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The Splendid Myth

(x = space)

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The Splendid Myth

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We have a problem

Everywhere

In that

We perceive myth

As untruth

As a story

That’s a lie

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That’s a myth

We say

Meaning it’s

Untrue

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But myth itself

Is better

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It’s is a culture’s aim

To explain

What is larger

Than our words

Because

It’s larger than our thoughts

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The source of things

The wherewithal

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The why

The motivation

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Weather

Natural disaster

Seasons

Where and when

There are seasons

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The attributes of animals

And of ourselves

And finally

Mortality

Of everything

It seems

Except perhaps

The Earth itself

The light and dark

With sun and moon

And other skyward things

We might take in

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Though all these

Need our stories

Too

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These are myths

Neither stupid

Nor naïve

For they are put together

By great minds

And hearts

To work the mind

To placate

To work

To stir toward greater

Effort

Greater meaning

Our thoughts

Our feelings

All our ambitions

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Everything

Given worth

If partially

Yet splendidly

Explained

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C L Couch

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Photo by Gabriel Ramos on Unsplash

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Hellish Season

(x = space)

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Hellish Season

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It’s summer

And it’s hot

The sky too dense

With particulates

Of fires

And there’s

An irony of floods

And there is war too hot to fight

Yet fought

There

And in

We’ve heard

The war at home

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Too much heat

It could seem

For sin

And yet not (yet) hot enough

To forestall

Our trying

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And should

The hellish rise

In us

Around us

There might be balm

Valued

And adored

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Christ

(of battle

of

the coming of the Lord)

Spirit

And angels

Come with mercy

Like cool liquid

On fevered heads

Once bodies

Have been taken

From the fray

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And then the heat

Might break

A cooling rain

In fact

Begins and lasts

All the next day

Like the fourth day after

Three days

Of terrifying

Awesome

Blooded battle

All battles drawing blood

But this

Specifically at Gettysburg

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Four days at Gettysburg

The fourth day for rain

To wash the field

To mist the ignominy

Either of retreat

Or too much victory

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C L Couch

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(after three days of accidental, built-up, pent-up, exhausting, murderous battle, starting on the first, the battle at Gettysburg was done and on the fourth day there was rain—ironic for the nation, being the Fourth of July, of course our independence day for the USA)

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Photo by Henrique Sá on Unsplash

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2

something small series

(x = space)

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something small series

(three parts, that is, three poems)

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For What We Are About to Receive

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Thank you

God

For what is small

For what is easy

To see

To hear

To guess a touch

A taste

And what is left

A smell

In likelihood

Or gentle appreciation

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Flower

Bird

Child

Not to touch

But to leave alone

Unless the touch be necessary

Or requested

Of the thing

Not my agenda

Or the world’s

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Leave the flowers grow

And the birds

And the children

Provide

Teach

Enhance

The opportunities

Hold them

When our own

Release them

To their own

Be thankful for the borrowing

Even beholding

As a work

Of yours

In a museum

Without walls

With working space

And fields for play

The sunshine and the wind

To enhance

The experience

All experience

That’s human

Sanctioned by divine

In the making

And the giving

Thank you

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The Open Gift

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Thank God for something small

Seemingly

Seemingly

Easy to love

As if we had received a gift

For our delight

The flower

Or the bird

Or a child

Given in labor

Pain

And innocence

Returning both perhaps

Charged to our keeping

But here is the gift

A moment for the beauty

And the truth

In our beholding

In what is revealed

From the force

Behind all forces

The presence

We may guess at

And not know

For sure

Thought we know

This moment with

The flower

Bird

Or child

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They are not avatars

They are their own

They are not agendas

Though they are

Naïve messages

Of innocence

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Realistic purity

On Earth

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(part 2 of something small a series)

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The Final Solution

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And now

Praise God

For something small

With song

In appreciation

To adore

Creator

In creation

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For all there is

And isn’t

And should be

(the Quixotic dream)

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Take in the leave

Take in the wind

Take in a stranger

Passing by

In New York City

Millions

Not to see again

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Until our sight

Be perfect

And unbidden

Sighting love

In focus

Blissfully

Agenda-free

Sinless

Indiscriminate

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Find something small

To love it

Even a molecule

Considered

The illustration

From a textbook

Or a website

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Thanks God for protons

And electrons

Neutrons

That have meaning

Though they seem

Without an interest

Of their own

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But they are here

And all the rest

To bind

In gravity

Of love

And willingness

For unity

And one’s own identity

Everything shared

Nothing lost

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Praise God

For something small

That’s you

And me

When you

Love of self

And the other

We delightfully have both

And all the time

One by one

Small part by small part

A miniature greatness

That is set

And to combine

To form out of apocrypha

Or apocalypse

The real thing

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We’ll be there

Won’t we

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(part 3 and probably enough of the something small series)

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C L Couch

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Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

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The Lonely Makers

(x = space)

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The Lonely Makers

(an accounting for geneses)

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There is God

There is the Spirit

There has been Christ

As we have the story

There is Christ

Before Sarah

In fact

To speak to bring the world

Ex nihilo

Into something

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The world was made in six days

Each day therein

An age

Such as the day of the dinosaur

Or the days of Camelot

Count twenty-four

God could do it

But there was void at first

Then light and dark

How shall one count

In that

Before the world of clocks

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Christ speaks

And all is made

The Spirit moves

Behested to breathe life

After the first

Breath

Into the sky

Over the water

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Abstracts are done

And then

The species

Of the Earth

Come forth

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Creatures

With small spirits

Even

Our own

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Breathed out of dust

To live

To make our way

To make

Our own

Shares in creativity

By will

Because later on

We ask for this

Alone

And alone

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C L Couch

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Photo by Christine Kozak on Unsplash

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New Song

(x = space)

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New Song

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Sing to the Lord

a new song

All right

A new song

And what shall make it new

New arrangement

Instruments we rarely

Have in church

Maybe there should be dancing

Like

The king’s before the ark

As it was taken

Across Jerusalem

(risking disapproval

of the court

the queen)

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Maybe not

A psalm

Of normalcy at all

By that I mean

New words

Phrased by us

And our understanding

A gift today

And as a record

Kept in legacy

With the music of

The music master

(female

or male)

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What we keep

Because we made it

With a notation

Of the first time

It was read

It was played

It was sung

It was danced

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C L Couch

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Psalm 46

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Photo by Jefferson Santos on Unsplash

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(if you want a story of the queen risking the disapproval of the king, then read Esther)

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annunce

(x = space)

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annunce

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do not be afraid

it said

how not to be afraid

before an angel

calling

might have been a good

lesson

from my mother

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I bring you

good news

but I am betrothed to

a good person

and

the families

are not in conflict

so

what need have I

for

further prizes

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you shall bear a son

not by Joseph

but by

the Spirit of God

pause

well

pause

what will they say

what will he

believe

am I being offered

something

may I say no

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I know the fall

of Eve

was from will

to know the truth

of good and evil

and I hope

I know the truth

at least enough to

decide

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I shall say

yes

what other answer

to an angel

and my Lord

and if it was foregone

then

I will risk

divine trickery

or naivety

to choose

and then to say

x

yes

angel

yes

to God

x

as it is

I know I risk

sanction

and refusal

doubt

and rejection

and if there is reason

these reactions are

reasonable

x

but I will

go with God

and go to Joseph

and to

mother

father

and shall hope

and in hope

prepare for motherhood

as a complex surprise

in my youth

rejoice

O young woman

in thy appointed youth

pause

rejoice

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c l couch

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Ecclesiastes 11:9 (ASV)

Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thy heart, and in the sight of thine eyes; but know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment.

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Photo by Bartosz Kwitkowski on Unsplash

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Be, My Soul

(x = space)

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Be, My Soul

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Be still

(imperative

second-person subject

that is

you)

This

That doesn’t mean

Don’t move

As much as to quiet

Everything

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The rush of blood

The frantic function of our organs

The ragged parts of breath

Meaning

The ragged parts of spirit

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Smooth out everything

For a time

And in that time

Hear

More than ears

What God might say

Or you and God

To each other

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C L Couch

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“Be Still, My Soul,” a hymn by Kathrina von Schlegel (1855)

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Psalm 46

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Photo by Felix Mittermeier on Unsplash

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First Comes Love

(x = space)

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First Comes Love

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What shall we say

For real

But that God loves us

And would rather

Love us

Even more than judge us

Though there’s judgment, too

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Remember the first one?

It was

That this is good

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C L Couch

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4 God saw that the light was good, . . .

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Photo by Meriç Dağlı on Unsplash

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Greetings from Earth with All Things Earthly

(x = space)

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Greetings from Earth with All Things Earthly

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So what’s new

The day is new

It’s re-creation

Isn’t it

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Some would say

The day’s the day

It’s yesterday’s day

Redone

And nothing new

Same sets of compounds

To have earth and sea

And sky

And we are nothing new

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But cells are sloughed

There is room for change

There is age

There might be new growth

From where our cells

Land

Like the sower’s seeds

Some on good soil

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There is a thought

That built on yesterday’s

And does that count

As old or new

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How shall we measure

Ongoing

Something old

Something new

Something borrowed

Something blue

Here meaning

Blue for calm

Thankful for

The return of sky

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And as for borrowed

It’s all borrowed

After all

We own our souls

We should own our skins

On Earth

Our thoughts

And our discoveries

To have

To share

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Should be no fear

Rather with impunity

Or the fear of loss

Unrecompensed

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So here’s

To a new day

It is founded

It is its own

It is tomorrow realized

It archives yesterday

As for what’s new to argue

Let’s first be

Thankful for the having

Then appreciate the cells

That change

The thoughts that build

That what we thought as next

Is now

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C L Couch

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Photo by Dave on Unsplash

Dancers

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