Salvation Chair
Really
Now
And should the Spirit
Come to call
After the dancing
For the sky
After all the lights released
Half
A world on
That’s felt
One’s own half of the world
After ingesting
All petitions
In all the other continents
Even on the
Needful
Melting fields
To the south
And north
Between the poles
It stops
To dwell a while
In my
Clay house
And maybe find a room
For me
In a truly quiet hour
While I give all the rest over
To
Possession
And renewal
At the same time with
All other crises
And the stretched-out needs
So
Casually asked
Sometimes
Please
Sit
Have something
While I work out with you
How to have
My own
On both sides of enigma
That is
Mystery
Of faith
That is
Saved
When given over
C L Couch
Anne Bradstreet, a prominent Puritan poet, employed the “clay house” metaphor in her work. In her poem “As Weary Pilgrim,” she reflects on the impermanence of the physical body and the longing for spiritual rest. Here are some lines from that poem:
A pilgrim I, on earth, perplext
wth sinns wth cares and sorrows vext
By age and paines brought to decay
and my Clay house mouldring away
Oh how I long to be at rest
and soare on high among the blest.
https://www.poetry.com/poem/3075/as-weary-pilgrim,-now-at-rest
(the note before the excerpt by Copilot)
Photo by Asim Hamid on Unsplash
inexactitude
1
first full day of summer
the solstice
slides around
though it’s our calendars
you know
and the inexact nature
of the world
as is
and maybe as should be
as
you know
the foundation
of everything
our math is built on pi
our philosophy
inexactitude
uncertainty
plussed or minused
into everything
we cannot count
without
knowing there’s less or more
the rings of everything
aren’t worried
about the x and y and
z axes
shall work
in angling somehow
off other
they work
it works
we work
and that is
all we know
and all we really need to know
2
who came up with this
uncertainty
some might say
the devil
though I think it was
the Lord
everything
a thing
and everything in motion
all the time
we measure
we presume to stop the thing for
numbers
but the thing keeps moving
everything keeps moving
so what can we know
okay
okay
well
maybe enough
for jazz
here is the formula we made
plus or minus jazz
3
the glory
by the way
that jazz is
a syncopated tribute
to creation
in a day
of
twenty-three hours
fifty-six minutes
plus seconds
for change
or the day
of an age
say
the jazz age
or how about
a day
as in the day
of thunder-lizards
or the day
of Arthur
of Morgaine
c l couch
photo by Igor Omilaev on Unsplash
Blameless Solstice
Sun
With clouds
And lightning
Animate the forecast map
At noon
And I’m thinking
On line
These are the days
Of our lives
To come
Starting
Tomorrow
While today is
Simply hot
Well
“Steamy”
In the Southern
Or the tropical
Way
That is the grid
For the next week
Or so
We’re sliding
Into summer
So we might
Wonder
What is next
In our
Region
Relative
To the world
C L Couch
Photo by USGS on Unsplash
Maur Adrar Desert
(we might become a colorful desert, too)
written on the occasion of--well, yes--the heat but also a local town that declared a drought emergency today; what's ironic to me is that the town is set where a wide creek pours into a wide river (always strikes me odd when that happens)
Montage
(well, a little one)
[haiku]
a blossomed morning
so many beautiful things
Juneteenth celebrates
Time Like
An ever-rolling stream
That
If we’re walking
We cannot step in
Twice
The same experience
Same water
But a new thing
Every time
So said
The pre-Socratic
For a thing
To teach
A lesson in
Immutability
And that there is none
While the water
Rolls
And we approach it
For whatever reason
Not for
The same thing
Every time
Change is natural
Therefore
Whether by the
Evolution water
We prepare
To swim
Or hand up our lyres
We might know
And like the health
Of a source
That’s moving
And meaning
Altogether
Change
With unchange
C L Couch
(Heraclitus and a hymn and a psalm and, you know, hopefully some inspiration)
Photo by Conscious Design on Unsplash
Forest River & Waterfall
shall we gather
Deep and
Wide
(the call
and then the gathering)
Tomorrow’s
Juneteenth
Remembering
The
unrelenting drive toward freedom
After war
After the
smaller wars
That
Take us
One by one
Even
together
For a cause
To have a
life
That daily
speaks to
Choice in
where we go
No one to
intervene
Direction
Or allowance
●
To be free
Of that
ridiculousness
That is
itself
Free of ethics
Free of consideration
For the freedom
of the flesh
Itself
Herself
Or himself
Or in the
people
All my
people
As ways
The right to
be unchained
As in each
birthing
In each
house
●
How sad
Tragic
To have to
make the case
For liberty
To use up
energy
Needed for
So many
other
Needful things
In life
For enough
acquisition
Self-esteem
in work
And play
In laughing
with the children
Of our
legacy
●
These and
other lines
Established and
maintained
As on a ship
Where working
lines
Is vital
To the journey
●
Knowing when
to keep them taut
When to let
go
Of everything
To pause
within the wind
Maybe the
wind
That tricks
the journey
Of misdirected
Doctrine
Or information
Then agendas
Without evidence
Or conviction
of
Truth inside
●
Goodness
We go far
For only a
day
But if we
don’t remember
It seems we
repeat
Not the
better parts
But the
things
That bring
us down
Into a
whirlpool
Of unknown
ending
Though without
the likelihood
To brins us
Home
●
Juneteenth
Something to
do with Texas
Though the
nation
Wholly free
Should ring
throughout all states
And to the
world
New liberty
bells
From the
same carillons
That have
been sounding since
From Independence
Hall
And are not
we owed
All of us
Some room
inside that place
That forum
From the
start
When each
one aimed
First pled to
Europe
Then
Campaigned
Consciously
●
While pushing
on
Indigenous
From the
start
And the gross
Wrongheaded
And wrong
hearted
Soiled
Spoiled
Impractical sin
In presuming
to own
People
To work a
place
In which
Nothing was
avowed
For these
●
And by the
way
Of our
family
Traded for
And purchased
In the way
of hell
Against
Disgrace from
heaven
●
Then begin
Inside one’s
own
And all our
own
Words and
moves
Toward freedom
Centuries
Ago
Throughout
A woeful
Backward aga
Into the
struggle
Even for
this hour
Certainly
for this day
●
Juneteenth
A new day
For triumphant
calendars
For the
meaning
And the pleasuring
Owning for
Instead
Flesh
And home
And fear
only of God
In this
brightened hour
Followed by
another
In arriving
To the
lit-up day
Illustrious
And carried
to tomorrow
For a legacy
●
But in this
time
We have
Please own
it
The idea
The discretion
Humility
Restraint in
Knowing
And having
This second
Freely
Then with
hope
That anyone
might
Freely have
Into another
And another
Toward that
better age
To which we
add
In quiet
ways
Of love
And this
Our proclamation
Of the same
●
Amen?
Maybe we
could say
Syllables for
striving
An
Amen
C L
Couch
Photo by Pawel
Czerwinski on Unsplash
Love’s Labors
I rock
While cross-legged
On the bed
I think it helps
To stretch out small parts
Of my lower back
I think
I breathe
Like thinking
I am quiet
Letting the world go around me
While I think about
The very thing
The world
All its troubles
All the better possibilities
With
Faith
Hope
And love
Sorry if that’s trite
As I should sound cleverer
Uniquer
In a poem
But these are the answers
Have been for two thousand years
Reflecting older teaching
And the laws
From Deuteronomy
That now
You don’t have to read
Though it wouldn’t hurt you
(much)
To know that love has come from God
And was the goodness in creation
And the reason
For first promises
Even for provisions when
We were cast out of Eden
Though the sweat of labor
For the man
And the real sweat of labor
For the woman
Wasn’t fun
And maybe still within the garden
We’d have worked
We’d have birthed
Without all the sweat
And all the pain
That we’ve learned to make
Philosophy
And a marketplace
To say that sweat and pain are actually
Good things
And you should buy our
Reasoning
Along with our products
And our memberships
But then
As far as relegation
Goes
Why not accept
And make the most of things
We must work
We must bear children
As we do
And while the process hurts
The product of pay
Is all right
And certainly
What comes with woman’s labor
Is a source
For joy
Delight in the present
While remarkable has happened
Toward the future
And maybe God and angels
Sweat and even
Hurt with us
Through everything
And there are
Times
When it’s hard
When I imagine we don’t care about
Divine sponsorship
Maybe after
Maybe not
Though we could thank the Lord
And the angels
When the job goes well
When a child is born
And for the mother
We work under a curse in all endeavors
Which sounds terrible
But that’s
You know
The way things are
‘Til dawning
Of the new age
When all pain is tabulated
Health restored
Hurt dismissed
And then
All the apologies in heaven
Divine
With what was mortal
May begin
C L Couch
Photo by eze cmf on Unsplash
(haiku for Father's Day)
happy Father's Day
to the father I don't have
once or anymore
c l couch
photo by Kelli McClintock on Unsplash
(it isn’t, but this could be my father with my younger brother way back when)
All Around
Love
Love
Love
Love
The Gospel in a word
Mentioned four times
In the song
To start
And then five more
And as it’s a round
The times are echoed
So the word
Is heard
Eighteen times
And eighteen more
Each repetition
Might be an important word
This
Love
Meaningful enough
To sing
Sometimes
I imagine
The notes and lyrics
Go inside
Maybe the music
Makes us think
As well
Even sends some to exegete
The texts
That give the rationale
For Gospel
And for song
C L Couch
the Love Round is a song anonymously composed, arranged by Betty Pulkingham; the words often changed because the word “brother” is in it, singly, i.e., without “sister”
Photo by Li Zhang on Unsplash
thy faithfulness and 14 June
(two poems)
thy faithfulness
and now for God
though maybe
God has been with me
from the start
because if not my own
it’s in
God’s nature
and certainly God’s
skill
and also
desire
the same desire
that made everything
and more
the wish
the will
to love the everything
and above all
and with the will of
unfallen angels
to love most
ourselves
we are that important
not for demons
whose interest in consumption
is not the healthy use of
creation
but frankly
to suck us dry
of flesh and spirit
and then display the husks
eagerly
in hell
but we have God
and willful angels
elected
on our side
and in the room
though will leave us quiet
when quiet
is soulfully
or physically demanded
quiet
time
and should we wish
some company
divine
with less than a word
shall be here
to cheer
and to guide
to love
and to show
how love
begins and ends
with presence
one form
or
another
14 June
(2024)
happy
Flag Day
Mitzi’s birthday
the puppy
(not the flag)
who crawled up
on the porch
the day our family
moved
into Pittsburgh
northern suburbs
and remained with us
the next
seventeen years
and was
extraordinary
patient with
several
growing children
as for the flag
you know
we flew it
very day
I recall
there are some things it seems I wrote about most years; today is a thing
c l couch
photo by Pawel Czerwinski on Unsplash
clcouch123 
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