A
my friend is diagnosed
it’s only
at the start
and
there are other things
like how I breathe in
infestation
or who is killing whom in Iran
Palestine
Ukraine
and
Yemen
to mention all the volatility in so many lands
that
do not
take the grace to get along
but he is
sick
and it’s a creeping kind
that works its way
well
through nervous
systems
I suppose
and should take years
and
then take the time of living and
and of waiting
here
c l couch
photo by Chris Ried on Unsplash
“Halogen filled blown glass forming a brilliant structure which was installed at the Cheekwood Gallery in Nashville, TN”
if only these lines
words and beats to know someone
gathered here and now
c l couch
photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash
made with Canon 5d Mark III and loved analog lens, Leica APO Macro Elmarit-R 2.8 100mm (year: 1993)
[“loved lens”]
In the image is a rendering in English of a sentence that is a litmus for typing skill and speed: “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.”
love your enemies and pray for those who persecute
we pray out of need
out of
love
and that love extends by prayer
and then by action
to our enemies
even
the active persecutors
and we are not asked to take part in s and m
but
to go for healthy if serving
and sacrificial
and that seems a mystery
I guess
for which the Bible offers precedent
even
as paradox
but there is need
and
there is
prayer
yes
for thanksgiving and other
reasons
too
prayer for the friendly people
also
thus for each and every
as
needs press
we ask
then
move in the world
say
as wise as
serpents
and as gentle as doves
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Matthew 5:44, 10:16, also Psalm 65:3, Proverbs 24:17 (and, you know, verses and passages around)
photo by iso topon on Unsplash
maybe I drafted this because I need reminding not of the suggestion but direction
each message
we are called
might be in silence
yet
by some sense
spoken to
a message left for each
to open
when we and life
are
ready
only enough
and not
to wait ‘til all conditions
perfections done
but rather to find
by
whatever state
the sender waiting
on
the other side
of interference or inhibition
by a wall
or
door
the dark glass
or our own orneriness
to find
the sener
waiting
for
the chance for either side
to open
and
to greet and
to try
c l couch
photo by Studio Pizza on Unsplash
to near
nearer
my God
to thee
line-making by me
speaking to God
a prayer
this is the aim of the singer
and the sayer
same folk
together though for those who fear one’s singer
could read or hear
and
share along
which counts as prayer
as
worrying over what may count
should
go
there is mention of a cross on the way
or I guess
to
finish it and a rock cited for
rest
while yet on Earth
then to find that everything’s renewed by
the greater faith
that we
acknowledge
and
through salvation join
which is by
will
and what is near is imminent
for
concern or for jubilation
an attitude that’s
set by
choice and then by
eventual
to wait
as one who’s
still
and also one who serves
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“Nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!”—first line of the hymn, from which the title’s taken (the poem was written, arranged, and published in the middle 1800s)
the hymn was reported by survivors of the Titanic to be the last hymn played by the ship’s ensemble
photo by Moritz Mentges on Unsplash
1 Nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!
E'en though it be a cross that raiseth me,
still all my song shall be,
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!
2 Though like the wanderer, the sun gone down,
darkness be over me, my rest a stone;
yet in my dreams I'd be
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!
. . .
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
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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
the speculation
that God is love
and somehow that is wise
a God
to have
that world will make fun of and
withhold promotion
for the sake
of itself
against the virtue
yet
the way to live
when necessary
to profess
alone to make a job of it
or
finding friends
and so
inside the world
to hear God
and
fashion love
like sculpture or an E-I report
to credit God in all
however
large
or
small or seeming odd to credit
and through any jeer
or
other barrier
to hold fast and better yet
assail
the world with love
knowing the gates of hell
at first and by the last
shall not
prevail against it
rather by
Amor vincit omnia
to live
and wait as in to anticipate and
also
true and imperfectly
to serve
c l couch
photo by Alexander Kaufmann on Unsplash
not safe but good
sigh
what’s to keep expression of anything
from ranting in
frustration
even to sound virtuous
and
winsome
as dark forces look attractive
by temptation
as
a strategy for falling
for knocking down by fear or envy
or both
as it is
and yet there is good in the world
not
that it’s good but there are pockets
there are corners
there is
here and there with some
and could be
more
to let out hounds who yap for joy of running
farther out
and
further on
really
there is
love
that nature in the smaller ways
has taught
and is the marker and
the guide
could seem like that signpost up
ahead
or
not a twilight zone so much
rather the lamppost into
Narnia
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photo by Giacomo Leandri on Unsplash
gray building’s angles
trying shapeless loneliness
round peg in square hole
[prompt is the photograph]
Canada on fire
so many serve and rescue
feathered hope in rain
[prompt is the haze outside]
photo by Alexander Kaufmann on Unsplash
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