I Had a Little Extra Time

Tonight for our Supper Fellowship,
I made pot roast (pre-shredded for easy eating)
With a vegetable gravy,
And homemade gnocchi with
Garlic butter cheese sauce,
With fresh homemade bread and good butter,
And green beans.

One said, “This is stupid good,
Which is the highest praise I can say about anything.”

And, really, I think she was right.

The Stacks

I decided to read a book a day
For the next year. I figured
It wouldn’t finish my stacks of unread works,
But it would make a dent.

Four weeks in, I have read forty.

I realize now that I didn’t necessarily need
To read them all, but rather needed some feeling of order
Among my hundreds of unreads.
And I achieved that.

I have one book that I look forward to reading for fun. One.

Most of the rest of my books are not escapist pleasantry.
They are classics, with death and despair,
Or historical fiction, set during war and deprivation.
I have a goodly number of self-help,
More aptly titled, “How you’re doing it wrong,”
And a goodly number of Christian books (more of the same).

So I started to separate those that I intend to read
From those that I am not sure I ever want to get to.
And this was incredibly freeing.

I have shelves now, where I can pull one at will
And read it through.
And a single shelf with books that I am not committed to,
But will look at briefly and decide: be rid of? Or read?

But they are divided: the somedays from the maybe nots.

They have been organized.
All boys who entered the storage space
Were amazed at the difference.

And I am simply
Grateful.

The Ambulance and the Fence

There was a precipice.
People kept falling over,
Needing ambulances.

The city counsel proposed
An ambulance service. All voted
Yea, except one man. He suggested a fence.

“I have asked every one of the fall victims,
And all have wanted an ambulance.”
And so the ambulance service commenced.

We have both fence and ambulance.
The fence is the power, in Christ,
To be free from sin.

But should you skirt the fence and fall,
There is an ambulance available:
Repentance.

If we sin, our loving father still loves,
And so he disciplines. That is unpleasant.
So repent, and return to joy.

Preservative

I once sat in a lecture by a believer,
Who encouraged his hearers
Not to hold back unbelievers from
The slippery slope.
Instead, maybe give them a little push.

This was long ago, and I hope
His hope was that they would reach the bottom
And turn to Christ.

How different, though, from Christ,
Who called his followers to be the salt of the earth.

We live in an age of refrigeration.
In a hot climate without ice or electricity,
Salt would have been a preservative.
(And a flavor enhancement.
And a substance needed for survival.
If you sweat too much with salt, you die.)

This world is decaying.
So preserve what you can.

I suspect that love
Goes further towards winning souls
Than a push.

Bach

After months of painstaking practice,
I can play “Moonlight Sonata,” mostly.

Full stop.
That one piece was so challenging,
And took so long, I had no direction next.

I thought recently about Bach.
He, perchance, had some simple piano exercises.

And so arrived a book, and I started the first one.
Immediately recognizable,
“Minuet in G.”

So lilting and lovely it makes me cry
Even to play it imperfectly,
Or when I hear it in a tinny YouTube video.

I know this is not a difficult piece,
And that I will be able to play it well at some point
Somewhat soon,
But until then, I get to enjoy
The glory of Bach.

Such a gift.

Advent I

A candle for hope.

Not only a remembrance that Christ came,
But a reminder that, to this world of woe,
Christ will come again.

Even so, come, Lord Jesus.

Knives

I once bought a set of inexpensive,
Sharp knives for travelling.
I could cook on the road without risking anything expensive.

A friend saw this and was impressed,
But she later mentioned that she went to the store
And they were gone.

Months later, I was shopping and noticed the set.
And so I bought them, hesitantly,
Because who knows if her family had them in mind.

But seeing her joy and overwhelming gratitude
Reminded me:
Do not delay being kind.

Green Tea and Shortbread

Of all cookies, shortbread has always seemed
A bit lacking: no chocolate chips;
No chewy mouth-feel, like a snickerdoodle;
No lucious sweet-sour topping like a lemon square.

Sugar, butter, flour, vanilla, salt.
Bake to a crunch. Done.

But something about the rich sweetness
Called me when I was sick.

And in the morning, when I brewed green tea
And tried dipping:
That was a revelation.

But of course. This was something
My mother had mentioned long ago.
This is why my grandma took a midmorning break.

Get a little perfection in your mouth.
Go about your day, renewed and refreshed.

Treasure Hunt

Mind-dull with a head cold’s fatigue,
I found on my door, this post-it note:
“There starts the treasure hunt: out door.”

And so I followed the trail of post-it notes,
Lovingly placed by one son,
While the other four sons bounded ahead and swarmed behind,
One keeping up a color commentary.

There was a red herring, the word “Fire,” which,
When I opened the cold stove to take the note,
Found, “Not here,” an unexpected full stop.
Nor did it mean lighter, candle, matches, or Lego flames
(Eventually I realized: an electronic device).

This was not, strictly speaking, a treasure hunt,
As the prize was only the encouraging note:
“You made it yay!!!!!”

And yet, there was a treasure.
The thought and care and kindness that was given in
The several dozen clues.
The companionship of sons.

Let me not dismiss this treasure
Simply because there was nothing tangible.

Hard Core

Jonathan Goforth,
Missionary to China.

Cruelly bullied at Christian school.
Loved the perpetrators so that, four years later,
They agreed to support him financially for life.

Lost all to a fire.
Rebuilt.
Lost all to a flood.
Rebuilt.
Lost most to theft.
Rebuilt.

Five. Children. Dead.

The others, along with wife and self,
Almost killed during the Boxer Rebellion.

Blind the last few years of life.

Ever evangelistic, optimistic.
Intent on furthering the kingdom of God.

I read his life story and think,
Like Noah and the prophets of old:

This man was hard core,
Persevering to an extreme I cannot begin to imagine.

Expectancy

The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today.

I realize that Seneca has more fame
Than I could ever hope,
And yet I question his quote.

Is it not more fun to savor the coming joy?
When I prepare for a trip,
I appreciate the anticipation;

Rather than diminishing my today,
It enhances it.
Actually, this is true for a trip

Or eternity.

Shakespeare

A week ago, an unexpected treat:
All home on a Friday night.

I made the boys watch
Much Ado About Nothing,

As Shakespeare has been on my list
Of “Don’t let them leave home without it”

Things for the boys to learn.
One of the boys, miserable, cried through the first half.

(But one of the boys laughed so hard,
He almost fell off the couch.)

Tonight we had a reprise,
So we enjoyed Twelfth Night.

We missed the jester’s lines, of course,
But when the entire group

Broke into laughter at the duel,
I enjoyed a moment of timelessness.

Four hundred years now
Have people been laughing at Shakespeare.

Helper

A guest came.
He chose a beer.

Caleb reached into the right drawer
And pulled out the can opener,

Brought it to the guest,
And, after its use, returned it.

A helper, alert and cheerful,
Though he yet has to acquire speech.

Suffering

Try to remember the old law: selfishness begets evil and generosity begets good.

Let your good outweigh your bad.
Love to get love.
Is this not the basis of most religion?

Job’s friends understood the appeal
Of such an orderly universe.
So when evil befell him, they knew who to blame:

Job. He must have done wrong,
And now is reaping what he sowed.
It sounds so true.

Except it isn’t.
Job reaps pain where he sowed righteousness.
His actions had no correlation with his receipts.

This carries over: “Love your neighbor as yourself,”
Said the one who was tortured and killed
By the enemies he loved.

They were stoned,
They were sawn asunder,
Were tempted, were slain with the sword:

They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins;
Being destitute, afflicted, tormented;
(Of whom the world was not worthy:)

It seems to me that followers of Christ both affirm and deny
This idea of karma,
Of spiritual cause and effect.

The good that you do has cosmic significance.
And yet the good that you do may have
No rewards now.

And, indeed, no more reward later than that
Available to all:
Eternal life.

A Voice

None of my children had ever spoken up
As we sit at table with our larger family on Sunday night.

One young lady shared about her busy week,
That she had filled up her gas tank four times.

Isaiah piped up: “How big is your gas tank?”
And we all laughed.

He had said something
In the midst of the congregation.

The next morning, we read of Peter’s denial,
And he spoke up again.

“I find it interesting that the cock crowed once
After his first denial. He had a warning.”

True. Speak up, brother.
We need to hear your voice.

Happiness Is ...

Saturday night, in the playroom’s chair,
Four brothers cluster around the oldest,
As he reads a graphic novel aloud—
“But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks?”

Romeo and Juliet,
Reading pleasure of choice
By the band of brothers.

Bloomability

In high school, I read this book
About a girl who goes to boarding school
In Switzerland:

Day trips to Florence,
Or the home of Herman Hesse (after reading one of his works),
Learning Italian,
A two-week ski school.

I read it now again
And cry
Because since then I have been to Florence,
And I have listened to Italian,
And I have tried skiing and anchovies,

And I have, I think,
Lived my life with gusto and gratitude,
And I think I can say to my younger self,
Of course you admire this idyllic life.
You should. But do not long for it.
You, too, have had a good run.

Trafficking

When Africans were sold into slavery,
They cost about as much as a nice car.
They were an investment.

Today, a pimp says that the price of a girl
Is literally nothing;
Some kind words in a vulnerable moment.

With nothing invested,
They have no reason to do maintenance,
Cheaper to dispose of one body and get another.

Even so, come Lord Jesus.

Guilty Pleasure

I know the benefits of brown rice:
More fiber, more nutrients.

But I found one final container of
White jasmine rice
And we have been eating it
With alacrity.

So tasty!

Growing

Even as an infant, Jadon didn’t
Like hugs. We called him
Our porcupine, he was so prickly,
Or octopus, because arms and legs
Kicked out at those trying to get close.

He was standing in the kitchen
And I gave him a hug.
My son, up to my chin,
Almost my equal in weight.
He said, “Yuck!” and brushed himself off.

A Poem to My Ears

Mum-mum, mwah
Mum-mum, mwah

Repeated over and over
By little boy lips.

Precisely So

How dull our days, how lacking in surprise
Without these small epitomes of sin,
These flowers with their store of life within
And grave, appalling freshness in their eyes.

Frances Cornford sums up
Parenthood, admirably.

Tell John

When John the Baptist,
Imprisoned, asked Jesus if
He was the one who was to come,
Or should he wait for another,

The messengers waited and watched
An hour, while Jesus worked.

Then Jesus said, Tell John:

The blind see
The lame walk
The lepers are cleansed
The deaf hear
The dead are raised
To the poor the gospel is preached.

The last miracle mentioned,
Apparently, not less than the rest.

March

Since May, I have been cataloging books,
Going through drawers,
Slowly reducing my email inbox from fifteen hundred.

I have been trying to order my life.
Books I don’t remember, or those unread,
I moved to storage. Same with “Someday/Maybe” cookbooks.

Today, I finished the house.
Cleaned from top to bottom, I have a free and open space,
Perhaps more easy to maintain.

In the course of cleaning, last week
I found a note to myself from March, that I had forgotten,
That expressed how overwhelmed I felt,

With random stuff everywhere.
I am thankful that, in the same calendar year,
I had time to work toward resolution.

Great Art

Happiness in art …
Does it exist?

Are there great works
Without brooding
Or sorrow?

Don’t the harder things
Resonate more?

Worship music
Resonates, too.

Truth sung,
Joyful praise.

Perhaps God
Has a monopoly
On happiness,

And so anything
Apart from him

Falls flat.

Christmas Music

I have two or three Christmas albums.
I listen to them once every year or two.

But Handel’s Messiah
I listen to every year, all year. The choir sang,

Wonderful! Counselor!
The Mighty God! The Everlasting Father!
The Prince of Peace!

In the verbal equivalent of a company front,
I got chills again
At the power and beauty of truth, proclaimed.

While I Drove

I thought about a time of rich friendship,
Two couples, one single,
Laughing and talking, congenial joy.

I wished this could last forever,
Though I knew it wouldn’t.

One started cancer treatments.
One started dating.

One has since died.
The other, now engaged.

At the time, I grieved the change
In friendship that treatment,
Dating, brought.

Now I look back and think,
The death was going to happen.

What a grace, that the dating
Started when it did.

Runneth Over

When you first came,
You were a cup filled with sorrow,

Where the slightest jostle
Spilled gut-wrenching sobs.

Now you have a new song.
Your cup overflows—

Love. Joy. Grace. Restoration.
Thanks be to God.

Thankful

When Phil learned
That our fifth
Was a boy,

He was (a little) sad.
He wanted a girl
To snuggle.

Today we watched Caleb
Running around the house
With two older brothers,

All making shooting noises
With pencil “guns,”
Thoroughly satisfied with life.

“What would a girl
Have done in this house?”
He wondered, glad for five sons.

Mother-Daughter Tea

Despite my lack of female offspring,
I was invited to a mother-daughter tea,
And allowed the option of a college friend
To be my daughter for the duration.

Three other mothers with daughters,
And three hostesses, unmarried,
Spent the afternoon drinking tea
And eating tidbits,

And I drove home thinking how few
Opportunities there are for adults
To spend time with children,
Both as equals. No “children’s table” there.

Starving

I don’t usually leave the house without snacks,
But I was in a hurry and departed,
Filled up with grits (and the butter and sugar on top).

Five hours later, when we sat down for Thai food,
I could have eaten two meals.
I considered it.

Instead, we went to a French pastry shop,
And enjoyed the smell of butter and the look of the éclairs.
I ate a slice of flourless chocolate cake.

And when I got home,
I downed a bowl of tortilla soup
And, shortly afterwards, two tacos. So hungry!

VMFA

To see hundreds of works in a few hours,
And come away with only several dozen
Moments of transcendence
Felt … a bit flat.

Until I thought about all I saw in those few hours.

A torso by Praxiteles.
Faience, brilliant blue Egyptian pottery, breathtaking.
A mummy.
Papyrus with hieroglyphics.
An enormous Roman mosaic.
Early Renaissance feathers, painted precisely.
A lovely nude of Venus by Artemesia Gentilleschi.
A painting of grapes by Soreau, luminous beyond imagining.
A Fabrege egg. For real! Right there!
A portrait of Lydia Schabelsky. Gorgeous. And what is she thinking?
The Little Dancer by Degas.
A vanishing ship on the sea by Magritte.
A fascinating room of prints, demonstrating nightfall:
Rembrandt, Hopper, Gericault; Yankee Stadium and Taos.
A Tiffany vase.
A Rousseau of a gorilla trying to steal a spear from a man.
A bowl of daisies by Van Gogh.
A Rothko black on black.
Renoir’s son, painting studiously.
A Monet wintry scene: so chilly. And a more cheery flower field.
A painting of John Marshall, beautifully done. (He looked nice.)
A glorious canvas of a woman by John Singer Sargent.
An Audubon eagle.
Landscape with a wing: a response to the Holocaust.
A Jasper Johns that looked grey, but with hidden color.
A Diebenkorn with such beautiful colors, it mesmerized me.
A Calder mobile!
Three stylized lemons on a plate.
A roseate, misty painting.
A Hopper apartment building. Everyone is isolated. Always.
Colored streaks flowing down a canvas.
Red reeds made of glass in a shallow fish pond. Chihuly. Glorious.
And my favorite: a mango, with other fruit, by Gauguin.

Three dozen moments of transcendence?
We should all be so lucky!

How I Do an Art Exhibit

I like to walk through,
Looking at each work briefly,
Enjoying, despising, indifferent.
Then, at least, I know I’ve seen it all.

Then I return to my favorites,
To soak in the color,
To admire the brushstrokes,
To think about the details.

A New Season

Two friends invited me
On a trip to Richmond,
To the Museum of Fine Arts.

Years ago, Phil would say to me,
“You never go anywhere!
I wish you would.”

And today I did.

Pity Not

As beautiful as I found the falling leaves,
I grieved a bit about those that drop in the dark,
Where no one watches their gentle tumble,
Perhaps a bit like trees that fall in the forest
With no one to hear. Do they make a sound?
And then I remembered this creative answer to my concern.

“There was a young man who said "God
Must find it exceedingly odd
To think that the tree
Should continue to be
When there's no one about in the quad."

Reply:
"Dear Sir: Your astonishment's odd;
I am always about in the quad.
And that's why the tree
Will continue to be
Since observed by, Yours faithfully, God.”

Release

Three times in ten minutes
Did a gust drop hundreds of leaves.
What mechanism makes each leaf
Drop in the minute it does,
Neither two minutes before,
Nor two minutes later?

In any case: this performance
Plays all month.

Fall

I watched the leaves waft down
In the wind’s ballet.

Grieving

One son cried today,
Reluctant to explain.
In the end, he was sad,
For he didn’t know how
To deal with a brother’s
Disobedience.

Yes, my son, this is hard.
Others make bad choices,
You will see all your life.

Correct them privately.
If no change, then find another,
Probably parents in this case.
And all of it do in love.

Blooming

In general, I realize that children learn things at their own pace,
That if I had two sons reading readily at four and five,
It is okay if two more still struggle at seven and nine.

A bell curve has outliers, but they, too, are a part of the curve.

So I noticed with thanksgiving this week
That Abraham, from one day to the next,
Went from reading sequels to Nate the Great
To reading almost 200 pages in Smile,
A graphic novel about a middle schooler and her traumatic teeth.
“My brothers kept urging me to keep reading, so I did!”

And, perhaps buoyed by this success,
He started to write a fable, illustrated, yes, but predominately words,
Not pictures.

And Joe, whom I have worked with daily for a year and more,
Who still forgets more than half the letter sounds,
Got a short movie yesterday that sings, for each sound,
“The B says /b/,” starting with A and going all through.
He spent the evening singing these sounds under his breath,
Writing them and erasing them on his created whiteboard.
An aural learner, perhaps, who needed less visuals and more sound.

And so we learn together.

The Wind

When I returned to my hollow,
I remembered that, last time, I sought to sit
High on the slope, but felt called,
Inexplicably, to the floor.
From that vantage point, I saw the leaves
Falling so beautifully as to blind me.

I had forgotten this small prompting,
And record it now to say
Obedience is important,
Even in the little things,
For my own good.

Autumn Praise

Angels in the earth are shouting choruses of autumn praise.
Gold upon the trees is shaking, leaves in their translucent way;
Kingly garment, radiant blue, spread across the cloudless sky;
Dancing breeze to stir the treetops, swaying branches lifted high.

The sun, a strongman in his glory, brave upon the midday stage.
Silver diamonds on the water, tossed on joyful skipping waves.
Children running on the hilltops, in the rolling golden grass
Is this all just earnest payment of a great inheritance?

Now, while we have breath within us, let us offer thankful praise.
We’ve been rescued by the Shepherd, from the dark and stormy day.
We’ve seen winter, our souls frozen, through the nights of numbing cold.
Jesus gives to earthly paupers from the warmth of heaven’s gold.

Oh my soul, a taste of heaven, signals coming glory bright.
See him clothed in brilliant robes, the Lamb of God in perfect light.

Written by a friend, a decade and more,
This has been my October praise song,
From the yellow aspens in Colorado
To the long, vibrant orange fall in Virginia.

This year, the praise extended to the rocky coast of
Portland, Maine, where I stood overlooking
The diamonds on the waters of the ocean,
The colors of the trees around the bay.

In the clear blue skies and beautiful sunlight of the afternoon,
My niece ran down the grassy hilltop behind me,
And, later, many children rolled down a grassy slope with glee.
We offered thankful praise.