he kisses me
absentmindedly
as if he has better things to do
distracted by whatever
is in the foreword of his inner workings
tick tocking behind his blue eyes (those eyes!)
sketching plans on invisible whims
to catch the first train out of the station
riding heady currents of his singular thoughts
he has slept in my bed
for a thousand years
dreaming things
that have nothing to do with me
what has love got to do with it
everything
It has been an unusual Lent
to say the least
The devotional has been an old one I came across
of Henri Nouwen’s from Mt Vernon
on the Prodigal Son
I am broken open
this Lent
by this old story, this parable of a wayward child
and his truculent brother and loving father
I think of his mother and her fear for her younger son
and the weariness of that sad fear.
The relief and busy-ness of killing
the fabled fatted calf for a celebration and readying for guests,
trying to assuage her eldest sons pouts and consternation,
when all she wants to do is sit quietly
in her chair and be happy her son is home.
And I wonder if those thirty six righteous men are working
their asses off researching the vaccine to save humanity.
Or if they are wandering from place to stay-in-place,
just trying to find a soft chair to sit in
and a cold glass of water to drink.
Its all that ‘second loneliness’ that broke my chest open.
All that second loneliness for the world in all its pain and beauty
All that second loneliness in isolation
All this second loneliness, Lent 2020
With reckless abandon, Spring sweeps in
drifting acid green pollen in her wake.
She scorns the late winters chill
riding bareback and bare footed
into the robin egged morning.
What joie de vivre!
What carpe diem!
What sweet mysteries of bloom and bud
are whispered from her tulip petaled mouth!
She dazzles the bees, drunk
with their golden wares
all knapsacked to spill before their queen.
Shall we go back to the basics
of being human,
you and I.
First: shelter, food, fire.
Next comes touch and smell,
imprint of our human-ness.
We fold our skin over our beloveds,
a cloud of prayer above our heads,
leaning into each other, though far apart.
We are kin, skin to skin,
though far apart.
the small dog and I out
for a late evening walk, stopped
by the sound of a thousand wings
starlings in their blessed murmuration
whir and whirl in temptations of flight
and chaos, a perfect holy vision
of angels
***************************
amazing starlings murmuration (full HD) -www.keepturningleft.co.uk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eakKfY5aHmY&feature=share via @youtube
from the cold dark earth, comes the trumpet triumphant
death has been overcome
and life is abundant
rise up and sing
for the earth has once again awakened
and we are all
reborn
weak as tepid tea, the sun shines from a cold blue sky
in the newborn Spring. early morning frost rimed each
tenuous stem, rattling dry desiccated, until vapors
rose like wraiths disappearing aspirating vanished
leaving grasses pale bleached, limp and wasted.
fear hangs on my shoulders, atlas at his task,
holding the earth and all her
devotees, on my weakling shoulders, now bent
and ancient, grieving for the world and
its plagued population, struggling for breath
and light in the weak kneed sun on a early spring
afternoon.
