Tuesday, October 27

Extinction of Flame


There will not always be the silver glimmer
caught steady in the periphery:
The sun is not yellow, not even a tinge of bright to speak of

Or

The wave that has marched forth will not retaliate,
Will not return to shore and claim its rightful place.

But it is just that— 
a far flung flicker groveling for flame.

So with all the courage contrivable,
I dissect the very animal I fear the most;
Stretch my fingers into the gaping hole 
between ape and man;
Tongue the crevice taste the cavern 
Yawning crack of lack between

Sapien 

and

Pan
paniscus.

All of that 
Mouth-wide-open 
Nothing

And it is glaring back at us bright as the yellow sun,
to claim its rightful place—-
A most tantalizing lie 
Lie dead at our feet.


Romans 1:20- For his invisible qualities are clearly seen from the world’s creation onward, because they are perceived by the things made, even his eternal power and Godship, so that they are inexcusable 

Monday, August 10

Beasts of Burden



The limping horse 
Will grow as resentful as its unkempt ergot;
the load, while free, has cost him everything.

Furious:

He at me for needing him,
We, at life and death
both conceptually 
and 
the way their reality spit in our faces
(Can you imagine? Death dealing so disrespectfully
And before we’d been properly introduced!)

Quietly fuming, until at last 
The buck bucks and vehemently 

In rebuttal I rebuke
and plead for just one more way
to rid me of this pain

post script// thank you for listening 

about: a quiet reminder to not take for granted those who help us bear our burdens

Monday, May 11

Grave (at the River Bend)


I do not know

Have you tried the truth yet?
I know, it is disgusting--

All of those wet bodies
Not sardines, but all the more so
Entombed. 

Sardines but human
Raped young bulls but human 
Slaughterhouse but human home.

I 
Do not 
Know

What any grandchild is to make of all these ashes,

But to deny the ashes exist?

While he’s coughing up blood 
Lungs filled of fluid and another man’s folly?

The banks like the back are broken,
Feeble 
Arms grasping at the edges of their own extinction.
My God, how tired the dollar bill must be!
Weighed down by centuries of dead skin and bones;
I do not pity its inevitable demise.

Neither is an apology lethal
Is not humiliating 
Is not exacting, even but 
Rather a calling to arms, to alliance.

The grandsons would like to put the urn down now
But safely
But gently 
But human.

Grief of such impenetrable power 
Cannot run its river course
Without allowance from the trees to 
Bend.

Postscript// my own ancestors were complicit in the gravest crimes in human history; that doesn’t make me a victim of slavery and that doesn’t make me my ancestors.

Isaiah 58:6

Monday, March 30

At Wrest


Certainty is the weight on your chest
Even at wrest, cannot catch your breath
The absolute bottom of the barrel 
Bad Guy to end all bad guys

But why does he have your same left thigh birthmark?
Or why does her sharp wit
Cut glass in the same backward blade as yours?

The mirror knows what the reflection refuses to see.

The Pharisee, a champion against time and mercy
The father feeding his family from the table of demons,
The most well-fed woman in the world 
Who convinced her husband of their hunger:

Is not God, Himself, their Villain? 

Imagine that is the truth you have chosen to believe.

James 1:23-25

Tuesday, January 6

Culture Culture


All it takes is a sample of society

slicked smooth sliver of it really

to understand

science is not salvation.


The petri dish swarming in spilt blood

Cannot cure itself of the

lust for more blood.


Even as the skin or the very spine of

the river ran dry,

Still the physicist tries to

heal immorality.


Hands

Clasped

Desperately

at the beaker in prayer,

Cut glass poking through the flesh

of their 

very last hope.


about: from an anthropological standpoint, people will cling to their culture (whether born from semen or science) even if it's killing them.

Saturday, August 2

Reaching for the Cleaver


Banana cream maybe?

Apple a la mode, obviously 

Mango and Rumberries, to me

But always a browned-butter crust.

The purpose of the American Pie is just that:
First, it’s going to taste the way 
temptation teased it would

And then?
It’s going to kill you.

The poison isn’t the pie, per se
But the going back for more

Monday, June 16

3 Haiku on Belonging


I
Hood in the heavens 
Pack among the prophets, a
Lone wolf would have died

II
We want to go home
Said: take us to your leader.
Alien be(longing)

III
Although, look at God!
Sisterhood a mended heart
Every brother a blessing

2 Thessalonians 2:13- we are obligated always to thank God for you, brothers loved by Jehovah

post script// what if the science fiction genre needed to create the concept of  "aliens” to make sense of the heavenly spirit realm?

post2// I'm thoroughly and utterly in love