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Who Wins

(x = space)

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Who Wins

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An empty room

Where there might have been a meal

Smell the hope and then the fear

And here’s a garden

Pretty

There was violence here

Now the plot is done,

Everything realized

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Another foe

Who sought to shift the blame

From Rome to us

Our need to have an enemy

To stoke our places

In tradition

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The others should be caught

The followers

No hurry

The serpent is now headless

Only nerves remain

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The world has won

And we are glad

Our own strategy to overthrow

Goes back into a box

In which there is less silver

To count

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An easy price

To pay

For indolence

Now back to lethargy

We have time

And everything is scheduled quiet

Scheduled noise

Again

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C L Couch

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Photo by Daniel Katz on Unsplash

Masada

Lookout through ancient Masada building.

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Good for Someone

(x = space)

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Good for Someone

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He cried out,

Then death was quiet

Silencing everything

At last

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And was there keening,

I think so

For a time

Then silence imposed

By Jerusalem,

By Rome

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The Earth exhausted,

Unknowing  silence

That was a matter of salvation:

Now we say not dead

But sleeping

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Sin is quiet

For a time

(for three days)

Waiting

Wondering about

What will happen next,

What it should

Do

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Sin awaits

A guideline

Now that

God is dead

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Should there be smirking

Or a party by

The gates of hell

While Earth

And all humanity must wait,

Though we must think it’s over

Why might we think

Something new

Should happen now?

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We forget our stories

Let go all prophecy

We had our

King for a day

The welcome of a hero

Who has died with open wounds

Somehow bleeding

For the rest of us

New ritual

Or sacrifice of old

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A burial is proper,

If hurried

To be done by sunset,

Sunset all;

Wounded and sleeping

Earth is covered over

With a stone,

Setting a guard to

Keep it all that way

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Cruelty is tired

Everything must sleep

For a while, now

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C L Couch

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Photo by kyle larivee on Unsplash

New England, USA

it seemed like mother nature wanted to spotlight this fellow

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In Antioch

(x = space)

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In Antioch

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I walked by the campus

A few times

While visiting

In Yellow Springs

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I didn’t belong there

Though I wish I could:

A progressive place,

Sometimes angry

Famously

But with tradition

And understanding

Of good doctrine

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I’d like the hope

Of being there

In this week my sect

Calls holy

On a dark day

‘Cause the sun has gone away

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In Antioch,

They were first called Christians

Rather than followers

Of the Way

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The Way might have been

Better,

Less restrictive,

More inviting

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Not a club but a direction,

Not a t-shirt

But sandals and a walking stick

For all the deserts

Whose borders

We might come upon

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C L Couch

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Actions of the Apostles 11:26 (Christian New Testament)

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Antioch College, Yellow Springs, Ohio (USA)

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By Bernard Gagnon – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=12045971

Ancient Roman road located in Syria which connected Antioch and Chalcis.

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The Bridge to Thursday

(x = space)

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The Bridge to Thursday

(Holy Week)

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It is the middle of Holy Week

Who’s noticing

Who cares

Those huddled in churches

Mouthing with the pastor

Liturgies and litanies

All the holy words

And since it’s near enough

To Lent, there might be no

Communion,

Even practicing for Easter

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Some of the fun churches

(there are those)

Will bless baskets on Saturday;

All sorts of folk with

All sorts of baskets

Containing elements for

Sunday dinner

Will be there

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On the Friday before,

There will veneration

While on Thursday

An official working out

Of some kind

For the Last Supper

And the “maundy” part

Of Maundy Thursday

A command (mandatum)

To love one another,

Good reminder

For starting out the Triduum—

Or the rest

Of one’s

Of a church’s life

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But today is Wednesday

Nothing to see here

Or hear or taste or touch

No smell of

Incense, either

Wednesday doesn’t rate

Another hump day

In the USA,

Anywhere else that arches

The week that way

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Calm before the storm?

Hardly

There are storms, here and there

As happen

(one is brewing

outside the window),

There are the hungry

Who need big pieces of baked bread

And safe water

And more-real food

In order to sit up

Straight in church

For the coming days

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Feed the children

Feed each other

This would make a Wednesday, a

Holy Wednesday in a holy week

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C L Couch

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Photo by yvo bergers on Unsplash

Maastricht, Nederland

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But If the Numbers Lie

(x = space)

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But If the Numbers Lie

(they don’t)

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We thought we’d wait a year

Though we did it badly

We’d rather believe conspiracies

That allow us to travel

Go to bars

And live virtuously

In neighborhoods

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We didn’t take the year

In fact

And now numbers are increasing

There should be little wonder

Undeserved curiosity

About the sick and dying

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So back up now

Go the other way

We know the options for belief

But by now we know the dead

And could take a chance

On caution

And on care

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C L Couch

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Are there choices in belief?  Absolutely.  And options for our actions.  And I wonder if we might love our neighbor, then we could side with caution and prevention and, yes, inconvenience.  For now, I think it must be an inconvenient world.

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Photo by Alexander Grigoryev on Unsplash

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Looks

(x = space)

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Looks

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Pale sky

As if in compromise

To give late-winter earth

A chance to show itself

Turning slowly

Into spring

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C L Couch

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Photo by Biegun Wschodni on Unsplash

Blooming saffrons in the mountains.

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The Potentate of Time

(x = space)

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The Potentate of Time

(for Palm Sunday)

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We might sing about

Crowning with many crowns

Jerusalem the holy city

Maybe in England

About dark, Satanic mills

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It’s a gaudy day

With fronds flapping up and down

Carried by children

Sometimes into service

A favorite exercise of mine

To make crosses out of stems

To lean against windows

Or tuck inside picture frames

For the coming year

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It’s a good day

When people act as if

They like church

And each other,

And some of that might

Rub off into truth

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The church’s nemesis

These days being itself

A day of green neutrality

Might do a world of good

Before the world goes dim

And creaks and moans

In bearing all the weight

Of Passion remembrance

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C L Couch

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“Crown Him with Many Crowns,” Christian hymn written by Matthew Bridges, 1851

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Photo by Vladimir Proskurovskiy on Unsplash

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Convictions

(x = space)

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Convictions

(last day of Lent)

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I look around at everything

Liturgically, it is the day before

A triumph

Such as Roman victors knew

No wonder Herod was frightened

And Pilate tactically

Concerned

None of it was sanctioned

It spoke to rebellion

Though everything was peaceful

In that way

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I look around

And wonder about everyone

How to celebrate an arrival

And then turn on the one

A few days later

Or however long it took

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I want to say I’m sorry

I look around at everything

And say I’m sorry

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C L Couch

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Photo by MAURICIO EJCHEL on Unsplash

Jerusalém, Israel

Traditional loaf salesman at Old Town in Jerusalem.

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You before Me

(x = space)

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You before Me

(for everyone)

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You’re in line

In front of me for friendship

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We’ve been here

For an age

And hear the hits,

One hit at a time,

Behind us

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To feel the hit

Anonymous

Then know by instinct

Now

(it’s how the world works)

To strike the person

Back of the head in front

Anonymous (we’ll

get away with it)

And then receive

The things,

What people say

We’re due

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In a line of greed

Even for an age,

Someone must turn first

To receive the slap

Looking into the face

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Then the forward movement

Stops and painless

Possibilities considered

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It’s risky

Being hit so hard

(regulations say each

must hit hard),

But all good things are chances;

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Life might end for me

Or in part,

Begin for you

And everyone

Ahead of you

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C L Couch

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Photo by Srivatsa Sreenivasarao on Unsplash

Four Birds and Reflections

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