Saturday, April 29, 2017

after blue day




night rises
from dark soil
slowly filling
the space between
slender blades
spreading ink
over windows,
eaves, still trees
until the earth
becomes one
with the
stars.


(10 May 2016)

Friday, April 28, 2017

Baptism

Rain falls
peaceful, unceasing
filling brimful
the bright day.

Liquid shimmer
glowing ocean
softly silting soil
like love
filling full an empty soul,

O cleanse me
as, trembling,
sinful, I walk into
your sacred font.

View from Sutro


"It is God’s love that speaks to me in the birds and streams but also behind the clamor of the city." Thomas Merton

Seen from golden heights
the tangled city
squares up.

Straight streets,
rigid veins
spurt quicksilver
past towers
of fog.

It throbs.

Hearts, minds,
sing passion
joy, lust,  
boredom.

A dying man
clinging to desperate sheets,
passing;

An infant crying
drawing raw air,
beginning.

It’s alive,
greater
than its sum.

See how it beats
in the cool Pacific sun?

Thursday, April 27, 2017

St. Peter Addressing the Begger


Look up at me, turn
your wide eyes,
expectant, wondering,
hopeful, and see
what I can give.

Do you want a coin? Some-

thing good to eat? Do

you want a little
kindness?

I have none of these
to give you
but the kindness
and the secret of
the seeds of healing
flowing all around you
spring breeze,
swirling gentle desire,
blessing your torn lungs, infusing
your tainted blood, singing
sweetly your freedom!

In His name, then, I command you
to rise and take your place
beside me, and enter into
His holy temple!


(14 April 2013)

Wednesday, April 26, 2017

My Mother's Gift

Photo: Brian Federle


“It is our emptiness in the presence of the abyss of His reality, our silence in the presence of His infinitely rich silence, our joy in the bosom of the serene darkness in which His light holds us absorbed, it is all this that praises Him.”   Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation.

(for Brian)
You visited me near dawn. 

I saw you
and felt your joy
and heard your voice,
like a memory of waking to bird-song
on a warm, Ohio summer's morning -

you used to sing "rise and shine!"
bringing me bleary-eyed, bounding
into my childhood's
glowing day.

And last night
I saw you again.

I love my dreams about you.
You sweep away
all fear
with your calm voice.

But always after,
when I wake up,
you are gone,
and I face another indifferent day
in this agnostic world.

But this time was different!
"You are glowing!" I said
from the deep mist of my sleep,

"It is because 
He Is."

And though I could not see
what you ceaselessly see,
I gazed upon the 
overwhelming light
enfolding you,
and I tried
to find its source
but could only feel
its sudden glory...
its unremitting,
warm embrace
of unconditional
love.

I did not want to wake...
I wanted to stay with you,
in the warmth
of this revelation,

but of course,
I returned to the morning
to the pale sun,
to the granite and steel world,
to the darkness of the mirror,
to life,

and yet,
your  gift remains
in the glow of faith
beyond 
my failing sight.




(10 Jan 2011; 6 Dec. 2016: 26 April 2017)

Tuesday, April 25, 2017

Pietà




Into the church
we few mourners gather
close to the small table
filled with a photo 
of a smiling
young man,
a single candle,
and a golden cube.

I did not know him
whose ashes
now lay within 
that dark space.

Old friends, his parents, 
and so we came
to keep them company.

We pray the sacred
texts, sing holy 
mass to send 
his lingering soul
sweeping home

to Heaven,


but his mother weeps 
in the silent repose
of ancient pain.

Saturday, April 22, 2017

On the Feast of St. Catherine




The poet on the radio
earnestly read her expert lines
about the sad state
of the world,
the failure
of governments,
churches,
parents,
lovers,
the certain decline of
the cosmos,
the end of the world.

Her lines were exquisitely made,
and I listened with admiration and envy
to perfect rhymes, subtle
metaphor, nuanced images
until I felt both elation and
despair.

Then I looked around me,
to the riot of life in
my backyard,
the shrill ecstasy of birds
the shout of the rose.

My children gathered today
for a Sunday feast, full of
laughter and my corny jokes.

Maybe the poet didn’t have a backyard,
could gazed only on bleak
city walls; maybe her lover
walked out (or should have) or
her children never call.

I worry about the poor;
whenever a grimy hand out-
stretches, I see the pierced hand of Christ,
offering me gifts, pearls of great price!


(29 April 2012)

Author's Comments:

 I'm feeling guilty about dissing Adrienne Rich here... she really is a marvelous poet.  If you'd like to explore her more, try this link:   http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/adrienne-rich

Friday, April 21, 2017

Brian's Psalm



In winter's stark dawning 
in cold fog encased,
your warmth I'm discerning
though night will not fade, 

for unwilling is morning 
it lurks in sore limbs,
yet your song is arising 
and I know that you'll send

to my darkest night-hour 
new light to set me free
and your song I'll be singing
in the glow of the east!

Wednesday, April 19, 2017

Wisdom

Photo by Brian Federle, Hawaii, 2016.

"I beside him as his craftsman, and I was his delight day by day,
playing before him all the while,playing on the surface of his earth;
and I found delight in the human race" Proverbs 8:22-31


Dark mountains rise
to meet the sun.

Night drops
to the western sea.

Skyward
lifting joy to heaven

as dark waves clash
washing clean the past —


all pain subsides,
fulfilled.