Thursday, February 25, 2016

Prodigal

You warned me
not to overfill
my cup.

You told me
how life can spill
and drain the cup dry,

yet still I imbibed,
pouring darkness
like hundred-proof light.

My feet flashed like lightning
setting fire
to the innocent world
when suddenly I stumbled.

Seeing you come
down the narrow lane
I crawled in sorrow
into your open arms
once again.


(25 Aug. 2013)

Tuesday, February 23, 2016

Levi Becomes Matthew


The Calling of St. Matthew by Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio(1599-1600)

You call me out
of my money hole
and tell me to take you
to my home?
How can a rabbi like you,
so well known,
healer and
Anointed One,
come into my
unclean house?
But, please, come along,
at any rate, and
let me show you
my tawdry place!
All my friends see us
on the stony road
and ask to join
my sinner's feast;
but after dinner
you gently teach
your painful path
to perfect
peace.

(21 Sept. 2012)

Saturday, February 20, 2016

March





cries

pierce,
birdsongs
rise and fall,
from tree to nodding
tree, calling high between winter-
bare limbs, deep among buds long hidden, nearly ready.


(14 March 2013)

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Nothing but Light

“In perfect humility all selfishness disappears and your soul no longer lives for itself . . . . it is lost and submerged in Him and transformed into Him.” Thomas Merton

The proud man
looks into his mirror
and sees bright shiny lies,
power, pleasure,
possession,
and cries “all mine!”

until, at last,
in the honest, good night
sees in his mirror nothing
but light.


(17 February 2013)

Tuesday, February 9, 2016

Memory


sometimes in mass
as sacred songs
wash over me like rain,

I break free
and drift
into memory,

and again you rise,
your tears flow
as tears fill my eyes,
your dying breath
whispering
good bye;

after so many years,
the knife still cuts
again, and
again


(20 May 2015)

Crows in Fog


Shrouded limbs
hang high 
over the rising red church.

Breathless, 
the muted world
waits 
in morning's 
white core.

That's when crows 
black shadows
on thin branches, 

silently wait 
high above 
the empty schoolyard

for children's shrill calls
to begin another 
innocent day.

(16 March 2013)














































Sunday, February 7, 2016

Down a Bright Way (In memorium Maryalice Claire, friend and mentor)



Close to the center, 
near to where silence
fills my straining ears,

where long years
of searching end, 

I find you waiting
my old friend.
You take my hand
and in a glance
know all.

Without a word
down a bright way
we walk.

(16 September 2012)


Wednesday, February 3, 2016

The Book of Life



“Perhaps the book of life, in the end, is the book of what one has lived and if one has lived nothing, he is not in the book of life. “ Merton, Thomas, When the Trees Say Nothing: Writings on Nature 

Turn the pages
past the flashy cover
beyond sincere dedications;
what do you
read?

Are there tragedies
lurking in your leafy folds?
Do you struggle, oh Hero,
with sirens and one-
eyed peep-
ing Toms?

Are you triumphant?

In your brief tale,
do you satisfy
harried Plot’s demands?

Are you happy
with your climax, your
denoue-
ment?

Or, with eyes moist and red,
at last do you drop
your ragged volume
to the musty cellar floor,
and wonder,

what happened?

(29 May 2012)