Dark-skinned baby Jesus
Lay quietly in the manager
Atop the three year old’s
Mondrian lego dump truck
Wise men watch
Quietly
Too wise to intervene
In a child’s over-excited
Stubbornness
Macaroni and cheese
And sweet potatoes
Insistently eaten after
Boston cream pie
But before the
Made by himself
Cookie dough cake
Gathering
Crumbled wrapping paper
Carpeting the floor
Neighbors bring
Christmas greetings
Cookies
And – oh blessed gift –
Their three children
Five adults talk
For over an hour
As four children
Play
Inside and outside
A Christmas miracle
Worth celebrating
Year: 2021
Thanksgiving Challenges
To be thankful for:
ToDo lists that never get done
a God I’m not sure is there
the sun shining on dusty furniture
young dreams that never became
wet clothes I forgot to dry
life lived, sometimes well, sometimes not
a marriage betrayed
one time too many
a family broken
in ways that can’t be fixed
friends left behind
when I let life move me on
the winter of life
when the bright leaves have fallen
These are the challenges.
All the rest is easy.
Comfort My Age, O God
Inspired by Isaiah 40: 1-8
Comfort, O comfort my age, I cry to my God.
Speak tenderly to my years,
for I have served my term, my penalty is paid,
I have received from life double for all my sins.
My voice cries out:
“In the wilderness of age prepare the way of hope,
make straight in the desert time of life a highway for grace.
Every valley of despair shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill of discouragement be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
Then the glory of living long shall be revealed,
And we shall see it together,
for joy speaks still to us.”
God’s voice says, “Cry out!”
And I answer, “Do you want to hear my cry?”
All people are grass,
our lives are like the flowers of the field.
We wither, the flower of our youth fades,
when the breath of life blows upon it;
surely we are grass.
Yes, we wither, the flower of our youth fades;
but the joy of our faith can stand forever.
The Simple Truth
Four loads of laundry
Bleach with the load
Of bedsheets
Spot removal
On tea towels, napkins, washcloths
One load after another
Into my washer
With multiple settings
None of which I change
Three loads hung out on
Two clotheslines
Clothespin holder shaped like
A pioneer dress
I feel like a pioneer woman
As I lift the poles
To raise the well hung clothes lines
I feel strong and noble
Like I am personally saving
The plant
But one load goes in the dryer
As I pick herbs
To use in the Italian herb bread recipe
I found on the internet
And am bravely adapting
To stuff the bread
With our own cherry tomatoes
Sautéed in olive oil
That splattered across the electric stove
As I hung out the second laundry load
In the kitchen I killed a fly that persisted
In buzz bombing me
Until every smallest shred of Buddhist
Inclination vaporized
I thought of my Christian images
Of God
As I cleaned the kitchen
While my handmade bread rose
In my oven
With the setting for proofing bread
Some days
Even the simple life
Seems complicated
Much less my attempts
To commune with the divine
I wish I could wish
That I had not killed that fly
But I’m glad I did
And that’s the truth of it
His Earth
The earth itself is his natural element. Perhaps some god graced his parents With foreknowledge To name him Elwood Perhaps some imp tickled his friends’ fancy To nickname him Woody Because this son of a sharecropper Grew up Past his horticultural degree To become a tree farmer More hobbit than Ent He understands dirt And weather Seasons And lifespans His strength weathers like his trees His smile blooms like his flowers His love endures like his perennials His steadiness nourishes like his vegetables His generosity flows like his stream Into the carefully built pond of his friendships He rests in the sunshine On the porch he built As he rests in my heart On the love he planted there And tends so carefully With his gardener’s sure hands As though I were His earth itself
Joy
I turn into the driveway Negotiating easily Thoughtlessly Thanks to 12 years practice Between mailbox and side rock garden I pull the car halfway up the driveway But can go no further My way blocked by the pile of sweet smelling Wood chips Higher than the car Filling the top of the driveway Waiting for our shovels and wheelbarrow To disperse them So they become Once again Part of our garden Lying low on our pathways As their parent maple tree Once towered over all Despite the hollowness in its trunk I pause in the driveway Sitting in the driver’s seat Staring at the wood chip pile In front of me And I laugh aloud at the thought Of plowing the car into that pile Burying steel in wood I reach for my purse Take out my phone That is also my camera Open the car door Step out, putting my Starbucks grande mocha decaf latte On the roof of the car So I can take a picture Not of the wood chip pile But of the small brave yellow Sternbergia Blooming amid the rocks At the side of the driveway Blooming as if spring And not autumn Were just now, just here Blooming their yellow promise Of another spring Right around winter’s corner Between wood chips piled high And Sternbergia blooming low I am immersed in joy.

Words
My head is loud with words
Too loud
Too often
Too many words
(I never learned the knack
Of wordless wonder)
Who was I, do you suppose,
In my mother’s womb
Before words conquered me?
Who am I, do you suspect,
In my secret soul
Where words delight me?
Who will I be, do you suggest,
In my lifeless grave
When words desert me?
Will I be?
Can I be?
Do I want to be?
Without words
Beyond A Word
A word can bounce around in my
Almost knowing just barely
Scarcely avoiding
tongue
A word can fly from my
Almost stopping just barely
Scarcely parting
Lips
A word can echo echo through my
Almost joining just barely
Scarcely muttering
Prayers
But I have yet to find
A single word for
That bird’s shadow
Swinging just barely
Scarcely across our green lawn
Seen, not said, through
My kitchen window
My hands warm in soapy water
9/11/2021
from Psalm 113
God is higher than our deepest depths are low God is brighter than our darkest day is dark God raises us from the rubble of our troubles God lifts us from the ashes of our destruction God comforts our minds, our hearts, our souls So that we can feel secure and honored, loved and protected Just when we need it most When fear and sadness, Danger and divisions Threaten to overwhelm us... God fills our emptiness with Her grace, God blesses our sorrows with Her comfort, God mourns with us, With all of Her oft troubled people Praise God! Amen
Mysteries
All of my friends are mysteries to me. Wendy’s steady gentleness That can still speak hard truths when needed Ann’s proud self-assurance That hides her too-real insecurity Norma’s thoughtful faith That welcomes my many doubts Carol’s urgent caretaking That out-strips her diminishing strength Their lives, their souls are ever mysterious to me But then so is my own My writing, my praying My fractured relationships With my children and My sometimes God No friend is more mysterious to me Than that God Whom I am never really sure Even exists But whom I talk to daily Not to seek favors Or even salvation Simply because As mysterious as it is to believe in God It is impossible not to.