A Game
There is a game
To play now and then
It’s called the future
Something blank is all that’s needed
Not even paper
An open book
Or tabletop will do
But keep it empty
Then place a thought inside
And then another
You will lose your way, and that’s all right
You’ve won by then!
Maybe play again
Or realize
Tomorrow
C L Couch
Photo by Wolfgang Rottmann on Unsplash
Lessons
Simple, elegant verse about God
Jesus loves me, this I know
For the Bible tells me so
But I want it on my own, from my
Own words and thoughts and sentiments
The strings of my soul
The lines that go from me to you
That must be played
That must be worked
That must be played
C L Couch
sculpture at the EMP Museum in Seattle, Washington
Alex Hendricks – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=39290671
After Words
(Lent 41)
x
There must still be words
We’re stuck with them, I guess
Or at least I am
x
We could end here
Or yesterday
But we won’t,
Which is not a matter of words
As it is of life
x
Yet we should be ready
Now,
To pause when needed
Maybe turn the pause to play
Whatever is called for
x
It’s called for often
Snow day
Day in the sun
Comp time (whoever has this)
Playing hooky
(you can look it up)
x
Work will resume
With its kind of
Awareness, learning, deciding
Not in cryptic ways
Or inaccessible
Though recall that there’s a mystery
In pretty much everything
x
The kind that moves a martyr’s heart
And for other reasons, too, can thrill the heart
Of each of us
Of the sort like
Joan, Priscilla, Rachel, Esther
Judith, Hrosvitha, and Hildegard
Who found their way with God
While in the world
x
And for the Joans, Priscillas, Rachels, Esthers
Judiths, though I don’t suppose we’ll be
Naming anyone Hildegard or
Hrosvitha for a while
We may
We will
x
I don’t know, I think we’ll find
What we need
As long as we don’t keep the process to ourselves
Or the results
x
Anyway,
I thought I should say something once it’s all over,
Our Lenten experience
We’re comingling times and traditions
Of the end of Lent (for those still counting),
The Passion, the Triduum, then
Easter and the Easter season
x
I pray
Together and apart
These are all good for you
The way spring days, clean from rain,
Can be
x
C L Couch
x
note for the blog
Counting forty days from Ash Wednesday takes Lent through Palm Sunday, which might seem odd given the reflective nature of the season maybe abandoned in triumphant celebration. But the count of days in Lent can take out the Sundays and Holy (Maundy) Thursday (when the celebration of the Eucharist occurs) and add in Good Friday and Holy Saturday to make up a count and observation of forty days. Timing of events for the Passion and the Triduum might overlap this way of counting, and it’s also true that some have it (more or less officially, according to one’s tradition) that the length of Lent (even the sense of forty days) be taken metaphorically.
I guess I’m counting forty days from Ash Wednesday and let the paradox of Palm Sunday prevail.
Whew.
x
Photo Credit: Wikimedia User John Morgan CC-BY-2.0
Clytemnestra
(Homer, Aeschylus)
Agamemnon
Leader of the Greek forces
That went to war against Troy
He won a victory
He sacrificed his daughter for safe passage
From a god
And brought a prophet back to Greece
As a trophy and a mistress
The antique word and calling, concubine
His wife would dominate the next act
In a drama of her own
In which he would finally become the victim
The real accomplishment he’d earned
C L Couch
By Travelling Runes – https://www.flickr.com/photos/travellingrunes/2949254926/, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10603596
The Mykonos vase (750 to 650 BC), with one of the earliest known renditions of the Trojan Horse. (Note the depiction of the faces of hidden warriors shown on the horse’s side.)
An Eighth Day
If we were given
an extra day,
would we play?
It if were announced,
a day that wouldn’t count
for acquisition,
a gift of food and air
and water,
a day when no one could
wage war
or victimize another,
would we play?
Would some say
not me,
I’m too urgent,
I have to impress,
nature to command,
so many things to hoard
and wielding bellicose conversation,
I will not play.
Well, go home, then. You may
have a room in which to
exist; nothing
will work, and there will be
no toys.
Angels will referee, if need be,
though mainly they’ll be waiting
by the fields, near the water,
at the table in the
houses that have
family rooms
to help, to pass out balls and
gloves and discs that fly,
to spread out the board, play-cash,
and tokens
while everyone gets the piece
they want to play.
Everyone gets chosen
everyone feels first
everyone gets a turn;
agendas are released
and for a change, all genders
and colors are assets like
winning extra turns.
The cosmos will keep quiet,
slide over to tomorrow.
When it’s time, we’ll catch up fine.
After our eighth day
for play.
C L Couch
Nyla Moss, an eighth grader at Polaris Charter Academy, plays at Kells Park in Chicago’s West Humboldt Park neighborhood.
Andrew Gill/WBEZ
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