4-7-2017

Superpowers and Achilles' Heel

Suckerpunched by a cartoon! Alas and alack!
O how your frown turned upside down when
I revealed my hero to be Linus van Pelt and then
Melded the card that read: "Wearing a jetpack."
And you a giant too, but with the flaw of laughter
Dooming you. Did you fret like my hero
Earlier had done in a pumpkin patch? Enemy dear, Oh
You must have felt like Goliath after
One tiny shepherd appeared to do battle
Until you felt your laughter stop you
Like a stone in the forehead and addled
At the absurdity, as the judges made you rue
Ultimately how your own sense of humor
Grew like a malignant tumor.
Here, let's toast your downfall, friend: laughing is really the best way to end.

3-24-2017

In like a lamb
That German monk that lived so long ago: Eckhart
He said, more or less: if the only prayer you say in  
Answer is "Thank You," it would be enough. Apart
Now from those who would hear me, still when 
Kindness comes out of nowhere, i know
Years of misunderstanding are not enough to 
Overturn what the act of that dying blow 
Unleashed to sin, once and for all. We grew 
So much in that moment of his election 
One life for God alone to show us how to live. 
Many are confused by our daily, slo-mo crucifixion
Uniting us with him. Each thank you, we give--
Chosen not forced-- each step pounds like hammers:
Hear the roar subside as the journey begins: soft as lamb's ears.

3-7-2017

Walking in your shoes

Where i come from You were so much bigger:
Holding my fingers to balance
Every step and guide me. Your figure
Reaches to me even today to steady my stance.
Each step i take reminds me i am not alone.
I still hear your voice's amusement when i teeter.
Chasing me later, were you sorry for my runaway abandon
Or did you know the outcome from the theater
Margaret Wise Brown painted for us--as the bunny championed
Escape in so many ways only to be captured with love
Forever? Now here we stand precariously. I watch you
Reach with your cane. I cower from above
Only now realizing what you meant by your smiles and winks:
"Maybe bunny literature is the answer to the riddle of the sphinx."

2-22-2017

Dune Jumping

How we jumped, the two us, that year when Mom and Dad
And Marjie and we vacationed in South Carolina.
Perhaps that time, distilled better than it was, evokes sad
Pleasure for you as well. For me, I like to imagine how fine a
Youthful line we drew in the sand; separating our lives from
Boys like us from Dayton, Ohio at the century's turn.
In a similar way, our father bought us a flying toy. Some
Reasonable spark of how a kite can fuel what innovation burns:
The lift of wonder can lead us through boredom, so that gravity
Has no sway. Do you cherish, still, the weightlessness of leaving
Dunes and embracing wind outside of time
As I do, dear brother? Even a landing with sand in
Your mouth was worth the dream of flying at Myrtle Beach.
Earthbound eons are worth grasping for eternal brevity.
Realizations of a moment often end in sputtering levity.
Icier would be no wind and no toy of any kind.

10-4 Good Buddy

I had every intention...

On your Birthday I had every intention of writing a poem worthy
of you. And what i wrote did not pass the smell test. And while it's
tempting to claim form follows function by declaring the poem was
about the card game: go fish. So, yeah, it was supposed to stink.
But one can't hang laurels on that fishhook and expect anyone to think
"Yeah. What he said." But for better or verse, I did think about you and chuckle today.
For instance, in the dentist's office I saw a New Yorker cartoon with a couple driving
with a blue whale in the back seat and the caption was: "Well I thought you meant it when you put
that bumper sticker on the the car!"
Later in the day there was a radio story on a father who taught his daughter how to be a Luthier.

If you did not catch it you can hear it here:

http://www.npr.org/2016/10/04/496138785/a-father-daughter-luthier-duo-builds-souls-into-guitars

8-30-2016

Dimension travel is the poetry of physics:
Astonishing when done right, but doesn't pay well.

Even though Daniel and Wu met and spoke
Neverending circles, the center of the wheel
Did not make Daniel understand and he woke
Little to the lessons that Wu tried to reveal.
Ezekiel spokes and tangents and Daniel tired
Soon of stretching brain and brawn in the park.
So what if they all rode the tai-chi tandem. Wired
Sound in each student with music in the dark.
Universal truth was not any closer than breath.
"Maybe I made a mistake in thwarting the song.
"Maybe," replied Wu, "but mistakes often bless
Eternity with wisdom. You spend too long
Raking the soil of past fruits. Stop digging for
Ore of lore. The nightingale is gone but the ode lives evermore.
Forever love. Forever live. Do not go back. Go on to give."

April 3, 2016

Example

Thought, Word and Deed.
Can you imagine a being with integrity enough
to think, speak and act love merely by willing?
Well, you may say, there is always Venus on the half-shell.
But, still, that is in the realm of the ideal.
What about the big bang then? 
God muses: "Hey, I know, Universe!"
Then God says: "Universe!"
Then: Universe!
I can give you the stick-figure diagram,
But God gives you the symphony of spacetime.
Enjoy the concert. Follow the example.
Be a Whale.