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Reach

Reach

 

I’ve been drafting

I’ll try one more time to get it right

It’s not that I’m miffed

Far from it

(and how much would that matter)

I simply want to pierce a little

Just a little

A slice of shard

Of the dark glass

I don’t have a method, really

An art or a science

Theory of a skill

But I have a desire

Not to prove a staff can be a snake

A stone turned into bread

Angels dancing on a pin

(it’s not merely an exercise)

 

It’s not merely an exercise

I want enough

To tell another

That faith might be unseen

Unheard, untouched, and so on

But that it’s evidence enough

Understood, felt, guessed-at

So that we might

Talk about it

Or simply live

In having it

 

But here’s a thing:

The process is at best

A matter of unseeing

Untouching, untasting

That if, really, our senses

Could be quieted enough

(just some—I’m not recommending

deprivation tanks)

We might know

Through the intimacy of knowing

That our senses have

An ally

 

That we have an ally

It might be an angel or

A second guess

It might be real enough

For jazz or maybe

A hit toward the backfield wall

 

It isn’t only us

Not one by one

There’s something to cooperate

In us

That can reach out

And understand the other

Not so alien

I evangelize, excuse me

Take me or leave me

And I’ll understand

(either way)

 

You are beyond me

Yet there is something

Here

Call is a bond or simply

The pleasure of acquaintance

But if there is ineffability

To touch

(without hands)

Then there might be something

More

 

That’s all I’m saying

Now, I’ll listen

 

C L Couch

 

 

Image by Vytalis Arnoldus from Pixabay

 

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Christ for the Celts

Christ for the Celts

 

At Whitby, they were quieted

We were told to keep it Roman

None of that wildness in

Worship, thank you very much

No more statues with odd lumps

No more the branches and

The flowers and the bonfires

Stop the dancing, too

The music we don’t recognize

 

Romans one, Celts zero

 

The Celts respond

You say

But in a thousand years, you will

Be asleep

And it will turn out we’ve only been

Resting, waiting for the time

To waken and resume

The merging of our styles

And traditions

 

Sorry, Augustine

(first Canterbury)

We want to respect you

But we were hoping for a little back

Before the final gavel

So we’ve taken to the trees

Under earth and over skies

 

We believe

And we believe

Maybe you’ll find out how much

And how thoroughly

God and creation

Christ who bought us from the devil

The Spirit that transpires

 

Who is the better negotiator

And keeper

Of us all

 

C L Couch

 

 

Iron Age Castro culture triskele, reused in a barn. Airavella, Allariz, Galicia

José Antonio Gil Martínez from Vigo, Spain – Trisquel de AiravellaUploaded by Igrexas, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=20104869

 

I saw the title Christ of the Celts (from my list) and thought for a moment it was Christ for the Celts.  I imagine Christ is for the Celts.

(Synod of Whitby in 664)

 

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Recollect

Recollect

 

Sometimes the spirit isn’t there

The pressure of zeitgeist,

Although, maintaining

Sometimes it’s just a mortal day

With bread that burns and

Coffee spills,

Liquid things that stain

It’s a day for paying money that

Might or might not exist

(such is the way of penury

to make us all impoverished

mischiefs), though we have to

Try something

 

But then

The spirit’s always there

Always here

God is inclined to stay

Underneath the window sill

Or in the corner where

We pushed the table

(insert a cartoon image)

Ready to intrude

But staying everything

For reason and for love

Until we scrape the bread

And remember that in many places

Still

We can always raise the sash

Or make space in the corner

 

C L Couch

 

 

Photo by Nadia Valko on Unsplash

 

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A Cycle of Faith

A Cycle of Faith

 

Seasons move

And then return

Though nothing stays the same

There is a year and then another, and

Each moment, each molecule is new

There is a cycle

But like the one on wheels

It covers new ground when it must

Or when we like

There is a degree of choice

Stay where we belong

That’s good in town

Strike out anew when we are away

And a wide, open road unreels

Beneath us

 

We believe

What we believe

Does it cycle like the year?

We have it, then we let it go

Like distractions of the seasons

We may like a

Philosophy at home

But then the alarm goes off

There’s smoke

And we run away

Smart move

 

What scared us away

Fear of fire, as it should frighten us

But when fire is a thought

Maybe we decide

 

When I was in school, I read philosophy

I read more now

Not to prevaricate, it isn’t all

The mind

The rest of us makes choices, too

Have you never felt it?

 

Pheromones, some might say

Or other such attraction

Call it a cause, even

Somewhere the heart must stir

It doesn’t have to be

Against the rest of us

 

There’s ritual:

That can get us far

It will not fill up all the years

It shouldn’t have to

All our lives can’t be spent in the temple

Unless that’s our job

And even so

Life outside is necessary

Air outside is different

When it moves

 

So there are factors

And ingredients

With the passing of time

Ineluctable

We choose

And we have faith

Or not

Don’t deny the power that’s in

Miracles or tragedy

Trauma of the ages

In our spirit

Tragedy through time

We think we’re the only one

And we are

Now we’re not

Here comes the sun

The rain on all of us

It’s all right

 

Do you marvel now

We can be moved?

It comes and goes

We need the respites in between

But does it grow

Like arches should we walk upon

An aqueduct in the other way

Toward the source of water

 

The spire grows, if on a side

The arches take us somewhere

Toward the origin

The start of creation, we might say

But the aqueduct’s not made for us

Ours goes the other way

The spire toward the future grows

 

And so the cycle breaks

Its rim cannot hold

We are better than our borders

And, like Aslan, should be

On the move

 

C L Couch

 

 

Luis Rogelio HM – Merida – 045, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=72766771

 

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Pillars of Hercules

Pillars of Hercules

 

Do you believe?

I do,

But you don’t have to

What is there to believe?

What is in front of us

How we feel inside

What that indicates

Things that happen that we see

And hear and taste

The ground we touch

Through shoes

The scents of spring

That time is passing by

 

What else,

Something beyond electrochemical

Ethereal, if not ineffable?

A child’s love

Our own attraction to so many things

When something good occurs

(say, Christmas morning)

Or something bad

(someone we knew

is no longer here)

 

Faith is the evidence of things unseen

Isn’t that a lark?

And if God is so good,

Why do so many bad things take place?

On these two points

So much atheism depends

(note I haven’t brought up evil yet)

I can understand:

How can we respect something

That isn’t there?

Yet I might ask,

What do we see when we are looking at

Nothing in particular?

Our eyes are open

Ears as well

Our fingers at the ready

Like the pianist’s prior to play

 

We are ready, and

What is really happening

When nothing’s happening?

Not convinced of the ethereal,

Not yet?

Give it time

That is more fluid than

We believe we know

Here endeth not a lesson

A suggestion, sure

 

C L Couch

 

 

View of Europa Point and the Rock of Gibraltar from the Strait of Gibraltar. Levante Cloud overhead.

Nol Aders – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4259571

 

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Evidence Unsee

Evidence Unsee

 

God

Our hope

Our refuge

We need to say

We need to sing

Because the world-storm rages

All about

And we believe ourselves adrift

So easily, so often

Every day

Because we are only, well, you know

 

And in the way we do

We must

Rely on what is, like perjured

Testimony, inadmissible

In human courts

 

C L Couch

 

 

(image from Pixabay)

12019 / 10266 images

 

(in the title, I left off the n to make a new word in the Old-English, English way)

 

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Small Reveries for a Tuesday Afternoon

Small Reveries for a Tuesday Afternoon

 

The coffee pours like witches brew

Twirling steam as in a cauldron

Or frozen nitrogen,

Disassembling

For a movie or a manufactured haunted house

How can I help but think of magic

And then

A million years ago

 

I don’t know what was happening

No one does except

The players and, well, you know

If one can speak playful of one’s

Creator

 

There was no time

No word, machine, or measure

There was no language but

What was spoken in the trees

Or as the water met the oxygen above

A dance of air

 

Creatures spoke

We know, we study their voice boxes

And the whole thing about the trees falling

In forests without our presence

Yes, they make noise

As nearly all things do

 

Our attendance is not required

Our participation does not make belief

We may try to lock up faith

But like ancient sounds

That happened without us (I’m saying)

Faith has a purpose for all senses

We can shut it out

Its existence remains unaffected

And all songs, all expressions of it

Persist

 

Yesterday, today, this moment and—

Until apocalypses—

The next one

 

The final time will measure

All things unmeasurable

And render choice a quiet science

All pointing and all chances done

Because what has been signaled

Will arrive

 

Though grace will last, I think

Up until the consequences

And a little after

In the denouement of

Revelation

We may choose

Once more for forever

 

C L Couch

 

 

This picture shows a fossilized dinosaur egg. Just below the dinosaur egg is a ruler to help get an idea of its size. Dinosaur eggs have been found at over 200 different sites around the world. For more interesting information on dinosaur eggs check out our dinosaur fossil facts page.

http://www.sciencekids.co.nz/pictures/dinosaurs/bones/dinosauregg.html

http://www.sciencekids.co.nz/

 

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Invoke the Fool

Invoke the Fool

 

Sometimes a fool is needed

A clown of God

Call the fool

We are foolish in the wisdom of the world

These parts are nothing new

But I don’t like the notion

Of my own foolishness

 

I trained in clowning once

Wore the clothes and make-up

And took my act out there

You know, where you are

 

It was all right

It didn’t hurt

And I didn’t hurt anyone else

Maybe we did some good, together

But it’s a squeamy feeling, all the same

 

Not to talk

Not to eat or drink

Were not the hard parts

It was the openness to whatever:

 

I might be laughed at

Though that was the point

But, depending on the working preposition,

With or at?

 

Then there was

The brittleness, the fragility

In scorn

 

But faith is something funny

Faith in me, faith in you

Faith in God

Faith in humanity

Faith in Earth

No evidence required

But that we cannot sense

The more we demand material,

The more we lose the energy

Lopsiding the equation

 

Fair is foul

And foul is fair

But it’s not that even, either

For faith finally

Is not a seesaw, evened out

But requires all

All we have to risk

For something evidenced so poorly

 

Who would believe this anywhere,

Anyone

But a fool!

 

C L Couch

 

notes

 

There is a sad and beautiful story by Tomie dePaola called The Clown of God.

 

Fair is foul, and foul is fair:

Hover through the fog and filthy air.

—the witches in Macbeth

 

 

(image)

By ingawh, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=45210850

Stratford Upon Avon

 

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Saint Peter on a Sunday Afternoon

Saint Peter on a Sunday Afternoon

 

The Shoes of the Fisherman

Is on TV

I doubt I can help but watch

An old film, yes

I imagine too stodgy and too staid

For a reboot

I’m relieved

I should read the novel

But the movie engages viscerally

As sometimes movies do engage us

And we with them

A pope is elected

Cyril, first from Russia

In the Cold War

And for all time

 

As I understand the story

Cyril came to Russia with Methodius

Wanting eagerly to share the Gospel story

And found

So many tribes at war

First, then, they imposed a language

So that all might speak and

Might be heard

Cyrillic

 

Sounds mythical,

I know

For our time, an allegory

 

Rome is eternal, so they say

And the Vatican seems that way as well

I wonder

The church is not the pope

It is the people

This is not new teaching

A billion people

I could be one of them

 

C L Couch

 

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