Category: Poetry

Pantoum on the Pandemic

They told me several things the other day:
“Wearing masks could help to save more lives;”
And something else that made me more afraid:
“Most of this pandemic is a lie.”

Wearing masks could help to save more lives?
White-coats cry “This is absurd invention!”
Most of this pandemic is a lie?
This requires disbelief-suspension.

White-coats cry “This is absurd invention!
Get back in your homes and do it fast!”
This requires disbelief-suspension;
Such a phony cure could never last.

Get back in your homes and do it fast,
The air is thickened with heart-pulsing fear.
Such a phony cure could never last;
Surely somewhere the end is near.

The air is thick with heart-pulsing fear–
The powers of the state have overreached!
Surely somewhere the end is near;
Social contracts everywhere are breached.

The powers of the state have overreached,
And shall a bright red sea restrain their hand?
Social contracts everywhere are breached;
That red is like the bleeding of our land.

Shall a bright red sea restrain their hand
Against the blue tsunami’s godless swell?
That red is like the bleeding of our land.
All our tongues are set on fire by hell.

Against the blue tsunami’s godless swell
Only truth could stand and plant a flag.
But all our tongues are set on fire by hell
We plant nothing more than filthy rags.

Only truth could stand and plant a flag
In this scorching, ash-encrusted ground,
And we plant nothing more than filthy rags,
Scattering our fallenness around.

In this scorching, ash-encrusted ground,
I saw many kneeling, lying prone,
Scattering our fallenness around
The base of a bright white blazing throne.

I saw many kneeling, lying prone,
And many red-inked pages lined their way
To the bright white blazing throne.

They told me many things the other day,
And something else that made me less afraid.

Luna

Have you ever looked up
And seen the Moon
Looking down from her velvet throne
Holding the scepter of the night,
And wondered what in grace
Could be so great that
It would replace her grandeur?

And then remembered that it’s
The Son in glory,
Sitting down beside the ivory throne
Holding the book of life,
The brilliance of the moonlight
Now a twinkle in his eye
As he engulfs her splendor?

Have you ever looked up again
And watched her start to sing
And gotten the sense that even she
Can’t wait for this to be?

Lost Siblings

I lie awake in the orphanage bed,
The songs have been sung and the prayers have been read.
The kindly sisters have kissed our brows
And tucked us in to let us drowse.

I thought I heard you gently rise;
It stopped my heart to realize
That soft, tickling sound like the trickle of slobber
Is the cool, soothing croon of the Cradle Robber.

Pulling the covers up over my head,
I strain my ears with a gathering dread
Hoping you’ll argue or tell him to go
And swim for your life from his song’s undertow.

But no, you get up, and start to climb out.
I want to scream, or sob, or shout,
But all I can do is cry in my pillow
As you both slip away and go play in the willows.

Our adopter is coming; didn’t you know?
Couldn’t you wait for the new morning’s glow,
To fall laughing into his welcoming arms
And live there forever secure and unharmed?

And now the Robber is luring me too.
I’m lying here scared, I don’t know what to do.
Can’t you come back like a prodigal waif
To comfort us all and remind us we’re safe?

Good Friday 2019

O dripping scourge,
The implement
That stripped Christ’s back
And ripped and rent;
You who drained
His vessels dry,
Behold the blackening
Of the sky–
His work was done
Once you did yours,
In pouring forth
The sinless gore.
The blood you wrenched
Out of his flesh
Now cries aloud
For wrath to rest.
O whip of Satan,
Tool of God,
Did your hands spill
This wine of love?