Standing on the edge of the field
the wind scything the brambles
toeing the brown grey dirt
through deadened mulch
my boot heel stretching
then
cracking the ice
I search for your voice
your sign
a sign
the terrible whisper
that freezes rivers
hearts
I come out here
because nature
is capricious
as often You seem
I still
cannot fathom
God as a Baby
or on a Tree
so I watch the earth freeze
turn white
clean once more
see the choir of snow
touch ice crystals
and listen

CHRISTMAS 2010

No one can celebrate a genuine Christmas without being truly poor. The self-sufficient, the proud, those who, because they have everything, look down on others, those who have no need even of God – for them there will be no Christmas. Only the poor, the hungry, those who need someone to come on their behalf, will have that someone. That someone is God, Emmanuel, God-with-us. Without poverty of spirit there can be no abundance of God.
Archbishop Oscar A. Romero
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"And when we give each other Christmas gifts in His name, let us remember that He has given us the sun and the moon and the stars, and the earth with its forests and mountains and oceans--and all that lives and move upon them. He has given us all green things and everything that blossoms and bears fruit and all that we quarrel about and all that we have misused--and to save us from our foolishness, from all our sins, He came down to earth and gave us Himself."
— Sigrid Undset

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Human beings suffer,
They torture one another,
They get hurt and get hard.
No poem or play or song
Can fully right a wrong
Inflicted and endured.


The innocent in gaols [jails]
Beat on their bars together.
A hunger-striker's father
Stands in the graveyard dumb.
The police widow in veils
Faints at the funeral home.


History says, don't hope
On this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime
The longed-for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up,
And hope and history rhyme.


So hope for a great sea-change
On the far side of revenge.
Believe that a further shore
Is reachable from here.
Believe in miracles
And cures and healing wells.


Call the miracle self-healing:
The utter, self-revealing
Double-take of feeling.
If there's fire on the mountain
Or lightning and storm
And a god speaks from the sky


That means someone is hearing
The outcry and the birth-cry
Of new life at its term.
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From The Cure at Troy by Seamus Heaney, his translation of Sophocles's play Philoctetes. courtesy of the Ekklesia project


And,my all time favorite, from John's Gospel,the quote that actually changed my life when I read it shaking in bed
"There,on the shore,Jesus stood. And it was morning..."
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to everyone I know,Blessed Christmas, to anyone I may have hurt this past year, I beg your pardon, may I do better this next one.To all those who helped me[which is everyone] thank you,bless you.

So less the better

Fighting the flu for the first time since the early 1990's.It's wearying ,however,there are people who feel like this every single day of their lives.I'll take the hand I've been dealt...a right wing -nut judge in Va. overturned part of the Obamacare bill as "unconstitutional." America has almost vanished,Amerika grows closer.Justice is simply another commodity bought and sold by clerks in business suits...ADvent,onto more and higher thoughts, is 17 days upon us.My favorite time of the year, the weather is cold crisp,clear the air breathable ,I ignore the stores the black Friday bullshit,the Santa Claus monstrosity of consumerism, and try try try to focus on the Lord Jesus.And, I find it keeps me somewhat happy, certainly in tuned to a small stillness which resonates . My wonderful beautiful wife is an Advent person,filled with light and life, intelligence and the deepest compassion of anyone I've yet to know. I remember our first Christmas as parents,poor, tired, overwhelmed constantly [the baby was a week old]out of our depth,and i distinctly recalling that it was the first time i began to understand the Incarnation .We were happy, poor, tired ,confused, frightened, ecstatic.It was Christmas...

Blasts at 2 Sufi Shrines

The evil continues. Two more shrines in Karachi were bombed today,courtesy of the frightened and ignorant who fear Love and Light, and who scurry in the corner like vermin,or send children strapped with explosives or illiterate peasants to do their dark work. The Forces of Darkness cannot win,will not win.Love will overcome.We pray for the victims,the children,and the perpetrators,who are being led astray by sick twisted minds and souls.My they all begin to learn the Love of God .May God be merciful with them,Lord hear our prayer...

The Mets

I have been a NY Mets fan since I was 5 years old. I attended my first game, in 1965,the night they announced Casey Stengel's retirement. I do not know ho many games I have actually attended without ever having a season pass of any kind[hundreds }.I remember Wes Westrum and Sheriff Parker,Joe the Cobra Frazier and George[where the hell is the exit} Bamberger. I actually saw Willie Mays play for the Giants [SF} and the Mets. I was at a number of games in 69 and 73[and all the intervening years] I have worn my Mets shirts though thin and thinner, accepting the taunts of Yengee "fans" as one would catcalls at a republican convention: a badge of honor .I wept and got loaded when Seaver was traded, cried when Lindsey nelson and Murph passed, cheered when M Donald Grant sold the team he helped to destroy with such ease.So much for my Bona Fides. Watching another losing season with the ever dwindling number of fans, then seeing the truly bizarre press conference between the Wilpons[ons{I like Fred, his son, well, think Bush jr,Franklin Graham, for examples of not too bright men siring veritable morons.}Now, the bullshit that was thrown reminded me of the art exhibit at Bklyn Museum where the pictures were smeared with Dung.No thing, as in nothing will come of this. It is the bankers saying[in between guffaws] that they have learned their lesson.It is the republicans talking about unemployment and the recession as if the democrats were in power all those years.It is all lies. The new Gm will be a toady who will listen to the boob son Wilpon, Wally Backman will be the ticking bomb in the clubhouse[the fiery field general.sigh.weep]nothing will change.When the mets were good and arrogant they had color[and black players, by the way]These guys quit on Clueless Willie Randolph and nice man jerry Manuel. They should hold Beltran over the Kosciusko Bridge by his heels until he pisses himself and make certain he does not ever dog it again. Reyes should get off the HGH[oh yes, Thyroid,right...} and someone should insert a foot in his ass.Wright, another nice guy who lives off of stupid pitchers,either moves in or gets traded. Nice guy, so is my neighbor, don't want him playing third base,either. No more head first slides, 10 grand each time.Too much?Tough shit.If Pagan can run out every ball, if Clemente ran out everything, and Mays and Kailine and Henry AAron did, then these mutts should, too. And hey,Keith stop the bullshit, I saw you JOG down to first base many time on infield ground balls, and leave the dugout during the 6th game in 86,so stop this ranting as if you were Lou Gehrig. Time for an overhaul.Time to stop the bad craziness.The Tragic is back

See them as Roses

She shuffles
now
with a cane dragging in her right hand
sifting through garbage
for the deposits on cans
and bottles
she lives in a house
though her clothes are soiled
tattered
she has a name
though few know it
and more often
she is spoken to
if at all
in epithets
in gentrification
she is unwanted
as vermin
yet
yet
she
to some
who can see
with their hearts
is a perfect flower
created by love
nurtured
by beauty light warmth
O
to learn
to see with them!
to see angels perched in trees
to hear birds whistling to the Lord
to see God picking through refuse
looking for a Rose

the light

whisper
a prayer
of thanks
ceaselessly
a Saint once proffered
how that is done
has
confounded
irritated
moved me
since its encountering
I know
now
much less then when I was 20
and even less then at 30
unlearning
is more difficult
then its opposite
to pray with my whole self
is then
to offer what I am
broken and not
to That Which is Beyond
Any Comprehension
or Thought
That which
I put a name on
God
will do
I offer my
self
as is known only by
the Great Other
to become love
many years ago
a wise man instructed
me to learn to be great at love
to love as a flower does
like the rain
people talk about love
he told me
don't talk about it
become it
and when I was 25,I thought
it simple...