(x = space)
x
x
Listen
x
Up
Down
Inside
Outside
For alarms
For words—for
Signals
Of all things
That make a world
Listen for
Small voices
The kind that
Make a testament
As at Mizpah
Me and thee
On Sinai
And in
The gospel message
Good news
Of all kinds
That make a world
That made
The heavens, too
All things
That will last
Listen to them
x
C L Couch
x
x
Pass by
Photo by María Julia Martínez on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
Bother
x
Lord,
It’s Thursday
And I don’t know what to do
There are many things
Looking after,
I suppose, like
The Kenny Loggins
Song about Pooh Corner
x
Some things
Might be important
In the world
Not for fame
No
But for minimally
Watching expectation
That some imperial force
Around the corner is
Coming ‘round
And keeping count
x
I’m not sure how
The anchorites and hermits
Pull it off,
Remove themselves from
The bazaar of interchange
For profit,
Recognition,
Maybe a place
At the table where
All the shining people sit
x
Maybe it’s the maybes
The desert is a sure thing,
After all
Or maybe they know something
So much better
Than the rest
And to rest in that,
Surprise in know
How content they are
x
But removal
Like a spot
Need not be necessary
It’s Thursday
We can pick up something here
Or there
That does need doing
And deciding
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by Joshua Fuller on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
Amnon
x
I don’t know what
To say about the women
Who have died
Who were murdered
Or left
To die another way,
Another kind
Of murder
x
Casualties
In war or other
Barbarism
Starved, thirsted
Frightened
Or abandoned out
Of existence
x
We can do this
We can do this to each other
Men can do this
To women
x
C L Couch
x
x
[Image by] Gary Todd from Xinzheng, China – Winged Victory of Samothrace, Marble, c. 190 BC, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=101242500
x
(x = space)
x
x
A Kind of Peace
x
A weird kind of
Thing
Happens for no reason
A reason
We don’t know
Yet can live with, anyway
x
Spirited
Even takes our words away
Fills us with
A moment when
We see
Each other
x
When we know the world
Enough
To have enough
For being filled of
This other way
x
C L Couch
x
x
Earthrise
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=306267
x
(x = space)
x
x
Amen for Catharsis
x
You came
Dear God
And you were here
You were what I couldn’t see
The voice beneath the noise
Something soft yet muscled
Beneath the brittle strength of
The world
x
I don’t know about the timing
I wasn’t thinking clearly but
Have no doubt
Your arrival
Was perfect
In the way
Every plan from you
Is manifest
x
Now in a time of peace
An hour, the next minute
Maybe a day–this
Side of things
Is too partial
And imperfect
(not like grammar)–
And now I go about
Again (imperfectly)
To try to serve
To try to balance out the wills
Of people
And of nature
With my energy
x
And have I said it simply,
Lord
x
Lord,
Thank you
x
C L Couch
x
x
Part of one of my acrylic paintings.
Photo by Paul Blenkhorn @SensoryArtHouse on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
Dramatis Personae
x
The cast
Our parts
Shakespeare
Jaques
Elvis
We fret upon the stage
Curtains between acts
Performance
And performance
The show is over
Take a bow
Remove the makeup
And we’re done—
Cast party, maybe
x
Someone directs
The writer is in the audience
All our family, too,
And with our friends
x
The spirit has been able
The flesh does what it can
There has been some interest in
Memorizing,
Though much of the performance
Has been impromptu
And once it’s done
Everyone gets to be a critic
x
Though it’s the producer
Who decides
How long shall be the run
How many weeks
How many seasons
x
There is stage fright,
Of course
There doesn’t have to be
(and we can use it)
We can train
We can learn tricks
And once out there
We can have joy
Seven stages
For a scene
A play
A résumé?
Take more
Even have some fun
There will be reviews
(nerves in the offing
and then after)
But to get to do this is a treat
And not a one to miss,
If it at all possible
x
Than can be profit so
Variously drawn
But once you’re here
That part is taken:
Costume well
Though for a queen or king
There are many fools
Either can look splendid
Or look drear
x
There are rehearsals
We can practice
How much to worry—not
So much as we do
We can expect each other
From the wings
There are many places
On the stage
Some of which
We get to choose
x
I don’t know if
The play’s the thing
We deal here in metaphor
What is real
Is what happens after
This cold reading
x
C L Couch
x
drafted while watching (and hearing) a play within a play
x
x
Garage Theater is a theater company from Qom, Iran. Garage Theater researches in the field of Laboratory theater.
Photo by mostafa meraji on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
Metaphorism
x
Are there candles
That burn
At both ends?
Is the illumination
Doubly helpful?
And what happens when
The ends meet
In between?
x
It’s an untried
Metaphor,
I guess
Like the silk purse
From the sow’s ear
Or trying to catch
The crocodile tears
x
Their value is
Instructive—still,
I’d like to see the candle,
Hear its twice-done
Hiss inside
The darkness
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by Ronnie Overgoor on Unsplash
Everglades Alligator Farm, Homestead, USA
x
(x = space)
x
x
The Agenda in the Storm
(having gathered)
x
New York was hit
Awfully bad
It’s moving north and east
The fires out west are also
Famously terrible
And there are storms
And floods and fires
Elsewhere
x
It is bad in Kabul,
Too,
The President asking for
More planes from non-military
Sources
And we can’t compare
This to Saigon, because
The fighting isn’t over
There’s a force ready
To fight the Taliban
Will North America and Europe
Recognize this group
To send them aid,
If an irony of aid
x
And there are other groups
In prisons and dealing
With worse persecution
(another irony)
On the outside
These groups are in Myanmar
And China
And northeastern Africa
And in North America,
Native Americans
And First Families
And do we want to keep the
Border nonporous to the south
Because we want to contain
Mexicans for being
Mexican?
And blacks and whites
Where are we now?
x
These are the ethnic
Fires and the flood of hate
And fear;
In the USA, we once liked
The melting pot
Though now it seems a crucible
To separate us and to test us
Then we might go back
To melting
In that first, patriotic pot
x
There’s climate
And still too much unchecking
You know, there’s a town
In Ohio that found natural gas
In a parochial way
And burned it all,
Frankly, excessively
Until there was none left
I don’t want to blame them
For excitement
Or working out technologies
At large, we need to do that,
Too
x
But I suppose there’s a lesson
In there, somewhere
And we have so much to learn
And do
To stop the fires,
Contain the floods
Mine in every way
Our minerals well
Maintain both poles
Step in, step out
So there might be
Peace in western Asia
And elsewhere
x
And then there’s hate
And fear behind the hate
That’s for our dealing,
Too,
To have a planet that we’re
Fond of and it shows
It breathes, it smells,
It tastes, it sounds, it feels,
It looks
Grand as canyons,
Vast as deserts,
Cold as frozen,
Hot as eruptions,
Living as oceans,
Deep as thought
x
C L Couch
x
x
The Gathering Storm by Winston Churchill is alluded to, above.
x
Photo by Kevin Grieve on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
Doctrine by Tempest
x
And should I turn
To the Spirit,
How shall she say
Or guide?
To love in all things,
Though that
Can be a mystery
Like faith
And should I ask for grace
Or is that bestowed
In quantities
Already
Measured out by God,
Dispensed by angels?
I don’t know,
I think grace might be wild,
Ready to fall itself
Into the crisis
Spreading all the elements
And changing time
For
Working things,
Which means perhaps
That prayer
Is unchained, too,
And to do so
Into the storm
In terror
And unformed bequest
Well, it counts
x
C L Couch
x
x
Hurricane Map
x
clcouch123 
Recent Comments