A Mystery

I have been wondering how to write a book,
Wishing for a plot.
Poems flow out without forethought,
Often clarifying my ideas as I write.

I woke early one morning
To broken glass covering the floor and my bed.
Strangely, it was not sharp shards, but tempered glass.
Where had it come from?

I went to turn on the kitchen lights,
But nothing happened.
This terrified me.
Then I woke up for real.

That would make a good mystery:
A broken windshield in the bedroom,
Malfunctioning lights …
But after such a promising beginning,

Nothing further suggests itself.

Provision

When Phil left to drive to the abattoir,
He had a bad feeling.
Shortly after he left, the boys and I prayed.
We had prayed at breakfast. We prayed again.

Before Phil left our road,
The side mirror fell out and shattered.
That was his only way to see behind,
As the rearview mirror is useless with the trailer.

He found an old rearview mirror
Among the detritus in the truck,
And a single piece of baling wire, and two zip-ties.
He tied this makeshift mirror on, so he would have some mirror behind.

It rained all the way up, but the cows were delivered.
On the way home, the engine for the windshield wipers
Suddenly exploded,
At the same time the cloudburst renewed its fury.

Large, unwieldy dually without power steering,
Towing a large cattle trailer,
On a busy road with no shoulder,
In an unknown part of town.

Already stressful. Now, literally, zero visibility.
I can only imagine the terror of that moment.
We stand amazed that he didn’t die.
Once safely parked, he did call me to come and get him.

So I drove the hour and a half to find him,
Through torrential rains,
Phone about to die,
Not entirely sure where I was going.

I expected we would leave the truck and trailer,
And return again tomorrow.
Except rain is forecasted for the foreseeable future.
A temporary break in the rainfall allowed us to caravan slowly home.

So was our prayer answered? Yes.
He was safe.
The cows reached their destination.
And apart from a three hour stress, we are all unscathed.

Loading Animals

Our chute is makeshift: a few cattle panels and gates,
Cobbled together with rope and baling wire.

I have post-traumatic stress about the time
We tried to load the pig,
And we had constrained it and constrained it until it seemed like
There was nowhere else for it to go but in the trailer
When it stuck its nose under the fence I was
Standing on
And escaped.

So today when the three cows came towards the trailer
And turned around in a tight space,
I knew I was the weak link.
Stressed animals, their horns inches away,
Desperately contorting to turn around,
To escape this strange confinement
And to avoid the dark cave at the end.

Would this end in the animals running free?
Quite possibly.

Did I mention it was raining?

We four humans stood in the rain, dripping, stressed,
As we tried again and again to get the third animal in the trailer.

Finally we gave up for another day,
And were thankful for the two we had loaded successfully.

Model Grief

Our friend came to visit, now a month into grief.
He loved his wife. He misses her.

Yet he is still so entirely himself,
Still so matter-of-fact,

Yet overlaid with a new compassion,
With a penetrating vision of the task God has before him,

It gives me hope that the grief I have hoped was possible
Is actually attainable.

“We do not grieve as others who have no hope.”
I have seen this modeled.

An Assassin's Response

At thirteen, girls can be unpredictable.
Those nicknamed “assassin,” perhaps more so.

Her father feared the response
When the time came to tell that her mother was gone.

Ecstatically: “Mommy is with Jesus now!”
Then: weeping.

It was all that a parent could hope for.
Thanks be to God.

Perfect Children

Years ago, I heard a phrase:
“If you’re not a perfect parent,
But you want perfect children….”

I think of that statement now with horror.
What kind of parent demands perfection of their children?
What crushing religious system would offer that expectation?

Connections

I do not conjure up dates and times on my own.
But somehow, I will think,
“I should check the score”
And it happens to be the final eight seconds when the team wins.

Or I will think,
“Was this around the time that a CD was released?”
And I will go back to find that, yes,
My future friend did release a CD on this date, and I was there.

Or I will think,
“What was I doing a week ago this week?”
And the calendar will show the visitors who came,
And so I remember an anniversary or a trauma.

I think God makes these connections for me,
As a way to remind me that I am connected with my community.

Orchard

I go to see my family this Friday.
It will be a year to the day after my friend came to visit,
When she brought me an expensive book of Cezanne paintings
That had belonged to her mother,
Elegantly wrapped.

She came from a doctor’s appointment,
And we sat in the orchard in the
Beautiful light
Of an afternoon in early fall,
And we spoke of prayer and faith and healing.

That was the first and only time my friend came
To the farm, just to visit me.

As I go to see my family,
I will be mindful that each visit is a gift.

There is no guarantee of another.

On Playing Beethoven (Almost) Perfectly

Rather than working my way gradually up to the classics,
I spent months laboring over the four pages of notes
In the first movement of “Moonlight Sonata.”
When I got it tolerably well, I stopped for a year.

Lately, I have returned to that piece,
Playing it once or twice a day, wrestling through some sections,
Always quite imperfectly, until yesterday,
When I played it all through with only one wrong chord.

There is peace that comes over me.
Not in the beginning, when the jitters of supposed audience
Interfere with my absorption,
But further on,

When the beauty of the music envelops me.
I gasp daily at the glory Beethoven proffers.

Commandant

After Corrie spoke of God’s forgiveness,
The former S.S. officer came to greet her.

“It is so wonderful that God forgives our sins,”
And he stretched his hand for her to shake.

She knew him. He had leered at the prisoners
As they walked before him, naked and powerless.

And Corrie could not lift her hand to his.
“Help me, God, to live my message.”

A jolt of electricity flowed through her arm,
And she took his hand with forgiveness and joy.

“It is indeed wonderful to know
That God forgives our sins.”

Profound

I read that rather than running our own race,
We look at others, and fall prey to

Comparing
Competing
Coveting.

Leave Me Alone!

The boys get home from judo
Late. Sweaty and tired,
They eat supper and head to bed.

Tonight, a frustrated Abraham
Was overheard telling Caleb
Repeatedly,

“Leave me alone!”
And when Phil investigated,
He heard this complaint:

Caleb keeps coming in
And turning off the CD.
And when I stand up to turn it back on,
He climbs into my bed!

Such are the difficulties
Of being a beloved older brother.

It's Nothing to Do with Me

Skimming an “atmospheric” book
Leaves little more than a general impression.

Overall, I don’t enjoy Natalie Babbitt’s work,
Finding a core of meanness I dislike,

But in A Search for Delicious,
The kingdom approaches civil war,

Fighting about the definition of what is truly
Delicious. And the longer-lived—

The forest spirit and the underearth dwellers
And the mermaid—

Don’t care.
“It’s nothing to do with me.”

Our hero Gaylen, adopted and young, has to consider this position.
Is the foolishness of men worth risking his life?

Is his community, such as it is,
Anything to do with him?

How beautiful, that even as this temptation
Appears and reappears,

That he is happening upon the people and things he needs
To gain the help that will save all.

Twelve years down the road,
His life is satisfying and lovely.

If you are human, pursue the right.
It is everything to do with you.

The message comes through clearly:
You are your brother’s keeper.

Catalogs

One of the fun things I do for work
Is go through dozens of catalogs,
Looking for promising books to review.

It shocks me yet how many are not promising.

Sometimes there are books that I wonder about,
Ones that, as I’m racing through dozens of horrors,
Maybe warrant a second look, with fresh perspective.
I pull those pages aside “for later,”
Until I gradually accumulate
An overwhelming folder of papers that are
Almost promising.

I finally figured out how to deal with them.
I take five sheets out at a time,
Look over the ten sides carefully,
Discarding or keeping.
Then I make a mark to show that I have looked
At those ten or fifty titles.

This way, I know that I am making progress,
Even if the fat folder does not appear to change.

I can do this for an hour before my
Decision-making capacity
Freezes

And I need to take a break.

Syrophenician

Yes, Lord: yet the dogs under the table eat of the children’s crumbs.

Jesus was, I think,
Very tired.

Thronged wherever he went,
Opposed by those one would expect to be his friends,
He went, at last, into a foreign land …

But he could not be hid.

During his life, many educated men
Ask many difficult questions.

Jesus always comes out the victor.

Here is a Greek,
A woman,
Who goes to this foreigner
And takes the insult he gives
Without objection
If but her daughter could be healed.

Could there be a greater contrast?
The Jewish men, powerful and strong,
Plot to kill Jesus after he insults them.

The woman, foreign, powerless,
Receives whatever analogy he offers,
If he will but heal her girl.

She leaves, victorious.

Brilliant Marketing

We have an Audible account
Because the boys are in the car
Three hours a week.
They’ll get through the entire
Lord of the Rings trilogy
In a few months.

Phil realized the opportunity then:
He could listen to a book while he worked!
He is outside, alone, a lot,
Moving cows, working in the barn, mowing.
I find it hard to get his attention now around the house:
Earbuds in all the time, listening.

But none of this affected me.
If I’m in the car alone, I pray or praise.
If I’m in the house doing dishes, I decompress.
I don’t voluntarily fill my mental space with noise.

And then …

Audible ran a sale: five bucks a book.
Most of their options were ridiculous,
But I scanned the titles anyway, curious.
Cry, the Beloved Country,
One of my all time favorites …
I could listen to that during dishes, and be happy.

And then …

Mansfield Park.
I have read this before,
But remember none of it, so my beautiful volume
Sits in storage, untouched,
Waiting for a day of more free time.

This I listen to during dishes,
Rejoicing in the beautiful language,
The interesting plot in miniature,
The newness and unexpectedness.

This objectively makes my life better.

Kombucha

When the batch Phil never liked finally busted,
I brewed anew.

Effervescent bubbles and delicious,
Refreshing drink.

Sickness

We have had sick people miss church
Four out of five weeks.

This seems statistically improbable:
There aren’t that many of us.

I have heard Christians suggest
That we fight against the dark forces.

I am not sure that this is the way of peace.
What does it mean to resist the devil?

Does it mean casting him out?
Or does it mean worshipping God, no matter what happens?

Because I have seen that,
No matter who is sick, and what they are missing,

Things work themselves out.
Is this not also a provision?

In Which the Dalai Lama Proves to Be an Introvert

When you talk, you are only repeating what you already know. But if you listen, you may learn something new.

Clearly, the Dalai Lama has never needed
To externally process.

Sometimes I discover something new
As I’m talking about it.

Shopping Regret

I bought a rain jacket because I felt beautiful in it.
How could this be?

I still don’t know.
Rain jackets aren’t known for their stylish cut.

Weeks later, I saw a rain jacket at Costco
For one-seventh what I paid. (And mine was on sale.)

I don’t like shopping much,
Because even if I love what I buy, I still feel regret.

Betrayal

Two books by an author
I deeply appreciated:
Creative, interesting, kind.

Two more
I deeply enjoyed:
Books to finish and go about the day with a smile.

Then I hit a stretch of four by the author that left me
Feeling eviscerated
And betrayed:

Nasty characters doing nasty things,
Thinking nasty thoughts and
Living petty lives.

Why would anyone voluntarily go to the library
And be subjected to such an assault?

Dry

I’ve been working so hard lately,
The idea of writing about my life or thoughts or emotions
Seemed absurd.

I find it challenging to know
Where to begin.

Shalom

We expected the cows would run away.
Stressful loading is all we’ve seen.

So when, at the end of a long morning,
The two cows voluntarily went into the trailer

Without direction or force or people close by,
I cannot think of that except as a miracle,

An example of the shalom I seek,
Where man and beast dwell together in peaceful mutual aid.

Drama Director

A commentary suggests
That pastors, teachers,
Are the drama directors

Helping the cast understand their roles,
And play their roles well.
I can see this. I like it.

Coherence

On my favorite Sundays,
The meeting has unplanned coherence.

Phil read something by a friend in Kentucky today
That directly echoed a book I read yesterday
That related to what Mike was thinking about this week
While Sarah was living it
And that Andrew’s friend talked about this morning.

These connections remind me that
The Holy Spirit is at work
In me
In us.

A Gift

I try not to be tied to numbers.
If we have three people for dinner,
We share our lives with those three,
And leave satisfied.

So it surprised me that, immediately before
We arrived at our destination,
I thought, I would like someone new tonight.

And, when I walked in,
There she was!

Sickness

Three times in four weeks now,
The person we expected would address us
Has been, at the last minute,
Sick.

Statistically, this seems improbable.

We can spot resistance when we see it.

Observed

A friend said,
People confessed their biggest secrets
Anonymously, online.
I read through this list of brokenness—
Incest, molestation, divorce, adultery,
On and on—

And I have never seen more clearly
The divide between what it is to walk in darkness
And walk in light.

The only hope for the world is Jesus.

One Orange Leaf

I sat in the forest.
Amidst the green on all sides,
One shockingly orange leaf

Hovered, unconnected, yet suspended.
Realistically, I knew that this leaf
Had an invisible web that sustained it,

But when I imagined that away,
The leaf took on a hue of mystery
As it swayed gently in the breeze.

Endorphins

Caleb was a bit bored,
And as I read in bed,
He fell over me
So I hugged him
Until we were both
Laughing uproariously.

Changing Tires

Phil has been worried about the state of our tires.
He took the van to the store.

1.
They said they would run a sale the next week,
So bring the car back.

2.
The store’s sale was so good, they had no more tires.
Come back in a few days, they said.

3.
The appointed day arrived, but when Phil reached the store,
They had no tires yet.
He went grocery shopping, and when he finished,
They called to say they were restocked.
But he had a van full of perishable food
And a 45-minute drive ahead of him,
So he headed home.

4.
With five boys in tow,
Phil brought the van in
The Friday before Labor Day.
As the worker tried to get the bolts off,
One of the struts broke.
If another broke, the van would have to be towed,
And Phil would be stranded, with five boys.
At the start of a holiday weekend.

The shop couldn’t fit us in for a week.
We’ll get those tires fixed one of these days.

Lack of Motivation

We bought a little riding mower.
It no longer functions.
We didn’t know, when we moved,
That gas deteriorates.
Probably one fall, we left the tank filled.
By spring, the mower no longer worked.

We bought a tractor with a mower.
The mower blades broke the first time out.
Phil repaired them once.
Maybe twice.
But our land remains not quite smooth enough;
The mower gets used sometimes, but not too often.

We bought a trimmer.
Phil wanted to clean up the back before a party
And a pebble broke our back door.
Sometime later, the trigger broke.

We bought a lawn mower.
That seemed like a safe possibility,
To keep clear the areas around the house.
After Phil spent the afternoon outside mowing,
He felt sick when he saw the back of the van:
The rearview window had shattered.

Caleb and I were outside when it probably happened,
And the car would have blocked us from a flying stone shard.
So this story is not entirely without thanksgiving for life,
But I can understand a certain lack of motivation
For Phil, if every time he steps outside,
He creates a need for repair.

Babies Are Part

As I taught some things I’d read about Ephesians,
Caleb crawled over the couches and smiled at friends.

In church, babies are usually shunted off to the nursery,
Where they cannot distract the adults.

As the one interrupted,
I understand the appeal.

And yet … is it not good for babies to be included, too?
I don’t miss the nursery.

Burial

A year ago, we buried my grandfather.
I think he fit the definition of a narcissist:
One who charms all,
But those who are closest all need counseling.

As we sat outside next to the burial hole,
Rugs covering the grave of my grandma,
The siblings and a few grandchildren and spouses
Gathered to commemorate.

In the midst of so much brokenness,
Most were able to find something good.
Some weren’t.
May God restore all things, in his time.

I was privileged to witness this,
Me and the five boys,
On a hot Tuesday morning
Last September.

Movie Night

During my high school years,
My family would watch a movie
Most Sunday nights.

This Sunday, after we had eaten and prayed and sung and visited,
We watched O Brother, Where Art Thou?
And laughed all the way through,
Children, college students, parents.

And I thought, This is what families do.

In the Midst of Turmoil

We share our lives at Supper Church.
This week, there were some heavy things.
Maybe there are every week.

This Sunday, after we shared,
We had a beautiful, peaceful time of prayer,
One for another.

Loving Through Challenge

A friend is interning.
Her mentor proves hard to work with.

We talked about how backwards God’s kingdom is,
That we go forward in love and faith,
And God fights on our behalf.

The Perfection of Jesus

No one has yet discovered the word Jesus ought to have said. He is full of surprises, but they are all the surprises of perfection.

My friend is reading the excellent
Encounters with Jesus,
By gifted teacher Tim Keller.

When Lazarus dies, Mary and Martha
Say the same thing to Jesus:
“Lord, if you had been here,
My brother would not have died.”

To Martha, Jesus brings the ministry of truth:
“I am the resurrection and the life.”

To Mary, Jesus brings the ministry of tears:
Jesus wept.

To one, his deity shone.
To the other, his humanity could not contain his grief.

There is no savior like our Savior.

Shopping

With winter coming, I looked at my wardrobe and realized
I had many cardigans, many jackets, enough winter sweaters,
But no good long-sleeved shirts,
And few short-sleeved.

In a day of satisfying shopping,
My friend was free on Labor Day,
And we went to seven stores,
One of them twice.

With a coffee break in the middle,
We were relaxed and happy,
As we searched for my style:
Fitted, casual, comfortable, classic.

This was surprisingly difficult to find,
But I ended up with all that I needed,
And a skirt to delight in
And a jacket I loved at a price I could pay.

Thanks to Labor Day, 49% off the total.
Thanks to God for a good day.

The Temple

My friend was studying the passage in Kings
Where Solomon built the Temple.

This, covered in gold, and
This, covered in gold, and
This, covered in gold, and
This, covered in gold, and
This, covered in gold,

The most repetitive passage,
Reinforcing, in its own excessive repetition,
The opulence of the structure.

Can you believe that, after a place like this,
God came and lived as a homeless man?

The mind boggles.

Later that week, my friend ended up staying in the hospital,
As numerous tests were run on her friend.

The incredible complexity of the body,
The intricacy, the elaborate precision:

Perhaps the body actually was a more suitable temple
For a king than some structures plated in gold.

Mirror Image

The new judo gym
Was once a dance studio.

Abraham said,
“There’s only one person
Who understands me completely.

That’s him.”

And he pointed to himself
In the wall of mirrors.

Patronized

My weekly news magazine,
Some books on the history of science—

Both delight me, inform me.
Both assume no one of intelligence yet believes in God.

They exude a subtle, constant assumption
That ignorant people were churched in times past

But today we know better
As we and our culture evolve to a higher understanding.

I grow weary of feeling patronized.

Given

I.
I had been dreading the idea of driving
Up to town
For church.
All summer, people came to us.

Until the week we actually made the transition:
My friend had died,
My house uncleaned.
When I needed to change, I was ready.

II.
A new family moved next door,
Four children,
Small house.
They seem like we were.

Phil met them, and was happy,
But I felt exhausted
Just at the prospect
Of letting more people into my life.

People require emotional energy.
I had none.
Until the moment
They arrived. Then I was given what I needed.

Toothbrushing

Four boys got appliances in their mouths.
They need to brush and floss more diligently.

Two boys had never tried the sonic toothbrush.
They were terrified.

I will not describe the contortions required to brush their teeth.
There were many.

But in the end, I think they were a little chagrined
By the extent of their protesting

Over the non-traumatic reality
Of the brushing itself.

Change is hard.
When it happens, though,

I will hope for the laughter from a tickling toothbrush,
And abashment for the vehemence of unnecessary protest.

The Right Response

After being asked twice in two days,
“How’s the farming going?”
I realized I needed a better response than,
“Not so good.”

Because though that is true,
That things around the farm are slow
And often discouraging,
My life, as a whole, is good.

The second time, when asked,
I had the right response:
“Although the farming itself is not always what I hoped,
I have no complaints.”

I think that captures both the
Disappointment inherent in our life on the farm,
And the overall sense that we are where we’re supposed to be,
And the satisfaction that comes of following Jesus.

Jitters

Wednesday, I lay down to sleep
And bounced up again, jittery.

Caleb and I stayed up another hour.
And I stayed on edge for two days.

I have a lot of friends in transition.
Their sorrows become my sorrows.

Friday, I took a silent retreat.
For five minutes, I wrote down the sorrows.

They are too much for me to carry,
But Jesus is stronger.

Then I lay down to sleep
And slept until I was refreshed.

And as many as touched him
Were made perfectly whole.

Blind But Now I See

Unexpectedly, I had a few hours to do …
Something.

I looked at my shelves desultorily:
Surely there would be something to read?

But what came to mind again and again was
The Blind Side, that Sandra Bullock movie.

Caleb and I headed to storage to get it.
I was scanning movie titles when he escaped.

He kicked over some books, and I, impatient,
Started to push them together.

And there, at the bottom of the stack,
Was a commentary on Ephesians.

My inner being leapt: this was what I desired.
I had forgotten I had it.

The movie went unwatched.
But the way my day ended satisfied me.

Inspiration

A week ago or so, while reading the Word,
I thought that I should have all my sons
Go through their whole wardrobes.

Cold weather is coming,
And I have some doubt they have jeans enough.
We’ll travel at some point. Will there be anything to pack?

I have never done this thoroughly,
Always relying on hand-me-downs and gifts,
And a very occasional ancillary purchase, as needed.

This thought must have been from God.
All my sons have grown at least an inch since March.
My oldest, on review, had no clothes fit to wear in public.

My husband took him shopping for a complete wardrobe.
He called his mom, wondering how she managed his clothes’ shopping.
They were gone eight hours.

And they aren’t quite done.
Shoes, jackets, sweatshirts yet to come.
And then we must outfit the other four boys.

A Small Hand

I haven’t canned in five years.
I tried to move applesauce
From fridge to counter to canner.

Happily, only one shattered.

Unhappily, I had to redo the entire 30 jars.
Applesauce, so it seems, has to be hot to can well.

In the midst of the chaos of a kitchen
With almost every pot in use,
Boiling applesauce splattering;
In the midst of another too-many-hours project,
With the question always looming,
Is this the best use of my time?,

I asked my son to unload the dishwasher.

For some minutes he protested,
Coming up with an astonishing array of alternative suggestions,
Including the mind-boggling,
“Why don’t you do it?”

At which point I explained, mostly calmly,
That I was at imminent risk of burning,
That I was tired and not having fun,
And could he please just do his task with a good attitude?

Silence for some minutes.

The dishwasher was thoroughly emptied.

And then a small hand rested briefly on my back,
A gesture of apology and
Comfort.

Best Topping for Toast

At my Grandma’s, growing up,
We ate chocolate sprinkles on bread.

I tried that for a month or two.
Surfeit of sweetness. I took a break.

At my own house, growing up,
We ate cinnamon sugar on toast.

When the bread is browned,
And the butter melts in,

And the cinnamon sugar is saturated—
I have yet to grow tired of this treat.

Prism

Triangular glass,
Cool and heavy,
Revealing the rainbows
That surround us.

Hot Cross Buns

The boys and I sing this song
And sing the solfege of this song
And play this song on the black keys.

It makes me happy.