(x = space)
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Ant Envy
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An ant crawls across the screen
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I haven’t smushed it
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And I won’t
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It’s springtime
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Leave the ant alone
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I know
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The ant is never
By itself
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It’s crossed three times by now
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And I can’t tell
(too dark)
If it’s on the frame
Or does it go inside
Then out the back
The other side
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Which is a perspective
And a journey
I would envy
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C L Couch
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Photo by Jonas Frey on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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Our Days
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Yesterday was
Ocean Day
And also many people
Many of them
Students
Wore orange not for
Protestants
But for an end
To violence
By guns,
The bullets inside
Guns
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Two days ago
Was D-Day
When by the thousands
Soldiers landed
To take back
France from Hitler
And the rest of
Europe on
Which he had
Had his eye
And after a year
Of slogging
In a blood-soaked way
Town by town
Bridge by bridge
Europe
Was restored
If Germany divided
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Days for marking–we
Have so
Many now
With added reasons
Each cause
And each remembrance
Just
And exigent
Even the silly,
Days for doughnuts
And cat breeds
We need the breaks
Sometimes we need
The money
Come from
Merchandising
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Sometimes we
Simply want the break
An excuse for
Chocolate
Or for ice cream
For a ball game
A parade
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A walk
A conversation
Or simply
To stop
And think about things
Differently for
A while
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C L Couch
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Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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All Shall Be Well, Because She Says So
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I have not talked of God today,
Which might mean
I haven’t talked
To God
As well
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Dear God, what would you
Have for us?
What shall we do in this
Sad, broken world
In which we strive for joy
And sometimes meaning
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What can we do
What can we choose
To make it better
To make us better?
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Now and then
Now and again
Now and for the next time
No or yes
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Past, present, future
We don’t handle these
We can’t
Maybe angels move through time
To carry news
That’s sure, having happened
Maybe to stitch
The interstitials
Not to fix fixed things
But things that flexed
Won’t change the larger movements
Of predestined pieces
On the table
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With permission,
Save a few more
From the shipwreck
Withhold the hand
Sooner from abuse
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Well,
This is wishing
And not prayer
We pray for now
Into the next moment
If bruises,
Not the cause
But the healing
And to break the cause
The chain of hurt
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And, who knows,
Maybe a prayer
To increase what is right
Because there are right things
Simply not enough
For Earth to turn
In joy
And all our lives
Amen
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C L Couch
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Photo by Snehil Jonathan on Unsplash
East Anglia, Norwich, UK
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(x = space)
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Allowancing
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Should the
Spirit lead
Should an angel say
So that we rest into
Advice
From listening
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Pointers of direction
For the way
This is a response from prayer
Or simple stillness
Being still
Into the world, into night
Into the quiet blue of day
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Whatever time
To step outside
To step inside
Creation’s bands
The movement of the universe
Let it ride
For us
For a while
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We rest within
We rest without
We try to listen with disinterest
(not un-interest)
For a while
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If we get something
It’s a gift
Treat with care
Treat with confidence
Now get up
Carrying the lightness of a gift
Into the world again
Into time
(kairos into chronos)
Into hours of the day and night
Into chores
Into decisions
Into life
Into peace
Or needs be war
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Not worrying a win
But plainly things are better
If no new rewards
Maybe a win for all
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C L Couch
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Photo by Aaron Huber on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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Second Sight
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Be Thou, my vision
Begins my favorite song
In church
God should direct my sight
I should set my sight
On God
Maybe to the classic hills
Where help does not come from
Though our mortal selves might hope
But from God
Who made heaven and Earth
And those hills
Behind which God will come
If God wills
The will of God
We want to know
We get in wrestling matches
So to know
But the outcome is unclear, as the child’s
Magic 8-ball used to tell us
And then we grew
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God wills
It’s no fun not knowing
Inwardly, we might turn into fatalism
And there are less constructive
Ways
Is there a knowing beyond knowing?
I imagine so
But without genetic arranging
Or supernal training,
I must wait my turn
With the rest
Who want to know when heaven comes
And this be paradise
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Or what to do about tomorrow,
As if clairvoyance
Or supernal understanding
Were a guessing game
Sorry
If such, then such should be respected
All of us may pray, if we may
And we should,
Then use our best impulses
And instincts
Our best use of faith
To go through the day
Hope for tomorrow
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Clarity, the better vision
Direction, as we know it,
And we have ways to know a lot
With faith and allowance
For the rest
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C L Couch
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Photo by Roland Seifert on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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my own exegesis
(in response to the sermon)
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Exodus, Moses, pillars
foot of the mountain
young men sacrificing bulls
the blood upon the people
the purity of blood
they meet God
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this business about blood and purity
blood and sacrifice for purified results
I don’t understand it
I’m put off
if not revolted
I’m glad it’s done
thank God it’s done
by Jesus
thank Jesus
who for God and as God
sacrificed himself
whose blood must have purified the Earth
his blood purifies us
to be with God
now and forever
one sacrifice, one purity
for all time
the killing, bleeding business now is done
betrayal’s done
as is blood-letting
the blood of Jesus is
restoration
into garden-readiness
again
we could be back in Eden
we will be
new heaven and new Earth
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c l couch
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David Henderson preaching. I wrote this after the sermon delivered 29 May 2022 at Covenant Evangelical Presbyterian Church in West Lafayette, Indiana.
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Exodus 24
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Photo by Nguyễn Hiệp on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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I Hope the Dogs and Cats Are Well
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I heard stories about them
Early in the war
Not so much now
There might be zoos
I remember that detail
In a story by Unamuno
About the end of the world
And the wild animals getting out
But dogs and cats need our help
They always do
We made them that way
Adapted them for use
And took away their other capabilities
How could they stand up to wolves
Or bears or badgers
Wolverines
Or unknown men and women
With machine guns
Who have no familiar smells
Nothing about them
To indicate
Friend
Or family
Or home
Cats and dogs might do all right
With welcome from the stranger
But in battlefields
The anonymities are too severe
And the cruelties
Tend to pile up
Where did they go?
Where are the ones I was protecting?
I do not know anyone
Anything
Anymore
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C L Couch
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Photo by troy williams on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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Ephemeral
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A loose hair
A tress, in fact
Something for keeping
As Victorians
And other nineteenth-century
People
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In a box
A remembrance of youth
Or younger days
Or the other day
When the lock was snipped
And tied with ribbon
And I remember you
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C L Couch
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Photo by Emma Simpson on Unsplash
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(x = space)
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Unrequired Beauty
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I drove by
What might have been
An accidental field
Of flowers
No fine edges
No uniform establishment
To speak of
If it had been planted
That was a while ago
Perennials, I imagine
Every year the patch returns
Of blue and purple
Rising
From brown earth
Like holidays
Like celebration
Slowly
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C L Couch
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Uva, Russia
Photo by Daniel Spase on Unsplash
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