sun is over snow
like the paradox of doubt
with faith for healing
c l couch
photo by Haylee Marick on Unsplash
(x = space)
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Consider It All Joy
x
Let the outside
Be awful
If it must
For princes of the world
Might have their own way
There
(not letting
princesses rise
by the way)
If only
There
x
Be good on the inside
Your own realm
Where you have willed
Let in
Avowed
God to rule
While you serve God
Servant
Steward before monarch
Even when pressed
Persecuted
Outside
Sigh
Sometimes devilishly
On the inside, too
x
Consider it all joy
The paradox of life and death
And resurrection
Final joy
Complete
And unrelenting
Even
In new tasks
Assignments from
A celestial magisterium
Or shall we say
The will beneath the crown
Of the Lord
x
Doing what God says
Because
The glass is clear and
We can hear
x
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Consider it all joy when we must have trials, knowing that this testing of our faith makes endurance. And let endurance be complete even by trials so that we are whole, lacking nothing that we really need especially inside.
James 1:2-4 (paraphrased a little)
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Photo by Sam Mgrdichian on Unsplash
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(x = space)
x
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The Mix of Faith for Heaven
x
It is a mystery
And paradox
Thoughts
And feelings
Words for the hearts
Of millions
By each heart
Pierced
As a rule
x
Gospel for everyone
For one
For no one
‘Til engaging
We read
We hear
Interpret
(we’re allowed)
Good news about God
Having been
Set down
By people
In relationship
With God’s spirit
Making a kind
Of ersatz scribe
According to
The world’s
Expectations
x
Die to live
Love and take the hit
Joy in
Hard labor
Even for one’s enemies
The world wins
But does not really
Heaven after the end
And peace
Now
And forever
x
Though
In this life
Our flaws remain
And trip us up
And bring us down
And we
Are blamed
We blame ourselves
Though
Grace and mercy
Should attend,
Which is the holy law
But
Civilities
Must have their way
They often damn us
Excoriate
Our chances for changes
From
The first
After transgressions
x
Sigh,
Too many contradictions
Living near each other
In fact
Embracing
Over, under
Anywhere the breastplate says
For reassurance
x
A life of faith
Is hard
Easy
Soft
Rigid
Impossible
Demanded
Eternal
Fleshly
In each moment
Cells sloughed off
Like sin
Perhaps revealing
Virtue
In redemption
Should anyone on Earth
Have care
To notice
This
And those
While on Earth
Then disappear
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash
x
Lent 25
It’s a paradox
Unorthodox
This is a long time for slowing
Down, and yet
We must prepare for
Coming jubilation
There will be speed in that
The coming and the going
And the getting
And it’s spring
So what kind of spoil-sport
Must we be?
No kind, really
Work goes on
Of every kind
And there are families
And parochial festivities,
Which must be all right
So where is the season, then: where
Is our Lenten heart?
Well, in the heart, we say
Yes, it’s there
With other precious things we
Can recall—can reinvoke, if desired
(reorder to reorder)
Those times, those persons
Those happenings, those feelings
Discoveries
Then and now
We can keep the season
Let it work inside the mind
And maybe let it course
Through other organs
We can have Lenten lungs
A Lenten stomach
Pick something
We are so many parts to come
To know and to
Have everything done
C L Couch
East of Java
My first real taste of the day
Is bittersweet
I simply mean my morning cup of coffee
To which, yes, I add
Something sugary,
Which means I set it up
The contradiction and the paradox
First thing
First need
C L Couch
Coffee berries with insect bites.
Jyppe Quidores – Own work
Psalm 11
a song of innocence
Lord, I do not understand
Certain paradoxes of the world
Why such terror and so much
Wrong must persist in a
World of our choosing
Why can we not do better?
Why can we not use what we
Have to further human cause
To improve the life on
Our troubled, turning sphere
Make life not only better
But, in fact, a triumph in the living?
Can we not do better than fear
And making a market of that?
Might we not do better than taking
Base desire, such as purchasing
Destruction, to barter in a
Hidden marketplace?
The challenges of life would still
Remain, if we choose differently
Responding to severities of
Nature, discovering redresses
From disease, the right for each
To grow and thrive, even the finding
Of new worlds
We’d still have much to do
If we choose differently
And our accomplishment would
Be of the lasting kind
A legacy of gain
And, from that better living, new
Kinds of profit for all of us
clcouch123 
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