in waiting
waiting as in stillness plus
waiting as in serving
stillness
and serving
the God beside us
in waiting
is waiting
c l couch
Revelation 3:20
Revelation 21:5
photo by Yucel Moran on Unsplash
for once
(please or is it pleas)
if God
then God
come down
not only from the Christmas tree
but from every tall place
we cannot reach
or only with precarity
and up from every
deep dark place
we can imagine
not to mention woeful places
we cannot
and from left
or from the right
and then from the inside
where our own spirits
reside
with or without alliances
from the spirit
that moves everywhere
and with our will
might live
within us
God come from every place
every point
we measure
and beyond
and realize
please
for once
a real form
that we can see
from which we hear the voice
that we could taste
and close enough to smell
even to touch
with or without piercing points
for remembrance
or for proof
and be here for a while
we could have coffee
with or without
an armageddon
after
c l couch
photo by NASA Hubble Space Telescope on Unsplash
“Christ Climbed Down” is a poem by Lawrence Ferlinghetti, which I thought of when writing about God climbing ("come down")
(x = space)
x
x
We Say, We Believe
(maybe it’s Revelation 23)
x
God is love
The metaphor
Reality
So much better than
God is gold
Even
God is power
Though God is both
The metaphor
Reality
x
God made the gold, at least
And also power
Power lent
To us
And in the Earth
Inherent
x
Borrowing
And legacy
That’s not our own
No matter how many times
We name another name
x
We do not last
Not on our own
And everything on Earth
That was our own
Is naught
So that when everything’s renewed
There will no monuments
Except the living
In a city
Where the temple
Is a person
And water is provided
That’s life-giving
x
C L Couch
x
x
By Voky89 – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=72763611
This is a photo of a monument in Ukraine, number: 53-101-0501
x
(x = space)
x
x
Homely Revelation
(Psalm 19:2)
x
Maybe
It will start
On what we’d call
A clear, calm day
In fact, cerulean
x
The armies might be
Lined up, anyway
In the desert
x
On all borders
x
A day for maintenance,
Patrols
With no shots fired,
Nothing pointed launching
x
Mary out of blue
(cerulean)
Shedding all colors
For us
Might come first
With John and Michael,
All directing
That the fighters clear their vehicles
While things are peaceful,
Rather easy
Before a miracle
Of rust shall have the
Armor and the gears,
The nuclei of fuel
Returned to earth
x
Before a rain shall fall
That satisfies the thirsty
While frustrating
All the radar,
All the targeting procedures
x
Like the cartoon
In which the prey
Like a magician
Causes flowers to appear
Inside the muzzle
Of the hunter’s gun,
Children shall be
Fed and entertained while
Parousia take
The unexpected
And frustrating
Lack of determined war,
The crazy metaphors
Made real
That taught us for an age
To give us
Love and time
x
Frightening things
Might happen:
God’s arrival in
Healed flesh and sprit,
The judgment of the wicked,
Victory in nothing gained
But love’s perfection
x
Awful as in awesome,
These should be
Enough;
The day shall satisfy
As water and air cover
And fulfill
The valley before
Baucis and Philemon
And perfectly
The entire Earth
Of us
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by Andrew Sterling on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
Each One an Apocalypse
x
I look up to hills
From the valley
It’s not that the rescue
Has to come from there
Though there are climactic moments when
Over the ridges
Everyone needed
And everything
Appears
x
It’s that wherever from wherever
God is there
And it is God who rescues
Who swoops down
To carry us from battle
Takes us to water
Moving just enough
For a hand to fill
From which to drink,
Clean water played
Over wounds
We are better than we’ve felt for days
We are lifted up again
And taken to a home
Whose dimensions have been guessed at
But whose simplicity
In majesty
Is unknown ‘til we’re there
Where living’s perfect
And we are told
To stay
x
Each has an Armageddon,
An apocalypse
The unprevaricated spirit
Manifest
With mortality and eternity
On either side
And through and through
Some have called trinity
But is the nature of the Lord
Relational
And relational with everything
Forever
x
C L Couch
x
x
x
Patmos Day 10001
(Revelation 21 1)
I am here alone
Surrounded by the world
Or so it seems
The world tan and blue
The building bleached
In which I rest
Waiting for another vision
Testimony
That will not come
I fear
After all
I all learned about
The end of things
But there was so little said about
The new
Too brief
The new heaven and new
Earth
How they might be conveyed
For life in the eternal
I want to know
Not as if apocalypse were not enough
It burns the parts of me that
Sight things
Still
So I scratch on paper
When I can
A finger in the sand
When there is that
I wait
For them to come
The agents of the Savior
Telling me
In perfect love and fear
What to record
That might slip through the web
For all of you to hear
Theophilae
C L Couch
photo by Alexander Andrews on Unsplash
night sky over the church
The Start of Day
You give this to me, Lord
These hours and these days
I don’t want to waste them
And I don’t want the world to
Define waste for me
It is wasteful and so earns
Skepticism regarding definitions
Careless with money
Food (forty percent in the USA)
Relationships
With nature and each other
Yes, I’m of the world, too
And so don’t escape conviction
But there is a conviction
And conviction
We can do better
I can
How does it begin—why,
I think with wasting time
Being still,
At rest and listening
Tempering what I hear with
The community I trust
So many things start right
This way
The Pietists had it right
Listen for revelation
It will come
It won’t be crazy
If it is,
Your good friends will tell you
Then listen to them
C L Couch
A clear description of Pietism is found in Understanding Pietism by Dale W. Brown.
(image)
http://www.photogen.com/free-photos/free-stock-photo-564/
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