up
and wrote something
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(a story he told at a reading)
photo by Leonardo Iribe on Unsplash
how far
(away)
I love you
I heard on jazz radio
several minutes ago
and
not knowing better
I said
I love you
to the air
while I was driving
I know to whom
I said it
and then wondered how much
and then frankly how much
received
as I drove by churches
Sunday morning
which
I was sure
however wrongly
would not accept me
so how far love
how far until we stretch it thin to break
even
though we say infinity
some would say only so far
as duty is not broken
then
watch out
some would say the width and length
of
a cross
which as a metaphor
and truth
might not be fixed
what are the dimensions of grace
anyway
dispensed by God
and not by
us
and not
to leave the question
but
to leave the question I drove on
to
nowhere in particular
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photo by Marek Piwnicki on Unsplash
red and green on tree
late for fall or early Yule
auguring from leaves
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photo by Chinnu Indrakumar on Unsplash
(leaves are for illustrative purpose, of course—what I mean to get at is that I don’t know the plant or if its leaves change for fall or it’s another process)
camp song
peace
give I to you
not as the world gives
give I to you
well
that’s how I learned it
I recall the high tones of campers
singing
behind the fire
while I and mine were
on the other side
and it was night
and so
we sang across the flames
while
dark
received peripherally
an antiphon
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(I couldn’t find the song as I searched on line, though I imagine somewhere in cyberspace the song is cited, if not sung)
photo by Josh Campbell on Unsplash
supernal
rainy day
now how about windy
cold
you know
seasonal
autumnal
the coolness of fall in
the MidAtlantic
leaves trying to turn
but
needing the first frost or
really
just before
cool brilliance
cold
fire colors
dragon’s breath on leaves
they fly by at night
autumnal
serpents
breathing gently
(for
a dragon)
keeping the undersides
dark
scattered stars
the only things
not
to see
then to glide away
so we may warm by sight
and
smell the clarity of morning
with trees burning fall’s
consumption
only
and maybe
as
not
too soon
winter’s investment
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photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash
circumference
things
have happened
I don’t know
we’ve talked about some
but
sometimes
closer in
closer in takes over
and the world might still matter
but for a while is encircled
by
loving arms that
must
then
be letting go
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photo by De an Sun on Unsplash
reply hazy
I don’t how to respond poetically
to what’s at hand
the day is white and pale
approaching colorless
my place was cleaned for mold
left is the mold in me
and it could rain
and it could be cleansing kind of rain
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photo by Jonas Thijs on Unsplash
quasi-moon
quasi-romance
I suppose
to look on it from Earth
a companion
for
Artemis
love and hunting
in
need of a new horizon from which
to search the sky maybe with
a plan to take the new step
now
and for a while
so to
rescue the Pleaides
from Orion
then perchance to dance
together
freed in a midnight’s new quasi-lunar
glowing
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(recent discovery made near Earth, Astronomers Say Earth Has a Newly Discovered 'Quasi-Moon,' a Companion That Shares Its Orbit Around the Sun reported in Smithsonian)
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