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Good Signals

(x = space)

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Good Signals

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I had the extra headache

Yesterday

Today, eyelids are heavy

(really are)

So with the tranq

That puppy dogs at veterinarians’

Get,

I could stand to sleep

For twelve hours or so

There was the time

When it was so bad

I got taken to the emergency room

At night,

Where I waited a long while

To be told to leave

Without assist

(except to be told to leave)

Six months I had slept

Maybe an hour a night

I was falling apart

Inside,

Which might be the kind of thing

That leads people

To scream in emergency rooms,

Which I didn’t

But didn’t sleep that night,

Either

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Finally, nothing kept happening

And sometimes

I could get more sleep,

Though it took

 A heart attack to move me forward

With the world

If we wore signs,

Would that make it better?

The signs would have to

Talk as well

Maybe give off scents

And have a taste

So that the senses become

Part of the message

(sending and receiving),

Too

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Well, I have this day

(clearly, so do you)

The headache band is eased

Somewhat—and one might not believe

That I’m thankful

For all this

If so (if not), maybe it takes

Appreciating the knock on the gate

To be told in silence

Not time yet

And in reaction

Gratitude

For day-to-day mortality

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C L Couch

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The Grounds of Alexandria, Alexandria, Australia

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Exegete the Rocket Ship

(x = space)

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Exegete the Rocket Ship

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The shortest verse

Is Jesus wept

My favorite one is Help my unbelief

And then the verses about

A heart created clean

By God,

Presuming that means re-cleaned

As well

Doubt and renewal

Sorry, they’re important

I think we need them

Though, yes, I’ll speak mostly

For myself

When it comes to meeting means

For spirit and or in the flesh

The realms where we dwell

Without preference

Or will

We simply are in these

And must do our best,

Which can be exciting

On our planet buzzing through the universe

Of lithesome opportunity

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C L Couch

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“Axel Tschentscher,” CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=83143301

Church of the Holy Ghost in Bern. This is the spire in evening light with a clear view of the 4000-meter peaks of the mountains Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau.

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Demand the Gospel

(x = space)

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Demand the Gospel

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We are loved,

Which might be the hardest thing

To know at times

Because it’s so abstract

We are loved by something

In the air

Or so far inside

We have to wonder why it’s hiding

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Call it something

Spirit friend

The machine in which is God

Call us something

“Star stuff,” he used to say

Or maybe

Renegade from grace

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Fit for a book

Or a one-way conversation

Sunday morning

But really we need something

We need someone

In the flesh

Or whose magic

Makes a miracle of something

We need fixed

Or to have it

(define it)

Feel better

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No phantoms, please

There are enough in hiding

Speaking of which,

Where are you hiding and

Why do you hide?

Is there a base I should run to

As in a child’s game?

Enough, we need something real

Into which we shouldn’t

Have to plumb,

Imaginary depths

There shouldn’t be

A question

You should be here

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C L Couch

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Photo by Laith Abushaar on Unsplash

La Machine Dragon, Ottawa 2017

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A Race for Prophecy

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A Race for Prophecy

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The headaches have decreased

Somewhat

There’s a band of pain around my head,

But it is less severe

Shall I tell you of all my other pains,

Maybe adding sad stories as I go?

No, you’ve borne with enough so far, and I

Am grateful

It is a blue day outside and on the tress

The last of summer green

Now is the race for colder air, the kind that

Will render brilliance to the dying leaves

Before the new season earns its

Name

And on the ground a greater mass of

Wilted monochrome than the riot in diversity

I and so many cherish

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C L Couch

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Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

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Liturgy in Blue

(x = space)

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Liturgy in Blue

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A pleasant-looking day

In September

It’s been a while

Not that unattractive days

Are unattractive

They also have the wonder of

Inhale and exhale

Libation to the senses

For the God who made them

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Inside this

In here,

What else is there

To say beyond

Praise plus supplication for

Another such as this?

Another gift we’ll think

We’re due

We are—with the caretaker’s

Responsibility as well

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C L Couch

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photo by Kae Anderson on Unsplash

Nashville, TN, USA

trees with changing leaves under a bright blue sky

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A Devotion

(x = space)

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A Devotion

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Read the third letter of John.

Think about love, as in

the interest it took to make us

and to keep us

with our will intact.  To withhold

legions of angels in

scouring the evil from

our hearts and actions.  Now

it’s time to pray, which as you may

understand as necessary.

After acknowledgement, confession,

remember to ask for

what you want.  God is not a leprechaun,

but God will be hearing

and there’s a guarantee

of a response.

The last thing, then,

singly and together,

is to listen.  Amen.

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C L Couch

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Photo by Micheile Henderson on Unsplash

Dordrecht, The Netherlands

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A Human Gift

(x = space)

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A Human Gift

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God smiles on a Saturday

The human invention

Of a weekend

An extra day for homework

Sleeping in, perhaps

Housecleaning

Or play

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It’s a gift we gave ourselves

Along with ending child labor

In “Satanic Mills”

And the imposition on the profit-makers

Of an eight-hour day

For manufacturing iron and steel into

Gold and empire,

All of which happened

With agrarian losses

And also serfs and lords

In the old system

Classes turned into attitudes

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It’s more complex, of course

But doesn’t bear a quiz

This is the day we have

(not everywhere)

An extra day for homework

Sleeping in, perhaps

Housecleaning

Or play

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C L Couch

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“Jerusalem,” a hymn, words by William Blake

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Photo by K. Mitch Hodge on Unsplash

Belfast, Northern Ireland

Let’s play fetch!

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Ash

(x = space)

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Ash

(11 September 2020)

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Today is bright with gray

In my part

A good, sad color for remembering

Thousands lost, then hundreds

More in first-responding

And millions to the nation for

The grieving

A holocaust must happen now and then,

It seems

Babel, Rome to the Goths

Constantinople to the Christians

Germany to the Jews

Lockerbie

And all the despotisms that have set

Fire to nations

And for a time burned ours,

Though we have to speak to freedom, now

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We have to know

The idea matters

Of democracy

Over agenda

The vote over manipulations

Free-to-choose over robbing choices

From us

And then there are the harder notions

Love over hate

Forgiveness over condemnation

Though I struggle with that last shade, too,

Wishing wanton killers

All to hell

While me and mine

And victims

Go to paradise

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The good Muslim wasn’t there

To kill the Christians, Jews, Muslims

Hindus, Buddhists, Jainists, and all who take the

Way

Agnostics and atheists

Belief or lack thereof was not a standard

Everyone was worthy

To be killed

The only thing of value to the killers

A notion of terror

Destroy the enemy

Without a real plan for what is next

Since the aim has no success

With which to deal

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The main thing for us now

Is knowing the dead

To take those on the wrong side

Of anger

To place them inside good, quiet parts

Of Earth

In New York, Pennsylvania

Washington, D.C.

And all the family and the military plots

Required in so many places

To read words over these

And offer prayers

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Terrorism is its own failure

We are free to think on better things

A purer world

Filtered like our water

And our better thoughts

With restraint, awareness,

And love, all love

In stronger, wiser forms

Certainly than they

Who went without

Picked up the devil’s way

With unearthly explosions

Without a thought

The brain shellacked with scorn

And counting people

Like matchsticks,

Too ready to burn

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Though death is complicated

Murder, more so

And those of us in sunshine

Have to learn

Yes, certainly remember

Be smarter for the future

That arrives each day

Becomes the present

In which we clump the ash

Plant it, hope for

Fine returns

In crops and beauty

Sustenance that will destroy

Sin’s purpose

Hate’s agenda

Turn over like the soil

On which we stand

And where those of us

Still here—and we are here—

Must grow

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coda

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There have fires elsewhere

Many parts burn now

Inside the head

And through our hearts

Piercing the abdomen

On which our other organs sit

We should not forget

The hungry and the powerless

Who have food and will withheld

All the rescuing required

God and our better parts

Bless them and keep them

All the rescuers

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C L Couch

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Photo by Ben Lei on Unsplash

9/11 Memorial, New York City, USA

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Wishing, and There’s a Horse

(x = space)

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Wishing, and There’s a Horse

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It’s as if

The lower clouds

Muffle the sounds we make

Below

I don’t know if that’s the physics of it

Or simply a sensation

Only on the inside

A guess and a conclusion,

Based on wishful thinking

I hope it’s a good day for you

You deserve it

And it’s time

Because for now

(barring time travel

like the stories’)

Everything is forward,

And I want a forward day for you

Where is

All the opportunity

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C L Couch

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Photo by Annika Treial on Unsplash

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