must be an unholy day
the Romans hate us
which is easy
in so easy a hard
and harsh land
but our own
too
our people loathe us
hate us
people scorned within a people scorned
the larger group
too easy to be crying crucify
again
without even a Barabbas
to be freed in
irony of law
no trick for us of
politics
we shall simply be found
and ended
with the teaching
with
the message
and
somehow
maybe because we know the devil
is involved
we know the hatred isn’t Roman
is not
Judean
but something both
deeper and on the surface
temptation within
hatred expressed
in fear
in rage
a human thing
more than any group
even of
promises
or who seem to be the rulers
of the Earth
we many say
in darkness
now
the all of us killed the one
whom
came to save through reconciliation
all of us killed
one
who now is gone
and we wait
without waiting
for
who expects more after the finality
of death
not Roman
not Judean
all of us on either side
and from all sides
from
the wreckage of Eden
where
the devil also won before
finally a curse
and aren’t we all cursed
and now
enough philosophy
or
hoping something out of meditation
rather
now
we turn
we hide away
we wait for
not a thing
worth
the waiting
c l couch
for Holy (also ironic) Saturday
photo by Aleksei Agafonov on Unsplash
baruch
Yom Kippur
that I don’t fully understand
but that is happening
now
sunset Friday
to nightfall
Saturday
(which is today)
and this year
no doubt
there will be praying for the closeness
of God
upon the hostages
held by Hamas
and not by the Palestinian people
generally
the day is for repentance
to ask forgiveness of
the Lord
so that we might be restored
and reconciled
but something I’ve been told is that
the day before
Erev Yom Kippur
is a day for asking forgiveness
of each other
we forgive each other
and then
we may ask forgiveness of God
ten days for repentance
actually
between Rosh Hashanah and
now
the Christian doctrinal story
is about
leaving one’s gift before the altar
to go
make up with one’s sibling
(should
there be conflict)
and thus being
truly
prepared
even according to priorities
to go to
present at the altar
to have time
with the Lord
and be open to fullest forgiveness
forgive each other first
then ask
forgiveness of God
I think that’s how the teaching goes
in two traditions
maybe more
I don’t
know
I could be wrong
of course
But might God bless
the devout
on Yom Kippur
and
direct us all toward
reconciliation
c l couch
photo by Jeanne Rouillard on Unsplash
Prayer for Me and Everyone
(and everyone who needs to pray this way)
O God
Our help
Help me
Keep me safe
And sane enough
For jazz
Or really
For the world
Largely indifference
But with those
As we say
(as I say)
Who’d just as soon
Cheat you
As smile at you
(who cheat you
first
by smiling
at you)
Really
Though
I need your company
And to feel it
Please
As companionship
If I may ask
Not so much
As a judge
Even though you are
And shall
And woe to me
When that business
Comes
And
Yes
I’m thinking
Like the Amish farmer
Who when asked
If saved
Replied
For all this faith
And service
I hope so
And I hope so
Though there is a world
That needs you
Even for orneriness
And even
Scorn
And hatred
For the differences
It fears
While some of us find
Difference
Interesting
And how did I evolve
This way
Conservative
Yet believing
In the prismatic way
One light becomes
Well
Help me
Lord
Please
I am too poor
Without resources
To do much
But I am I
Such as that is
And it seems
According to doctrine
And the smallest
Mustard-seed
Like
Miracles that happen
You persist
Somehow perfectly
In loving me
And keeping me
And I’d like to ask
And will
About my friends
By blood
And choice
And happenstance
And for a world
That’s cracked
And losing air
To please give everyone
A chance
And then another
We need you
In unknowing
We are a cloud of witnesses
If a stormy
One
You made
And let become
Over ages
Where is Eden now
Where are the rivers
And the perfect
Vegetation
And shall
We ever
Know such things again
As at the start
If that
The angel on assignment
Could step down
And lowering
The sword on fire
Raise the other arm
Then say
The trialing time is over
Welcome back
C L Couch
Photo by NASA Hubble Space Telescope on Unsplash
it is Wear Red Day
locally
it is a “Heart” day
I am told
(with all the viewers)
wear red
remember
who’s researching
how to live with
all the troubles
that might happen
to this muscle
also
standing
(symbolizing)
for so much
National Wear Red Day
especially for women
who tend to go unidentified
as victims
of heart trouble
the day
this day
is also the centennial
of the American Heart Association
so much research
so much funding
for research
and also teaching
learning how often
this might happen to women
inside women
(yes
inside men
and don’t I know)
but the symptoms
can go differently
so differently
and she
and those for she
should know
identify
and react so fast
when these might happen
to her
red day
we are red
today
and red means oxygen
which all bodies
should take in
to nourish all our parts
with freedom
though when impeded
we need
red help
the symbol
raising money
and awareness
and our hopes
starting here
with her
with him
then to the world
with all the hearts
heart-lives
out there
out here
c l couch
(and, yes, it’s been the time for Imbolc and Candlemas and Saint Brigid and the groundhog did not see his (Phil’s) shadow—and these mean more than we may know for how we observe and take part in our seasons and also all our days
but women suffer from not only heart disease but from lack of awareness of symptoms and then what to do
while heart disease kills all of us more than any other reason such as cancer or crime)
photo by Nick Fewings on Unsplash
Count and Serve the Days
(for Martin Luther King, Junior, Day)
Four score
And fifteen years ago
A person was brought forth
Into the human world
To change that world
His clothing
As he wore them
When grown-up
Are on display
At least they were
Last time I was in Atlanta
So that we could see them
See he was a person
Not a giant
Not bearing metal armor
Though he had a strength
And for a while a protection
While others felt
Stronger and protected
With him
He was a pastor
He was named for
The first Protestant reformer
And he took steps
And got many
To take steps
To change things
That too many folk
Believed
Could not be changed
And he took on
The attitude
That not changing things
Was good
For the society
(a part)
That believed
The dominance arising
From not changing
Kept things good
Even though
Things were not so good
Protests
Marches
Covering details
With rides
And meals
The words that encourage
That could not always
Be counted on
For softness
For the wrongness to change
Was hard
And difficult
And broke many lives upon it
So strength was needed
Out of prison
Out of reason
In all persuasion
For all
Of humanity
That
Yes
It was time to dream
It was also time to move
Through the world we have
The time we have
To make things
Better
Make things fair
For everyone
Uncommitted to an evil way
Because everyone
(everyone else)
Deserves a voice
And to be heard
And everyone
Should have a turn
In which there is
Justice
And through which
Should there be an opportunity
To live
To grow
To believe
To vote
To be busy in one’s work
And delight in play
He served the faith
He served the people whom he knew
As well as
So many strangers
Finally
The human world
Out of Selma
Out of Birmingham
Our of Montgomery
With his family
That goes on
And his
Many
Many
Friends
And acquaintances
I cannot help but think
About the night he spent
In jail
As have spent
So many believers
And protesters
And did he surrender
For this
And all barriers
Set up to siege his conscience
And his hope
Seems not
For out of that experience
And all such similar
Experiences
He dreamed
He wrote
He shared his thoughts
Before
During
And after
So that there was a cause
And a cause
Articulated
We have those words now
We have the pledge to change
To take it
Or leave down
But it is there
And
You know
For everyone
For the famous
And the not-so
Most of us who do
Only small things
But change the day
And altogether
Change the world
Because
You know
Change is endemic
It is human
It is spiritual
If need be
We have our aging cells
To prove it
If change
Then change
For the better
Starting
With the smaller
Hearing the larger
And supporting
As we hear
His words
As with progenitors
Successors
Happy Birthday
Martin Luther King
Junior
On fifteen January
Starting in 1929
And for the ages
And even
For
Into
Eternity
C L Couch
Martin Luther King Day is tomorrow, 15 January 2024
Photo by Frederic Bourbeau on Unsplash
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
Form
x
God
I love you
Even though
I’m unsure of the terms
Or attitude
How to be both
Obeisant and
Democratic
x
See
You’re a monarch
Absolute ruler
Of the universe
(more than He-Man
or She-Ra)
While for now
To mortal lives
You’re also
Frankly
Invisible
x
I may say
You’re in the wind
Your fingerprints the bark
On trees
And all the patterns
Helix
Hexagons
The nautilus
In nature
x
We may say there’s evidence
I may say
And I believe
The wonder inside everything
Indicating
A wonder-maker
x
And there are words for you
As you speak
To Adam
Eve
And prophets
Though you tend so speak
Through agencies
Especially after Eden
Still
We say your words
Which is all right
For me
x
You are layered
Through the books
And we must read
And listen
Let it sink
Through layers
Into our own deep places
Reemerging
Into peace
And promise
x
We are surprised by joy
x
But who are you
And how are you
An image
In what ways
x
And how are you
Today
x
How is it to know you
And to live with you
Really
We wake to a clock
And then what
Should happen
x
There are domestic
Possibilities
When Jesus says
To wash and comb
x
When mourning
To offer in the temple
Our poorer
Open selves
Then give
What for each of us
Corresponds to the
Widow’s mite
x
We know you count the hair
Track the falling sparrow
Offer bread
When sinners offer stones
Plus you prodigally receive
Whenever we return
From profligacy
Spending our inheritance
The gifts you gave
And what we have
From the world
All gone
And only we are left
As shells
Needing frankly
Food and water
x
And then you give us
Feasts
While the righteous and the stern
Glower
While serving
x
There is that stream
Of course
We wander by
So I guess you somehow do that
And in some form
So we might walk
Together
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by Luke Ellis-Craven on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
Sing Earth and Celebrate
x
Shall we celebrate
Shall
We dance
Or tap affirmative
While sipping
To the side?
x
It is an open day
Sky for a ceiling
Though we can make canopies
And later
Light candles
For the bugs
(I mean citronella
or the like
safely
not to kill them
but keep them away
where they might dance
in dark
safe places)
x
Unsure about the music
We could argue
For
A bit of everything
And as for food
Can start with stones
Then
Enter friendly rivalry
For dishes from
Here
Or there
x
There should be
Volume
For talking
And volume as enough
For everyone
And let the children sleep
Near
Or under
Tables
To which
And for whom we brought
Sleeping rolls and mattresses
x
And
Yes
There might be plots
In the dark
Remembering
Our traitors were invited
Too
But
Try to be friendly
People
We will have had
This one chance
For Earth
On Earth
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by Louis Reed on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
2 poems about ecumenicity
x
x
Many Things to Make
(nothing like a rant but a ramble)
x
And there are other great traditions, too,
About which I know next
To nothing
Remembering the Gulf War when
Some of us felt ecumenical
And took part in gatherings of Christians,
Jews, and Muslims
Where I got to hear the testimonies
Of the followers of each
And who they were as persons
And believers
x
There was a young woman
Of Islam
Who articulately smoothly,
Even beautifully
That who knew her better than her parents
With regard for her
And so who better to arrange
A marriage for her?
x
And I was convinced
And I disagree
And there was beauty in the
Disagreement, too
x
Doubting that we changed much
Of anything—there
Was still a war, and our young
People left to fight—but
In the moments
Of these hours
There were the points of light
The President then
Had been asking for
Inside the nation
x
There is so much more
To learn
About my neighbors
In the nation
And the world:
Who are the believers?
What do they believe?
What is the story of their faith?
Might they respect
The disagreements, too,
So that our world
Has a chance
To survive
To prosper
To believe
So that with integrity
We might reach for another world,
Too?
x
Pray the world lasts
Until we meet upon Megiddo
Not to fight
But have a meal,
Exchange apocalypse in faithful terms
And human
For a conclave
And a celebration
Of each other
x
x
Reasonably
x
Most of us believe
And there are those who don’t
Though binary’s not enough
There must be more
Than defining one thing
By its opposite
Humanists
Secularists
Unitarians
People of the Renaissance
Who gave science a category
Near faith
Without faith
x
Objectivists
Phenomenologists
People of reason
Rationality
Naturalism
Modernism
Fitter for post-modernism
Than the rest of us
x
Who could lead the way, in fact,
In appreciating
Difference
And diversity,
The creative celebration
Of the mind
And the experiment
x
Sorry I must
Define these as an
Other
But they must be
Welcome at the table
They could welcome us
We could invite each other
x
coda
x
Yes, which is not to say
Believers are irrational
Some are
Some want to be
And there are those who keep
Their faith as
Something in the wild
Those who lost at Whitby
But kept the Celtic
Style and ritual
Below
And now in daylight
Seek in celebration
Understanding for the rest of us
x
But faith has reason;
Might we say
That reason is creation
By creator?
Say no
Say yes
But allow for some very smart people
To believe
x
No one has to change
Except in violent intent
It should be an instinct to
Understand oneself
When understanding others
x
Keeping in mind
With hopefulness
That the one requested
Will in turn
Turn toward you to say
And what is your story?
Delightfully,
Be ready
x
C L Couch
x
x
I was writing before dawn and thinking about the seasons that are upon us now, wonderful times—and that in the spirit of this or that we might serve each other not only better but also for the first time, the stakes being, well, everything
now it’s dawn
x
by M. Garlick/University of Warwick/ESO – http://www.eso.org/public/images/eso1627a/, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=99645426
x
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