Hymne to God the Father*

Before time

            your counsels chose

            that you would lose

eternal ties

            with your one

            and only Son.

Not sparing Him,

            you let the whips

            fall and the blood drip.

Judges condemned

            as the priests quipped.

On a dark hill,

            like Abraham,

            you left your Lamb.

No bright angel

            unveiled a ram

snared in thickets

            by its horns.

            Instead, the thorns

on Christ’s head caught

            the sacrifice

            of God’s own life.

Nails split

            His wrists and feet

            and severed sweet

communion, which

            left you bereaved.

Not even birth

            pangs compare to

            what you went through

at your Son’s death.

            Abba, thank you.

*The form of this poem was borrowed from Hymne to God the Father by Ben Jonson.

 See Ben Jonson's poem here:  http://4umi.com/jonson/hymn

Triptych: A Tree in Three Seasons

I.

Atop a hill there is a weathered oak

whose listless limbs spread so wide it seems

to hang by them and not to stand.  It’s bark

is scarred by whips of wind, by scratching beasts,

by birds that pierce its trunk with beaks.  When fall

arrives, a crimson stain spreads to all

the leaves.  They slowly trickle down beneath

a blanching sky, and then, leaf by leaf,

their reddish carpet covers up the ground.

It seems that with the leaves a peace descends.

The breeze breathes a sigh, perhaps relieved

and ready to forget how summer lived

intemperately.  But seasons change.  Amends

are made.  What was before cannot be found.


II.

Like a single, massive stone, clouds

roll in heavily overhead, sealing

everything in the darkened earth.  Stealing

downward, ashen snowflakes fill the ground.

Hours later, the landscape is buried

under whitish mounds.  The oak tree’s

limbs, covered in snow, slowly ossify

in the breathless, frozen air.  Nearby,

icicles curl over a stream, gripping

its banks like the fingers of a glass

skeleton.  The sun turns its vacant stare 

on the clouds, helpless to move them.  Everywhere,

silence keeps its secrets, and the days pass.

Winter is here: grave, still, and waiting.


III.

Early morning—like the first day

of creation—waits in dark mystery

for the light.  The dawn paints gradually

on its black canvass: first gray,

then color returns to the world’s

face like a man reviving.  All

winter long, the land has drunk the cold,

melting snow.  Underground, in small

gaps and crevices, things sprout and grow,

nourished by the runoff.  Flora raises

above ground, beyond the earth’s hold.

Limbs outstretched, the oak stands in bold

relief, suddenly shot through with the sun’s rays,

which crown spring and renew everything below.

Crux

Here—

where clouds overhead

and crowds at your feet

thicken into an untimely

darkness—

you can’t tell

miracle from murder,

blessing from curse,

God from your enemy.

Here—

where vultures overhead

and priests at your feet

circle, waiting for a

body—

you can’t tell

mystery from mockery,

life from death,

wine from blood.

Here,

beams, bones,

paths, purposes,

swords and fingers

cross;

“X” marks the spot

where you hang,

and

all you know is

you are

here.

Grief

Stepping out for a walk,

I see the fog is back.

You never know when it will come,

when the clouds will settle heavily,

blocking out the sun

from the sky to the ground.

It rolls in softly.

Almost before you notice,

it permeates everything,

and the chill is beneath your skin.

When will it lift?

No one can say.

As it comes, it goes.

It always evaporates

after awhile.

The last particles of mist

sparkle as they dance

and sublimate in the sun.

Until then,

I’ll just have to walk

in it,

keeping the company

of the silhouettes

that appear, memory-like,

in the vapor.

Farmland in Winter

Fallen timbers

criss-cross like bones

protruding from shallow graves.

They were once barns,

sheds,

outlying buildings.

Among other things,
they kept

what the reaper brought.

Now,

for all of us who pass them

as we travel this rural highway,

they hold the future,

haunted

by snow that drifts ghost-like

through the empty fields

where they lie.

Rise and Shine

The percolator

bubbling and puffing,

the clink of dishes,

feet thumping overhead,

the hiss of butter or bacon

on a hot pan…

Morning sounds,

like sprites,

hovered around my head,

until I was drawn from sleep

by their spell.

But it was the laughter,

the voices

spry with conversation,

that finally got me out of bed

and bounding up the stairs

from my grandparents’ basement.

What jokes had I missed?

What stories or discussions?

Had an aunt or uncle stopped by

with cousins in tow?

I didn’t know it then,

but now I can see

the face of God

behind the smiles of relatives,

the shadow of communion

in the buttered toast and jam,

the resurrection and the life

as I woke from sleep

and found the arms of grandma

or grandpa

open

and waiting.

Waking & Sleeping (for Dad)

It was like so many other times

I’d seen you sleeping—

on the couch after dinner;

with a baby on your chest;

on a lawnchair in the back yard.

Of course, you weren’t so thin then.

Your body wasn’t gnawed away by cancer.

Still, it wasn’t so different

with your head slightly cocked

and your hands resting on your chest.

The real difference

will be in the waking.

You won’t yawn and reach for the remote;

you won’t stretch and scratch;

you won’t roll out of your chair

to grab a cold one.

This time,

you will wake

where no eye has seen;

you will wake suddenly from troubled dreams

only to find yourself safe

in the secret dark,

arms enfolding you.