Poem: Where Does One Draw the Line?

Where Does One Draw the Line?

Where does one draw the line

Between obscenity and the right to read?

Let us convene a committee

To decide.

Should public tax dollars fund

Obscene books in a school library?

Absolutely not.

What is obscene?

This passage in a book

Where a man fucks a cow.

Is that what the entire book is about?

I don’t know, I didn’t read it all.

Let’s have the committee decide.

The committee is corrupt

If they think anything about 

A man fucking a cow is

Anything but obscene.

But you said you didn’t know

If that book was about 

Fucking cows.

Anything that talks about

Fucking cows is obscene.

Then you have corrupted this meeting

Because you brought up the obscenity

Of fucking cows.

Let the fucking committee decide.

The fucking committee has no right

To determine whether or not fucking cows

Is obscene.

So are you suggesting eating hamburgers

Is obscene?

Fucking McDonalds is obscene.

I really like hamburgers.

You are fucking obscene.

Well, fuck you.

Go read a book.

Let the committee decide.

Fucking obscene.

May 2023

About This Poem:

I wrote this poem shortly after attending a school board meeting about a list of books that some community members (none parents of students in our district) objected to and wanted removed from the shelves. I found the entire request absurd, but I listened patiently and then suggested that no book be excluded from the library without being reviewed by a committee after having read the entire book. One guy said that was absurd because he could tell that the entire book was obscene based on this one passage he had read. I hadn't read the book (I found his claims of the cow scene the way he described it as hard to believe, but perhaps...No other context was given), but the conversation inspired this poem. The photo is the high school library where the meeting occurred. That room has inspired several poems in me...
 

Poem: Who You Really Just Are

Who You Really Just Are

These little ditties here we see

Of radiant times and those dull

To me. I write them here to be

A boon to get me through glooms full.

I know their context or did when

I wrote them so all do make sense,

And some I love, and some I planned

While others are complete nonsense.

That’s how our days go—yes, they do—

Some seemingly so sensible

While others just seem like they go

To realms of nothing memorable.

Hold to those days you can’t quite feel 

Because, perhaps, your mind was numb

Or you couldn’t get beneath peals

Of nothingness, your mouth was dumb.

They make the person wholly you

With laughter, joy, tears, and some fears

All rolled into a fount that’s new,

Nothing one needs but to be near

The thing that you may not e’en know

But that which makes you who you are

Not who you wish to be, but oh!

The one who you really just are.

February 2024

About This Poem:

Poems about being yourself have been resonating with me lately. This is another one of those in rhyme and iambic tetrameter (roughly). The picture is me and my family at a Mariner's game over 20 years ago. My boys are both adults now...

 

Poem: Respect for the River

Respect for the River

While the river looks rough

From the hills up above

When you are in it stuff 

Seems to give way to love

Of the rush and roaring,

The rapids engulf you

In the whiteness rushing

Throwing the boat into

Disarray, perhaps turning

It over and your life

Jacket keeps you floating

Amidst the turmoil’s strife.

Yes, it’s that rush, the fear

You might drown in the waves

But your hope in life here

In your body makes you brave.

And I love the water,

I love it so, but know

When seeing daughters 

And sons drown, it deserves

Respect for its steady flow 

That rushes until I can

Only feel this majestic

Beautiful wave caress me.

May 2023

 About This Poem:

The Salmon River is just a part of me and I love it. This poem is about that and my knowledge that people constantly die in it because they don't fully respect it, often out of a lack of understanding. It's a dangerous river because of its depth, its current, and its deceivingly calm spots. People who aren't familiar with that don't get it and people who are familiar with it sometimes, at their peril, test it.

249. American Activism

American Activism

I have had over a year to think about another thing that I love about America and it hit me that I really like how American people don’t just put up with things they disagree with. Henry David Thoreau refused to pay his taxes (no withholding from paychecks in the 19th century) and spent a night in jail because he objected to being complicit in paying for the Mexican American was with which he disagreed. Rosa Parks just got sick and tired of sitting in the back of the bus while paying the same fare. Martin Luther King, Jr. led protests and was often thrown into prison for civil rights for Black Americans.

While Americans often avoid politics and stay pretty mute about it, seeming to be disengaged, they organize and join protests and rallies frequently when their elected officials don’t listen to them at all, claiming mandates merely by being elected. The Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s is a great example, but I think we’re living in another turbulent era when Americans are again speaking out in ways other than voting.

Some of my friends and I gather regularly to organize and write letters encouraging our elected representatives to listen to us. While that has some success, many of us have gone to protests, stood outside in the cold encouraging people to vote, or sign petitions to raise our concerns on the ballot for people to have their say with the vote. Like I said, our success varies but it feels good to be with others who demand that their voices are not ignored. This is something that I love about Americans: we are activists.

 

Poem: Who Doesn't Know the Shame?

Who Doesn’t Know the Shame?

Who doesn’t know the shame

That others place upon your name

For being something they assume,

Heaping upon you all their gloom?

It may be ‘cause of your skin’s hue

Or because of your accents clue

Of where you come, lands they’d undone

In spite from a king’s sense of fun.

It’s un American to think

One’s better because of some rank

Made up by finances from poor

Who found thieves ransacking their door.

But we Americans seldom

Care that here we’re not a kingdom

For we have fallen for masters

Tearing us from our own lords.

Who doesn’t know that shame

Others have placed on your name

For being something they assume,

Heaping upon you their own gloom.

May 2023

About This Poem:

This is a poem about feeling misunderstood, something that has happened to all of us. I think two things can come of being misunderstood: 1) you resent others for not understanding you; 2) you begin to understand others feeling out of place because you have been there. This poem aims at that second feeling: empathy. The photo is just a selfie gone bad, but I kept it and now I know why. :)
 

Poem: The Wedding Guest

The Wedding Guest

I was that wedding guest, you see,

The one to whom the mariner spoke

And told the tale of worry

In which the life of albatross he took.

A friend of the groom’s family

I was, just waiting church to enter

When this old man bid me tarry

To hear a tale of his center

Of which he needed to be absolved

And so he was, I’m sure of it

For his face no sign of grief showed

But this tale, he told me it

And such destruction I perceived

So that its tale did me amaze

How one man could cause such grief

That I did enter church all dazed.

Indeed, the mercy of the lamb

Is great enough to heal even me,

One who feels that he is damned 

For thoughts and deeds evil to see

But those I hide so deep away

That none might know or see the black

Deep with me stowed far away

Yet those he has also cleansed from my back.

March 2023

About This Poem

This is a response to Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. In the poem you hear the entire story of the mariner shooting an albatross and the famous lines like "water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink," but that poor trapped wedding guest never gets the chance to respond. This is his response. The poem hints at the story of joy and sorrows going through our lives all at the same time: the mariner telling a wedding guest of his sorrows at sea while at a wedding. The picture is me being carried in my wife's grandfather's wheelchair by my groomsmen and dad at my wedding, which also hints at that dual nature of life. And, of course, it's a wedding.

 

Poem: Keep Dripping From the Eaves

Keep Dripping from the Eaves

The air is moist, the breeze is cold

And I’m stuck here nursing at home,

Antsy so, the wide world to roam.

I read adventures, The Odyssey,

And think Odysseus so

Lonely missing Penelope

And infant son Telemachus

While here I mourn the wine dark sea

Lapping shores I cannot now see

Because I’m caring for my own

Penelope. How silly to think

That I would enjoy myself much

To be adrift on Atlantic

Or Pacific when I am home

Here in the hills of the Rockies

Feeling the snow melt from my roof

As the sap climbs into the trees

Roaming just as I would on seas.

Silly Odysseus, silly

Me, to think somewhere else we would

Rather be when all we really

Need must be within ourselves found.

So snow, keep dripping from the eaves.

February 2024

About This Poem:

I wrote this sometime after one of my wife's surgeries (she's had a few in our retirement) when I was feeling a little bit of cabin fever. Everyone has that feeling of needing to get out once in awhile and it's worse when you can't. That's what this poem is getting at and why I reference Odysseus.
 

Poem: The Design of Purpose

The Design of Purpose

Who thinks about the purpose of frost?

Who even thinks whether or not it has

A purpose? I always thought it was just

There. But, since someone, a poet perhaps,

Made me think about frost, not just its what

But also its why, I guess it does things,

Whether with purpose or not, perhaps it

Is given purpose by something or someone

Just like a piece in a jigsaw puzzle

That has no sentience of its own.

Is frost a tool, leverage breaking up hills?

There is no doubt it causes mountains to 

Crumble and move toward the sea. If you

Doubt it, take a drink from the sea and taste

The salinity of the far-off hills

Brought here by mountain frosts and cleansing rains.

Yes, indeed, frost has purpose and we need

Not wait for its salinity in sea

To preserve as it preserves of its own.

Purpose is in the coldest freezer and

The smallest salt shaker on a clear, star

Filled night placed just right in that Van Gogh print

Made into a thousand-piece jigsaw.

Perhaps the sentiency is not in the frost

Or absence of the sun that makes it so,

Yet even here within I can see

Something perfect in cracked rocks and salty

Seas that have absolutely nothing or

Absolutely everything to do

With me. That is the design of purpose.

April 2023

About This Poem

I don't know what precipitated this particular poem besides a frosty spring morning, but I often play with things that seem so disconnected like frost and salt and jigsaw puzzles. They so often connect when we think they don't, forming a beautiful picture that we might not ever see. You can see me playing with those connections here. The photo is just a frosty apple orchard outside of Yakima, Washington.
 

Poem: The One Who You Really Just Are

The One Who You Really Just Are

These little ditties here we see

Of radiant times and those dull

To me. I write them here to be

A boon to get me through glooms full.

I know their context, or did when

I wrote them so all do make sense,

And some I love, and some I planned

While others are complete nonsense.

That’s how our days go—yes, they do—

Some seemingly so sensible

While others just seem like they go

To realms of nothing memorable.

Hold to those days you can’t quite feel

Because, perhaps, your mind was numb

Or you couldn’t get beneath peals

Of nothingness, your mouth was dumb.

They make the person wholly you

With laughter, joy, tears, and some fears

All rolled into a fount that’s new

Nothing one needs but to be near

The thing that you may not e’en know

But that which makes you who you are

Not who you wish to be but, oh,

The one who you really just are.

February 2024

About This Poem

I don't know what precipitated the writing of this poem, but I like how it presents someone's (mine?) quest for identity. As we age we grow more comfortable in our own skin, accepting that there isn't time to be someone new. Yet we still might not completely know who we are. Self-discovery isn't just a thing of teenagere and young people. While that may be frightening in some ways, for the most part it is, I think, just comforting. My poetry is where I often make self discoveries and this one fully admits that. The photo is a selfie at Niagara Falls, New York. Me out of my element, yet still me. We are who we are, no matter where we are.

 

Poem: Dare to Provide

Dare to Provide

When one assumes the position of artist

One must expect the critics to arrive

And notice every stroke and color

Suggesting a hue is improper or

A stroke too broad. They have their preconceived

Notions of what this should be or what that 

Should say to society but you have,

Dear artist, a mind of your own that wants

To say what you’ve said and they should leave it

Alone. Yet, just that they’ve noticed and said

Anything means that your work has been seen.

This, alone, should give you pride that your work

Has fully arrived. Not many will feel

Just what you feel and they might just feel it

And not like it at all so they warn those

Who would feel, not as you but, as they do.

Nor, perhaps, would you want them to, but to

See what you feel, what you project, feelings

Through art weren’t made to protect. Just take pride

That critics will see and present your work

To society who will, in their turn,

Take time to decide the value of what

You feel inside and dare to provide.

February 2024

About This Poem

I don't remember what inspired this poem, but it expresses what I feel about one's own art be it writing, painting, or gardening. That does not mean I don't believe in a good edit, or respected opinion. I just know I've watched many a great movie that was highly criticized in a negative fashion and I couldn't agree less. So, sometimes the artist has to make the final decision on the artwork's release. I chose this picture because I thought something more abstract would best serve the purpose of this poem.
 

Poem: Palm Springs

Palm Springs

They came here some time ago to

Get away from all their fame and

On every street left their names.

They built their homes in the sand,

Mid-Century Modern, the style

Covering up the purple of 

Verbena and bringing here the 

Crowds who now peep through their homes’ gates

Hoping to spy a small castle

And probably surprised at the 

Modesty of flat roofs by pools

In which they’d swim during summer’s

Great heat, yet nothing like the flames

From strangers projecting upon

Them things that could not be true.

I wandered here one spring seeing

Homes of pianists with swimming

Pools shaped like those instruments they’d

Played, or little mail boxes there

Looking like a baby grand and

Thought it somehow strange that they would

Choose to live near farms of date palms

And sand blowing into great dunes

Settling into the bottoms of

Their beautiful blue swimming pools.

But we all have our little quirks

And now those people with their names

On that city’s every lane

Are, I pray, resting in peace from

Things that haunt us all while living.

April 2023

About This Poem

I don't really think this one needs much explanation. The photo is of the house of someone famous (which one I now forget) in Palm Springs.
 

Poem: On Writing Poetry in the Morning

On Writing Poetry in the Morning

I read some poems every day

Hoping for inspiration on what to say,

But sometimes the words just don’t come;

Nothing I say makes sense to anyone.

Emotions may have boiled in the evening

Yet I had no time to write anything.

I read a book before going to bed

To help erase all thoughts within my head.

So here I am in the arms of Aurora

Seeking words hidden beneath my fedora.

But they were stolen by Mr. Sandman

And I’m left with only coffee in hand.

May 2023

About This Poem:

I write poetry every morning when I journal, but sometimes it's just hard. I often rely on what I have read in the morning, or photos on my phone. But sometimes those are little to no help. This poem was written at one of those times. The photograph is from an afternoon walk just west of Potlatch, so you can see bits of town, the trees, and Gold Hill in the background with the sun tinting the clouds. If you don't live here you might think it is a morning shot...

 

Poem: Rejoicing is Satisfaction

 

Rejoicing is Satisfaction

The morning hour now slips away

And I am left wondering what

It is that keeps going here

As my life’s work has found its close—

But was employment really work

Enough to give meaning to life?

Alas, no. What would retirement

Be if work were done? Is the glass

Half empty or half full? That is

The question of one’s satisfaction.

But my cup runs over and so

My abundant life must be shared

In belief, in joy, in living.

What a gift is here that we’ve been 

Given, so how is there despair?

Some days there is sunshine and joy

While others hold rain and its gray

But always remember that that

Is just the sign of the cups flowing

Over, for we have everything

We need. So learn to be content

In all things you have been given.

April 2023

About This Poem

Sometimes, in retirement, I have had to refind my purpose. After having taught for so many years, starting at such a young age, I really had to work to reset myself. Now I tend to fill my time with all the same sorts of things I did while working but from a political standpoint. I'm now more of a cheerleader for libraries, schools, and, to a lesser extent, writers and runners. But I also have my family and that gives purpose to anyone. So this is about being content and finding happiness in that, wherever you're at in life's many stages.

Poem: Red Winged Blackbird

Red Winged Blackbird

It is you, red winged blackbird, trilling

The return of spring as each day longer

Grows and slowly diminishes melting

Snow. You appear in the cattails in the

Marshy creeks or the hawthorn in the gulch.

Snow banks are piled everywhere and 

Yet you sing in the frost of the morning

Not even letting the rain hush your song.

Funny, how I should go plodding along

For all this time oblivious to your

Song that gives hope. So like many others 

I forget to even hear that you have

Returned. So engrossed we are in our dark

Moods of mud and slush and gray, frozen we

Are to the songs o spring and your return

As you blend subtly into all the gloom

Like the raven cawing daily for us

Missing all the bright red tipping the black

And those short trills as the snow melt now fills

The river. You bring the cooing soon of doves

That awaken me in the morning’s cool

And cause me more complaining. Oh fool

I am not to notice you, your friends

And the miracles of life that on us

Descends daily, even in the dull times.

Ravens’ caws, doves’ coos, redwing blackbirds’ trills,

Intricate snowflakes flooding streams, sun, moon,

My cup runs over every day, yet

I think it only half full. Sing on red

Winged blackbird! Life abundant is your song.

April 2023

About This Poem

This poem is about forgetting to be grateful for what we have. I love the sound of the Red Winged Blackbird, but sometimes it just gets forgotten in the shoveling of snow or drear of early spring. That's what happens with so much of our lives: we forget to be grateful for what we have. That Red Winged Blackbird is a subtle reminder to me to be grateful. Life is so much better when you have gratitude. I'm afraid I stole the picture from the internet because I couldn't find any in my own collection.

 

Poem: Let Your Flowers Show

Let Your Flowers Show

Upon these pages strange tales I tell

Of one returning to the north from sun

Endlessly burning the earth to only sand

There in the heat I did sojourn at rest

From the relentless northern snows only

To climb those southern hills to find more snow.

Caught in a quandary of homesickness there

I climbed from the low desert heat to the 

Hills covered in snow and rested in sun

On snowbanks cold. It was there that I found 

A restlessness in my soul so that I

Could not shake wanting to be somewhere else

No matter where I roamed. There cactus grows

Slowly, contemplating rain, satisfied

With only a few drops now and then to 

Quench their thirst and they give thanks with flowers

Maybe once ev’ry other year, toiling

Slowly in desert sun, thankful for

Drops that seldom come from the sky above.

And me? I travel far and wide looking

Always for more, be it water, sun or

Storm. So there on high mountain top in snow

I came to know that while I still may roam

It’s not where I go or where I have been

But what is within that I do know.

For even in desert I can find snow,

And in forests of rain I can be dry

But it’s peace that’s within that will make me

Grow with weathering time and people dear

To me that I can let my flowers show.

April 2023

About This Poem

I was looking at pictures from a trip to Palm Springs and combining thoughts of restlessness with the knowledge that I just need to be content wherever I am. Typically I am content, but sometimes we all get a little stir crazy and need to be reminded to stay grateful and content. That's probably where this came from, but I don't fully remember what caused me to write this particular sentiment. The photo is a blooming cactus from that Palm Springs trip. 

 

Sermon From Grace Community Church, Potlatch, Idaho, May 18, 2025

Sermon for May 18, 2025

            Today is the fifth Sunday of Easter. Jesus is risen. (He is Risen Indeed) In today’s Gospel reading, he told us how we are to behave by giving a new commandment to love one another just like he loves us. This reading is before the crucifixion, stressing his new commandment of loving one another as he loved us. He is about to completely blow the collective minds of mankind by defeating death, but first he tells us to love one another just as he loves us. Pretty tall order, far beyond what the disciples could understand at that point. But he had to tell them so they could begin understanding as everything unfolded.  If we check our love meter as the church in 2025 I’m not sure we are loving each other as he loved us. I’m not going to tell you anything new today, but just make a reminder so we do check our love meter as a church and as individuals. We still seem to think we can put parameters on who and how we love. That’s not how Jesus loves us. He loves us completely, with all our sins and faults so we need to love others in that same way. That’s pretty radical, impartial love.  Love without favoritism.

All right. Before I get ahead of myself, let’s look at the context of today’s Gospel reading. It starts with “³¹ When he was gone, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man is glorified and God is glorified in him. ³² If God is glorified in him,^[a] God will glorify the Son in himself, and will glorify him at once.” The “he was gone” guy in verse 31 is Judas. Jesus had just told Judas in verse 27 “’What you are about to do, do quickly.’ ²⁸ But no one at the meal understood why Jesus said this to him. ²⁹ Since Judas had charge of the money, some thought Jesus was telling him to buy what was needed for the festival, or to give something to the poor. ³⁰ As soon as Judas had taken the bread, he went out. And it was night.” Jesus knew Judas was about to betray him and he was ready to get it over with. Remember, Jesus is fully human and fully God so he knew, better than Judas, what was about to happen, but he was also fully prepared for it to happen. It’s hard to imagine having that sort of physical exhaustion along with that sort of foreknowledge. If you think about it, it should give cause to really love that guy. His love toward us is simply unreal.

From the Psalm, vs. 5: Let them praise the name of the Lord,
    for at his command they were created,
⁶ and he established them for ever and ever—
    he issued a decree that will never pass away.

His love wasn’t just in that moment extended to his disciples and Judas, but to all of us: a decree that will never pass away. He knew what was coming, the brutality of his own death, yet he also knew that that would not conquer him. It was in a way (a very small way) like what I go through when I do these sermons: I feel like doing anything else, but knowing I’ll get through it just fine. While I really love having written, I’m not a big fan of the writing part. I’ve heard a lot of writers say that. And I’m sure Jesus would have rather not have had to go through the crucifixion as a man, but as the son of God, he wanted to do it for all of us. Again, simply unreal, his love for us. And I whine about little medical procedures like getting shots in my eye! Sometimes we really lack perspective.

And just a quick side note about Judas. I really think Jesus loved him just as fully as he loves all of us and the rest of his disciples. He didn’t just choose him to be a disciple for nothing. He knew Judas for who he was, yet he still loved him. He still died for him. What happened had to happen for his love to fully extend to all of us in its eternal way. I know some people like to think of Judas as worse than Satan but I can’t really think of him like that. We already know how he ended up feeling about it all, committing suicide. It’s part of the anguish of the entire story: radical love extended to every one of us, but we don’t all accept it.

Do you ever wonder why God would love us enough to actually become human and die a human death to free us from our own death to live forever? What a crazy gift that is. But he created us in his image and loved us from the very beginning, endowing us with intelligence and creativity, interacting with us in the most miraculous of ways unlike any other part of his creation. We are a little more special to him than that bookshelf you might have made for your spouse, or that pot you might have really enjoyed making. He created us with the ability to interact with him, to talk to him. We weren’t made to collect dust while moldering books sit on our shelves or to accidentally be shattered into pieces. Even when those sorts of things do happen to us—yes, some of us have been shattered, some of us might feel as we’d been forgotten with the old books and dust—he is still there, picking us up, dusting us off, putting us back together just for the asking. He really does love us. We are his beloved creation and we need to recognize that in every other person and every other part of His creation. But, as we all know, we don’t always do that. Sin has corrupted us, no doubt. He’s also taken care of that.

Let’s take a look at the reading from Revelation, what He revealed to John, and through John to us:

21 Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,”^[a] for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. ² I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. ³ And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. ⁴ ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’^[b] or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

⁵ He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”

⁶ He said to me: “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water without cost from the spring of the water of life.

There it is. The restoration of the broken pot, the rebuilding of the old book case. A new heaven and new earth for us. This is our hope and our faith. It is not an excuse to resign ourselves to the way things are now and just having something to look forward to. We are here right now, alive because of Him, our creator. The shackles of our sin have been removed and we are called to bring everyone into His radical, extravagant love. The love that is with us right now, right here, not in reserve for the new heaven and earth, but right here and now.

Look at how he revealed that to Peter, the rock of our church, a pretty orthodox Jew who spread the good news, the gospel, to we gentiles. From Acts 11: The apostles and the believers throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God. ² So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcised believers criticized him ³ and said, “You went into the house of uncircumcised men and ate with them.”

⁴ Starting from the beginning, Peter told them the whole story: ⁵ “I was in the city of Joppa praying, and in a trance I saw a vision. I saw something like a large sheet being let down from heaven by its four corners, and it came down to where I was. ⁶ I looked into it and saw four-footed animals of the earth, wild beasts, reptiles and birds. ⁷ Then I heard a voice telling me, ‘Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.’

⁸ “I replied, ‘Surely not, Lord! Nothing impure or unclean has ever entered my mouth.’

⁹ “The voice spoke from heaven a second time, ‘Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.’ ¹⁰ This happened three times, and then it was all pulled up to heaven again.

¹¹ “Right then three men who had been sent to me from Caesarea stopped at the house where I was staying. ¹² The Spirit told me to have no hesitation about going with them. These six brothers also went with me, and we entered the man’s house. ¹³ He told us how he had seen an angel appear in his house and say, ‘Send to Joppa for Simon who is called Peter. ¹⁴ He will bring you a message through which you and all your household will be saved.’

¹⁵ “As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit came on them as he had come on us at the beginning. ¹⁶ Then I remembered what the Lord had said: ‘John baptized with^[a] water, but you will be baptized with^[b] the Holy Spirit.’ ¹⁷ So if God gave them the same gift he gave us who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to think that I could stand in God’s way?”

¹⁸ When they heard this, they had no further objections and praised God, saying, “So then, even to Gentiles God has granted repentance that leads to life.”

We know that Peter always had an exuberant spirit for Jesus, but he also wavered in a big way when it came time to stand up for Jesus, even denying he knew Him, not once, but three times. Peter had put up his religious parameters on how to live, certainly to eat nothing unclean like the gentiles. But God made it very clear: “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.” And guess how many times this happened? Three! We are Peter. We are the church, and we sometimes think we know enough about people to know they are “unclean.” Thankfully, God is gentle and willing to repeat Himself to us. And who did he die for? Not just Jews. Not just Christians. (There were no “Christians” in the sense that there are now.) He died for all who have sinned. All of us. Jew, gentile, Asian, American, European, African, men, women, gay, straight, married, divorced. All of us. We’re all impure but He has made us clean. Remember Peter? Do not call anything impure that God has made clean. This is the radical, impartial, perfect love of God for all of us. No parameters.

And that brings me right back to Jesus, just after Judas had gone: ³⁴ “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. ³⁵ By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

And remember what I said about us being Peter and that we are the church? We are the body of Christ, our Lord. We may not be made perfect yet, but we have a new commandment to love one another. That’s how we spread the gospel, not by coming to church by itself, or any other thing that we do, except loving one another.

It sounds so simple, but I’m not going to lie. I really struggle these days with some Christians, and I have no doubt they struggle with me. I can’t believe, for instance, that the public school system is “grooming” children with inappropriate library books, or indoctrinating them with critical race theory, and Christians that say those kinds of things can really get under my skin. But I hope I’m getting better about defending the profession from which I’ve retired while still loving the people that say those kinds of things. I don’t want to break fellowship or friendships over falsehoods. I believe in radical love, and sometimes I believe in bleeding tongues from biting them as much as I believe in tongues of fire.

I know we all have our little irritations with our brothers and sister, but if Jesus can love me, I need to show my brothers and sisters grace and forgiveness and love. That doesn’t have to mean being completely silent because part of love includes dispelling lies and separating them from truth. It also involves recognizing that we all still walk in our own shadows of doubt and ignorance. It probably comes as no surprise to any of you that a retired school teacher believes that part of loving includes seeking truth through research and knowledge. I sometimes think the New Heaven is going to be a huge library (with large print books, or these eyes made perfect) and the New Earth is going to be beautiful temperate forests with perfect hiking trails. (I could never make sense of streets of gold…)

While it may seem like I’m getting off track, my point is that the new commandment is not exclusive, even while we all have our little quirks that can easily clash with others. Some people would not want to go to a heaven with libraries at all and others might want a new earth to be completely tropical. Should we not love those people because of that? Of course, we should. We are called to love everyone and our love will let others know we are Christians. It’s not our list of rules that spreads the good news of the gospel, it is our love. That’s the good news anyway: radical, impartial love. The love that comes from our God, the one who saves us from ourselves. Just as He loves us, we are called to love His creation, the creation that He died for, the creation that His death through the resurrection has purified. “As I have loved you, so you must love one another. ³⁵ By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” These are the words of our Lord. The perfectly radical, impartial love of our Lord. Jesus is Risen. (He is risen indeed.)

Amen.

 

 

Poem: From Where does Poetic Inspiration Come?

From Where does Poetic Inspiration Come?

So here I sit feeling scholarly

While reading the poems of Coleridge

Thinking they’ll inspire me to write

Something worth your while to read

But his inspiration is so removed

From my life and thus, probably, yours.

How much do I know about an albatross

When I live in a land locked town?

And a medieval tale of Christabel

Who feels abandoned by her father

As he cares for the daughter of his friend

Who was apparently raped by ruffians?

The romance of these tales 

Is so removed from my life here

That inspiration to write

Seems little by you to be desired,

Yet here I sit and with my pen

Writing of nothing but how all

Seems dull and old, yet day

Has itself renewed while water

And dust remain the same.

Somehow the combinations of all

Seem to inspire, perhaps divinely,

The renewal of each new day

So that none is ever the same

Though seasons come and go

In their own plain way

And Coleridge seemed to speak

Of renewal on the sea

And nature supernaturally reviving

Even while poor old Christabel

Seems to have grown tired of Geraldine

And I probably did too

So poor old Samuel can’t inspire

If I grow old and lack desire

To find the renewal in new day.

No doubt, it’s true, I have to see

In each day what’s new

And not beleaguer STC

With needing me to inspire.

How can he, if it’s not my desire

to pull the poetry from his grave

Telling tales of days gone away

When my day is born anew?

And yet, it is true

That I love that old guy

And his friend, Wordsworth, too

Because, in fact, they really do

Inspire me to write

Every day, even if it’s dull.

That this is dull is more my lack

Of remembering some deep emotion

From my life while I sit and write

And read their poems. I have to seek

The things in my life that mean 

So much, or at least they did.

It’s of those things I should write

Because that’s what Wordsworth said…

March 2023

About This Poem

This one is about how many times I taught a poem or author and had an outcry of boredom. Kids aren't alone in that. I read a lot of poetry that doesn't strike my fancy, or I just don't get it. And because of that I move on. Life is to short for bad books and bad poetry. The same goes for writing poetry. Sometimes you just can't do it because there is nothing you feel inspired to wax poetic about. I stand by Wordsworth's comment that poetry is intense emotion recollected in solitude. That probably explains why kids don't get into it as much. Granted, most of their emotions are intense because it's the first time they've had them. But emotions are very singular for an individual and getting that intensity across to others effectively is not easy. As you age more poems make sense. That doesn't make them good, but at least you get them. That's what I'm trying to get at in this poem. 

The picture is of an albatross in Hawaii because "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by Coleridge has an albatross central to its storyline. And it also answers the question I posed in the poem about how much I know about the albatross. (Now I know a bit, but nothing when I first read the poem some 40-50 years ago.)
 

Poem: Rancho Mirage, California

Rancho Mirage, California

Not exactly Palm Springs, but almost.

I sit at this little table outside

On a balcony overlooking a fountain,

An occasional fly buzzes about 

Me as the heat of the afternoon now

Begins to settle into the spring of

The Mojave Desert. We’ve come here to leave

The northern cold of home for a little

While since winter was brutal this year.

It’s good to be able to do that now

As I begin to grow old and don’t have

To work anymore. There is a strangeness

To it, this retirement. I could still 

Work but I don’t have to and I guess I

Don’t really want to. Seeing places I’ve

Never been to, taking runs far away

From home then returning to familiar

Can bring a sense of accomplishment and

A feeling of getting old while knowing

There won’t be much left of me for my kids

Just as I know there’s not much time left of 

My parents. It seems like I have to see

All I can before there’s nothing left of 

Me. And that, you see, can be a little

Bit of melancholia that we all have.

Some of us are plagued by it just a bit

More even while we experience joy

Beside fountained ponds in the afternoon

Settling heat of the Mojave ‘neath

Palm trees under blue skies near snow capped hills.

April 2023

About This Poem

This is just a reflection I felt (and sometimes feel) as a retired person. I was vacationing in the Coachella Valley of California with my wife's brother and his wife. We had a great time, but the sense of being in waiting for the grave sometimes just hits. This poem is about that. The picture is from exactly where I describe in the poem, minus the fountain.
 

Poem: Purloining Power

Purloining Power

Oh, I know what you say: a great honor

It is to be elected legislator,

You get to write laws that we must foller

As we country bumpkins dwell in the holler.

Doesn’t it say in the constitution

An educated electorate is

Necessary for the good of common

Welfare in a democracy? It is.

Yet here you go writing laws to destroy

Schools and prevent in every way their

Ability to levy taxes, your ploy

To derail schools so we are unaware

That you have stolen the power from us

Who, as the people, need to be kept from

The darkness of an autocracy, plus

You say the Blaine Amendment is just some

Old fashioned way to keep God out of government

Because we must follow His ways as it

Says in the Bible. But wait, that’s a blunt

Way of forcing your beliefs down our throats.

The serpent was never as deceitful

As you, gently legislating away

Our democracy because it is well

Known you are honorable, as you say.

Forgive me if I don’t go out of my way

To kiss your hand that would slap the power

Out of my educated head, that way

You can have honor purloining power.

March 2023

About This Poem

I have had a negative feeling about the Idaho legislature's need to control local education and make demands while underfunding for years. This poem is my frustration about that. It seems that it's only getting worse. And I seriously do believe that many of the people in power are corrupt and want the populace to be uneducated so they are easier to control. Look at the American desire to believe the craziest of conspiracies! Just gets worse as we go. The photo is of the Senate Chambers in Boise.

 

Poem: The Universe Converges at Dinner

The Universe Converges at Dinner

Around the dinner table the universe

Converges—gathers?—collects? Perhaps is?

The future sits down as past dishes out

Nourishment and the eternity of 

Generations finitely gathered to 

Celebrate infinity that brought them

Here to commune of things that do matter—

Never mind the fluff, the posturing of

Class or caste or whatever you call it—

Because each member gathered here can tell

Of things infinitely important like sense:

Smell, sight, touch, sound, and taste (for here we dine).

Of these we must not deny each other

While inexpressibly giving all our

Thanks for our communion through the senses

Of existence, that is something difficult—

That is inexpressibly beautiful

In its pain and pleasure because it is.

In our communion is our sustenance

Lead by recognition that it gives life

For which we must be eternally grateful.

It is here that we feast upon that known—

That divine power that has given us 

Existence that without we would be naught.

Bring here your burdens and all of your joys

For here you can be everything you 

Were meant to be, forgiven wholly now

For missing that point that you are forever

And you were meant to be nourished with His

Bread and wine, his body and blood always.

March 2023

 

About This Poem

This poem is clearly about communion in a Christian sense, but not necessarily in church. I feel like anywhere we dine together we are the two or three gathered in His name and that makes Him part of the dinner. Eating together is communion whether you are Christian or not. That's what this poem is about. I just happen to be a Christian so that's my approach. It also occurred to me that I could write an entirely different poem, or even a comical short story based upon this poem having next to nothing to do with communion in a spiritual sense. Maybe I'll do that... And the picture is of the dining room in the House of Seven Gables in Salem, Massachusetts. That could lend a bit of witchcraft to the communion, but I really am a muggle in spite of my name. But it is a nice dining room situation....

 

Poem: To Watch the Sunset

To Watch the Sunset

To watch the sunset

in a different part of the world

for the first time

is to see new colors,

shapes unknown before,

feelings new within your being,

youth renewed.

Step away from your own life

for awhile,

feel the intensity of living

and shake off the January frost

of routine becoming monotony.

A sunset on a prairie lake in Minnesota,

a change of the guard in Ottawa,

a little house on the South Dakota prairie,

an A frame in the Green Mountains of Vermont,

nestled in a deciduous forest

far removed from the Samaritan Mountains

of the desert of southern Idaho

and then to return and breathe 

the dry mountain sage as if

it were the first time.

January 2006

About This Poem:

I haven't posted on here this month, National Poetry Month, because I've been away in Hawaii being a beach bum. This poem, while not mentioning Hawaii or Kauai (where I was), touches on the importance of travel to me. So I wanted to share it here after my travels. The photo, while not a particularly beautiful sunset (though later it was) was from Poipu Beach where we were watching the return of the parakeets that roost in the palms there. So I hope this poem inspires you to take a trip, no matter how far or near.

 

Poem: Snow Fairies

Snow Fairies

In the silent hour of winter

Just before the black of night

When the last pinks and blues 

Have recovered themselves and 

Scuttled away from your sight,

Mothers and fathers have come home from work

And school children have brought home their studies.

The lamps have been lighted, the fires burn bright

Then snow fairies come out to play in delight.

November 2000

About This Poem

It's April Fool's Day, so I thought (since it has snowed both yesterday and today at times) that I should share a snow poem. I found this one in my journal and noticed a childlike sense of audience in it, probably because my boys were little when I wrote it. I like childlike poems and snow. So, since we're all tired of it, one last snow for the season. April Fools! 

The picture is, obviously, of snowflakes on my deck. The glitter of a true snow fairy is seemingly not photographable (like unicorns and other seemingly [but perhaps not] mythical beings) but snowflakes in all their intricate design are.