gifted
I’d like to give you each
a present
though I’m poor
and not the kind of poverty
that saints admire
for I have little
mystic understanding
and what I have
is tied
to nothing like
how much
how little
I have
I’d like to say
go slowly
as the Buddhists
say
especially
when parting
I’d like to say
remember all your loves
made up of
reason
practicality
and balance
not that passion
doesn’t count
it does
but there should be a measure
in most things
of what is right
and what is easy
(like
Jack’s pieces
well
maybe not so much)
which is
(really)
to say
let all good things
have their place
and do not rearrange
from the heaven
of creation
and the philosophy
inside all things made
for there is
certainty
as well as confusion
the way this world works
and don’t deny
the sure things
that you
and others
who are smart
and might be trusted
might ally
I’d like to say
think God
(like another movie)
though I know
that’s not enough
or I could say
love
and let love
not frilly silly
(‘til the day)
but steady
and trustworthy
have its say
and guide
however trite it sounds
each day
I guess
some things are cliché
like the way we use
iconic
meaning not a symbol
but celebrity
believe
and love
so common
(a cliché)
and yet maybe
we can still ourselves
and our sophistications
to accept
that some things
important things
the most important things
are commonplace
no secrets
no requirements
but to accept
what is instilled
(installed
as it were)
within internal palaces
or offices
or bungalows
(I’ll take a wooded cabin)
in the mind
in what we call the heart
in what really is
the spirit
might be
an alliance of the spirits
one by one
within
between
our groups
our nations
for an errant world
on its quest
our quest
to grow
to acquire
and to save
good things
and we could have rituals
and easiness
(not mindlessness)
in what passes
from the Earth of now
into
the next
of now
c l couch
photo by Luca Pennacchioni on Unsplash
time and temporality
(for dreamers and for planners)
we look
we hear
we wonder
as we wander
like the song
out under the sky
or being still
having gone nowhere
perforce
or by design
the need to have some time
an hour or a day
in which we do not move
but traverse everything
inside
and inside
where shall we go
what shall we
hear
what shall we
see
what shall we smell
or get a taste of
what is the other sense
what shall we taste
though we may
also travel throughout
time
slip into other states of being
as our possibilities
visit other worlds
that we make
for moments
that never happened
though we may go there
for the possibility
the changes
the resolutions
never having taken place
except there
in what we visit
on the inside
that time and life
under the sun
never allowed
waking issues
that are not solved
out here
but we should
do this
this is good
a friend of mine might say
about ideas
when we planned things
together
in the day
this added time to dream
might engender
visions
three dimensions
only
but good experiences for
our constituencies
starting with
those of
one
then two
and who’s to say
the dimension of the spirit
or the spirits
will not be joining us
the outer life
the inner life
somehow touched and satisfied
through dreaming and
then
through waking
c l couch
I wonder as I wander, out under the sky,
how Jesus the Savior did come for to die
for poor ordinary people like you and like I;
I wonder as I wander, out under the sky.
adapted by John Jacob Niles
photo by Ferdinand Stöhr on Unsplash
"Sunset in Vancouver"
all saints day
saints small s
every day is their
followers
of God
who try
both to believe
and to act
patronage
of nothing in particular
no groups
claim our own
but the
relative
ease and simplicity
without notoriety
or beads
or rituals
simply leave it
to faith and action
anyone
believing
anyone who tries
a life of faith
with flaws
the Holy Spirit
will provide
kintsugi
c l couch
photo by Motoki Tonn on Unsplash
(x = space)
x
x
Time and Again
(for J. R. R. T. in the birthday month)
x
Sometimes
We know it’s happening
Far away
By powerful people
National leaders
Soldiers with weapons firing
Or
A catastrophe
That has not befallen us
Specifically
And like parades
We know they and these are passing by
x
Sometimes it’s here
Still not for us
Our role might be
To observe
Or like the chorus
Comment on events
But this is not our stage
We are not the players
Not the principles,
At least
When there is news
We will know more
x
Sometimes it is our time
The light might be on us
Maybe not
But it is our time
The actions
And the consequences
Our place in the world
To secure
x
Perhaps I mean
The deaths of kings
(inclusive)
Then a fire in another part
Of town
Then maybe no more than
A birthday celebration
To have with grace
And thanks
x
Or maybe our time
Is more important
However to us
It seems
To the people
To the planet
To the cosmos
Believe me or not,
It could happen
x
It happened to the hobbit
Most of us are hobbits
Even without the provenance
Or wealth
(before the treasure is acquired)
Of Bagginses
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by Look Up Look Down Photography on Unsplash
Hobbiton, Mata Mata, New Zealand
x
(x = space)
x
x
From the Margin to the Center
(Charles III)
x
He said it in his speech
Bring the marginal
To the center
They might need rides
And smart, official people left behind
To assess the situation
x
They need to come
Angry, surly
Cynical and hopeful
Their pain needs to be understood
Not so much talked about
x
They’ll need a promise
Not assurances
The weight of a contract
And a moral contract
As if made with the ground
The promisers are standing on
x
God help the British king
To bring back
The table round
And a belief of might for right
As classically expressed
Though contemporary lived
Policy
And money
Where they matter
x
England is still post-war
And inside war
And must be ready still for another
But all the lonely people
Isolated like the wanderer
In an ice age that was once the north
Of need,
The people need companionship
And energy
Ways to live feasibly
As an island nation
As the English,
Each one
And together
x
Don’t talk
(anyone)
So much next time
As act
God save the king
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by Anna Dziubinska on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
The Way Love Is
(Martin Luther King, Junior)
x
Today is the Monday
We set aside
To honor
Martin Luther King, Junior
Whose birthday
Is close by
He is not honored for
Perfection
But for testimony
In words and action
To the truth
That we are equal
And together we can change
The world
For the better
x
He was a minister
Though anyone
Who acts to change
The world
For the better
Is a
Symbol of God
His name was not
At first
Martin Luther
(talk with his father),
But anyone
Who speaks
To truth in love
Is truly on the roll
Of heaven
x
We need truth-talking
And truth-acting
We need to be
Encouraged
We need to act
Together
The children of
Earth for the
Now, the next
Children of
The Earth
x
C L Couch
x
x
Landscape
Photo by Vincent van Zalinge on Unsplash
Oostvaardersplassen, Lelystad, Netherlands
x
(x = space)
x
x
It Might Be Magic
x
Do you eschew
Institutions?
I do, anymore
The machines
Made out of people
Don’t blame the
Bureaucrats:
They operate
What others made
A breaking efficiency
In copper and in
Oil replaced by
Split atoms, unleaded
Gasoline and now
Other fuels
x
The early price
Was trees
And iron from the earth
Water unafraid
Unplastic skies
That might storm
But otherwise
Were trusted
x
Press agents lie
Because they forward
An agenda
They were told
Beyond the news
To promulgate
Or else
Lose their jobs
The heroes and the villains
All are mixed
Or so it seems
Because they’re not
x
We are blended
Creatures now,
It’s true
Nothing of persisting,
Edenic status
Has existed for a while
And in our
Reconstituting state
Generations are confused
x
Hamas has launched
Three thousand rockets
Into Israel
That fights with
More sophistication
Missiles from planes
And from the ground
More of us
Are good at war, these days
x
I read the city paper
In the morning
To find out who has
Shot or otherwise killed
Whom
Or who preaches
On Hyde-Park boxes
That it should rain hate
Should we have our way
x
There is an answer,
So many traditions
Espouse
It’s a good thing
And nothing new,
Ancient of ages
But statues will have to
Have their clay feet
Scraped out
Then with something better
Slid into place
And shaped
While the rest of us
The citizens, the voters
Hold the upper parts
The structures of society
In place
x
See,
Nihilism is not the answer
Nor to fire agencies
Especially with fire
We can keep
The inefficiencies
Of efficiency,
The inexactness
That comforts us
Knowing the machine
Is never all
But flesh and blood
And synapse
And our loves
Matter more
x
Next chapter,
All yours
It might be magic
But it’s not:
It’s mortal hands
Moved by mortal hearts
x
C L Couch
x
x
In the Line of Fire
Photo by Christopher Burns on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
Through and Through
x
Francis would say
I think
That God is in the split
Between the seasons
x
That God knows
When it happens
And is there
To bless
The ending,
The beginning
x
The solstice has passed:
God bless the solstice
x
God bless new time
As gift
And chance
To get it right,
To let the garden
Sleep where
In Eden
Seeds of love were sown
x
We rest over this
And what may grow,
Some of which
Say half,
Say maybe more,
Is our side of the promise
With the gardeners
x
Keepers
Turned farmers outside
And warriors
And slaves
And liberators
x
Inventors,
Criminals,
And movement-starters
x
So much has happened
In the seasons;
Here’s a season now
x
Decide,
Go to it
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by John Hult on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
To Pilgrim
(at Thanksgiving, USA)
x
Pilgrims
On Thanksgiving
x
We make fun
Of their hats
And buckles
x
They might as well
Have been a foreign
People to the
(rest of the)
Whites as all the
Indigenous to
The whites
x
And they were:
They were a foreign
People
x
They carried faith
And dignity,
Faith in dignity,
To what all the western
Coastal, European
People called
A new world
x
Through stratagem
Or accident, they
Settled too far
North
x
They struggled;
They strove
x
Everything was
Struggling and
Striving to them
x
Moving, going
On their way
x
For them, to be
A pilgrim was
An action
x
On a journey
Neverending, ‘til
The end of this life
Start into another
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by Dhimas Widrayato on Unsplash
It was 22:39, I went out to get some fresh air after some coding session then I saw a big moon on the sky, so I grab my camera then go to open space to shot this picture. The photo was taken in Tangerang, Indonesia.
x
clcouch123 
Recent Comments