Mitzvah
God be with us
While
We’re parted
May I be good to you
As
You’ll be good
For me
May God keep us
Trusting all
Parts
Of this amenity
‘Til coming back together
For
Story-telling and
Renewal
C L Couch
Photo by charlesdeluvio on Unsplash
two poems of blessings
make me a world
the combination
old and new
forget the wineskins
(use them)
we’ll have inconsistency
in what we have
and use
old things for nostalgia
or because we say
some good left in them
then
something breaks
beyond repair
falling in with our national attitude of
disposability
moving the economy
and then
perforce
there’s new
or new because
and likely
we want something new
believing there is virtue
in a shininess
that someone else has made
that new-car smell
say
new food
certainly
from the garden that we know
so well
and count on
year by year
in the propriety
of seasons
so with age and youth
let something new
be built on
something old
and old foundation
like the Earth
itself
and there’s enough amelioration
treaty-making
for a day
having agreement that
again
bring in extremes
to love all forms
uneschewing norms averse
and plans
to build a city
or wherever
we might live in
with
and naturally
reasonably
needed diversity
the old
and new
for love
God bless and sing America
(which might mean north or south for jazz or all the rest)
I rhapsodize
without the blue
without the cool
of jazz
or jazzy notes
that Gershwin found
even
frenetically applied
so that we have
some music
for the nation
having co-invented gospel
then bringing home
with marching saints
New Orleans
then Memphis
and
Detroit
we need some music
for a country
as countries have
their own
and share
Olympically
also for normal moments
who should last a day
without some
music
and who should want
to
play on
having composed
and also improvised
then crazy-legs it
song and
dance
for all
outside with hats on ground
inside in
the ticketed way
but must be for democracy
music
free
and even
freedom-ringing
yet the gospel
emphasize
the freeing part
the part that plays
release
from tyranny
refrained
only
in freedom
composition’s
notes
we play on
c l couch
photo by Nathan Bingle on Unsplash
(x = space)
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Beatitudo
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Where did this quiet
Come from
With the light angling inside
Yellow for benediction?
It is a gift
Of spring’s first day
It is happenstance
I don’t care
I’m thankful
For the quiet
And the colors
And the benediction I’m
Taking these to be
Thanking the one who blesses
Everything
In creating
And renewing
Like green rising from brown
Made and remade
And by the way
A gift of oxygen
For us
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by Chetan Kolte on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
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benedictus
x
we could be pleased
with what we had
and sad for what is missed
we could love what there is
let go the hate for
what was taken
who took it
we could love with a love
not pure, because there’s always
imperfection
we could correct and sigh
sigh and correct over faults
x
we could love
because alternatives shall drive us
into places where
no one really wants to go
or stay
more so, we could come home
to the dwelling of our hearts
and smarter thoughts
inside the land that God more fully made
that shall remain
when the rest
the doubt, the pain, even scorn
shall fall away
while love remain
x
c l couch
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hoto by savvas kalimeris on unsplash
x
Tornado Forms and Passes Through
A tornado touched down here;
That doesn’t happen often
In the Midwest, I used to drive
Underneath funnel clouds forming
Within a sky of green and yellow
Sometimes the tornado formed
Sometimes it didn’t finish
Here there was the locomotive
Sound, and all things went awry
Gravestones lay flat upon the
Ground—parts of houses and
Other buildings rolled over
Discarded stone and memory
Roofs of schoolhouses pushed
Deep inside—the Amish will
Give to municipal authority
A list of broken property to
Be fixed in community, alone
The Red Cross Is here, while
We number what is lost,
Remembering simultaneously
What is to be thanked; for
This was a fatal happening
Yet stolid folk are quick to
Say it could have been much
Worse, because it has—retellings
From the cobwebbed past given
Anew to current, digital media
Meantime the sun remembers
To return to us a blessing now
Journaling at the Start of 5 February
Added coffee to the canister. Drank from a
Mouthwash bottle nearly empty with a full one
Beside. Same with toothpaste, when it’s time.
These small abundances matter much.
It’s a bunch of days. So the television tells me.
Something to do with weather, with a kind of
Food, and with the heart. Maybe something pre-
Valentine’s. I slept five or six hours, which is not
Enough. I slept under a throw, which is not enough
Though better than a blanket making me too hot.
Too hot in winter. (In a cold-winter clime.) That
Should be a blessing.
clcouch123 
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