reasoning
(a prayer)
O God
Oh
God
(invocating
supplicating)
how are you
in our lives
how do your angels
work in dialogue
between
two sets of wills
your will
so elastic
as to have us
mess it up through
discretion
or what seems perhaps
an accident
or random thing
from us
and yet your will
predominate
your cosmic will
and will for all your spirits
made
and always
from the beginning
ending
and beginning
and everything between
so how shall we have our days
our hours
in ourselves
not pawns
but active players
in some plan of yours
one plan
and all of us
somehow
as parts
yet what we do
must matter
from the inside
to the outside
even the outermost
and is it miracle
or an extraordinary
definition
of happenstance
or some other medium
in which
we move
and have our being
and our choices
matter
they are valued
they turn into
the ultimate reality
and for our judgment
into paradise
how does that work
what stretches
most
within your will
that becomes a point of doctrine
for our lives
a code
for our discretion
well
what we know
is what we know
that our choices
make a difference
in a universe
of shared presence
manifested
so you choose
so I choose
so we chose
not in a vacuum
but some substance
our of
everything that’s real
the real
that is material
divine
individual
and overarching
if not overlording
oh
Lord
our Lord
how majestic is
your name in all the Earth
maybe an odd affirmation
(time to time)
when you
have no name
being I am
we have names
we have bodies
we have spirits
we have choices
and all of it
has value
part of your way
that goes in every
direction
where solidity
and spirituality
have room
for a plan
we don’t know part of
but in whom we are
the stake
we decide
we could always
learn the rules
(they are in many sources
universally)
then go so far as
to obey
c l couch
Psalm 8:9
photo by Árpád Czapp on Unsplash
(x = space)
x
x
Gospel According to Today
x
The gospel for today
Is pick something
Choose something like a star
Says Frost
Or enter through time’s wrinkle
Teaches L’Engle
Who taught us to type this way?
They have names
And objects as names
They are the first typewriter
Makers, manufacturers,
And agents
Not bad people
How would we have got this far?
x
Forget them all today
Go outside
And listen for good news
Type it on your minds
Let your tongues be pages
As you tell
Others
What is wonderful
And challenging
And terrible
And potential
In the day
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by alyssa teboda on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
Victory at Sea
x
The sadness
That so much is done,
So much never started
But then I’d want
Eternity here and now
Everything
All possibilities
From which to choose
And choose again
To get it right
x
Would that Earth
Could turn peacefully
So that choices might
Be made from
Wisdom and from joy
x
But too many
Steal podiums to say
Beat the other side,
Don’t hesitate
To shoot
x
The second problem is
That hate will shoot back,
And when our
Magazines are empty
There is only peace
In death, that is,
Lives taken
x
Sibling murder
We pretend the other
Is not human
But a target for our rage,
For demon-stoked
Disapproval
x
This is so the world is mine,
Rendered in my own image
With death the medium
x
Would that
Famous people
Would shut up
And listen to the Earth
For a while
Then listen to us,
Which is nearly all of us
x
Pain, thirst
All kinds of ideas
And agendas
Find them
Find the stories
Hear them
x
Let change happen
Speak to it
Let peace prevail
And every other goodness
x
Favorite recipes
Homemade holidays
Comfortable shoes
Barefoot where the Earth
Is welcoming
x
We welcome each other
Sparing the lives that only
Insanity demands
And criminality
x
There is little more to say
Stop destroying
Leave self-righteousness to God
From whom we can learn about
Justice
And safe water
And living as if everything
Is home
For everyone
x
C L Couch
x
The title is taken from a TV series about bravery in war. Music by Richard Rodgers.
To be at sea also means to be adrift. Wanting to head for home.
(Not that the ship in the image is adrift, as in having no control. I don’t know. The ship looks lonely, though.)
x
Photo by Javier Balseiro on Unsplash
x
Half-Shut
It’s Sunday, and I’m tired
Somewhere the Gospel’s being read
And someone’s teaching from it
Good words, I’d like to think
I am here and writing differently about
A story that won’t be read in church
Not to sour-grape it
I don’t mind the anonymity
My story’s sad and uninspiring, unless
One needs to hear about
A mundane struggle, mostly secular
The seeking of good news inside one’s head
Though it’s not there
Not in the neighbor’s heart, either
It’s in the book
It’s in the neighbor’s heart
It’s in my head
(My heart, too)
But I have to hear
With two sets of ears that hear
In case the first set’s not so functional
(If you didn’t know, the deaf tend
To hear better)
Until something is opened
Nothing is going to happen
That’s the capacity that’s missing
And the action
They are there
It’s simple access, really
Like most things, altruism, sympathy,
Or sacrifice,
It’s made
It happens
With a choice
And on a tired day
When Sunday best is not enough
(It rarely is)
When the soul is split between awakening
Or remain embraced within the monolith
Half-shut is still half-open
And sides are being called for
Final play
Choose this day
Choose, this day
C L Couch

image courtesy of Charlotte Zoller
https://www.mfa.org/programs/music/millennium-gospel-choir-1
Whistling
Today we need to save the world
Because we don’t know how
We sit in the dark, a fine day for crucifixion
We betray all elements
In chosen ignorance of how to fix things
Not to those who know better
Who have the technicalities
Each of us in normalcy must choose
To save the world
Our own heroes in a comic book
And like those stories,
Our local universe is at stake
C L Couch
Better
I don’t know much about the world
It seems
I wish it were better
I’m offended
And I’m angry
Who really wants to care?
We have other things to do, less
Pandering to moods
Chosen when something more promising
Could be selected
Another code pressed on the emotion
Vending machine
I wonder maybe we have a number of tokens
And then the rest are gone
For deciding badly
For too-small convictions
When being noble in an un-ranked way
Would make the difference
Would light the factories
Would illuminate
Pockets and portals of prosperity
Nether (never) world
Intentions hide
Give it a chance
A two-step beneath the table
Smiling for no reason
Than
The joy in dawn-split morning
Or romantic night
The splendid times when
In spite of rusted gags and
Chains
Joy breaks free
an opinion expressed potently
in a White House meeting about
murdered Blacks, the living
marginalized—here’s my response
Black Life Matters
Do I even need to say it
Yes, I do
My best friend was Black
He died too young—
Complications from surgery
What a teacher
And a humorist as well
At least, to me
I am not Black, part
Native American according
To a family historian,
Which is good, though
Looking at me, I doubt
That you could tell
I am not female; I am
The enemy: an older,
White male
I eschewed the ol’-boy
Invitation and have
Often paid the price
Not in my life (though
Maybe there, too)
But in my work
In which I’ve lost the
Favored political place
Maybe each one has
A circle drawn around
From fear and politics
Leaving that (or never
Entering) means that
Protection from the
Core is not available
And some measure of
Persecution too easily
Is acted on
“Loving Engagement”
From a better Black-drawn
Circle of union and
Society change—I don’t
Know if I’ll be let in,
Resembling and, appropriately
(Regrettably), perceived
I’d stay in the back
And write my verse
In which I argue that
All are free
And should be free
That to usurp the job of
God in assessing human
Worth is about as wrong
As this world can get
Black folk (Black discourse
Uses that word; and,
Being from Kentucky, I like
Folk and folks, though I’d
Change the old state-song
Lyrics, too)—Black folk are
Self-determining, of course
I cringe to have to make the
The claim, as all persons,
Being made, are free and
Free to choose
Psalm 17
a difficult song about mourning
Lord, how do we mourn
in a free land? How do
we allow atrocity and
still have the freedom
to choose? We do not
cry in empty space: but
our crying would be worse
in a revenge-wrought iron
land, where security
would be the only aim
and no one would have
open air to breathe
or drop tears for the
dead and for the living.
We must choose to
choose. Not to allow
evil or to destroy
democracy. Mourning
and breathing while we
arm, yes, and await
evil’s annihilate implosion.
For now we choose, in
a free place, to bear
the weight of death—in
nations wounded and in
the raw-split parts
of the human heart.
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