the wild wood

there is a church there
according
to my mother’s favorite hymn
I’m not
sure if the church is
supposed to stand against the wild
or
to complement somehow
as in the kairos
of God
in
creation

and I imagine church is for order even to call
the program that
and
often that is how peace is associated yet
the day an age of having made
well
everything by God’s design
and by the will and by
the hand
for
actual or metaphor

and since we cannot measure cannot
count
so many things
and
good we try
for many

maybe it is mystery the mind
and the enactment
of God that from a mortal distance we can guess at
and
yet as a paradox of understanding
must
believe
if at all to believe

and so something uncounted in the wild
might
be acceptable
number of stems
petals
branches
leaves

while for leaves we might count pages
in our books
and
have the ordered time together

though in between
the solid
and ephemeral
we
might emply a medium of
humor
to keep us honest

time
and
or
in the wild at the church
that was
my mother’s favorite

c l couch


I know the hymn as “Come to the Church in the Wildwood” (though I tend to separate the wild and wood words); it is known as hymns are known by the first line, which is “There’s a church in the valley by the wildwood.”  The song, by reason of its lore, also has the name “The Little Brown Church.”

photo by Leo_Visions on Unsplash


n.b.

the song is about
a church that did not yet
exist
but was the verse-fancy of a writer
passing through
the Midwest
town and then there was a church
and yet is

my fancy
has me thinking of a Baptist church in or near
Bell Buckle
Tennessee which was where my mother
lived
and grew
and did the family go to church
I do not know

though she was
became
what have you a person of
faith

clc