THE FARM, THE RANCH
AND THE NEED FOR GOD
Who pray to when the rains don’t come
who forget to thank when they do
Who curse when the John Deere breaks
and the cow jumps over the moon
(by the moon of course I mean
the fence to the alfalfa field)
Who in the long nights pondering
under the stars too cold to be suns
a word big enough for big
MORE GLORY TO YOU
There is something
about a rotting church
in a by-passed prairie town
Pride become humility
spirit shining through the bones
WHERE ARE ALL THE MYSTICS NOW
According to Pir Vilayat Khan
Islam is the cocoon and Sufism is the butterfly
True of Christian mystics too
and all the saints, named and not
that bless each moment of the day
Every cocoon however
does not unfold a butterfly
In every congregation you will find
praying mantis – long may they pray
and wasps that swarm and sting
MISSING LEONARD
Leonard Cohen is gone
He doesn’t call, he doesn’t write
Huddle with me now
round the poem and the song and listen for the breadcrumb and the hint of old perfume
that speak
of other ways to God
than Jesus and the goddess
THE CANON OF FODDER
And ain’t every fodder
of every cannon
dying for someone else’s sins
Sweet Jesus as their model
CHURCH AND STATE
If religion the opiate
politics the placebo
GRANOLA GRENADES FOR GANDHI
“Even God himself dare not appear to a starving man,
except in the form of bread”
– Mahandas Gandhi
So many fellow women and men today
down at the corner of have and have not
asking for a little of what we’ve got
Flying cardboard signs that say
“I’m a hungry homeless vet”
or one I saw the other day
“the repo’d my Lear Jet”
Being a poet what I mostly have is words
but remembering the words of Gandhi
I decide instead of something to read
I’ll give them what they really need
It’s simple enough, just take an elastic band
and wrap three dollar bills around a bar
you can place them in their hand
or you can throw them pretty far
If monks balance the world with prayer
perhaps these souls balance it with pain
So if they don’t like granola, that’s OK with me
the carnivores can afford to attack a Big Mac
and the thirsty are half way to a six pack
CHARTRES CATHEDRAL MAY 9, 2001
Standing at last
in medieval thought made visible
one hundred and seventy three of the most
beautiful stained glass windows in the world
ten thousand figures in glass and stone
Feeling the light and form form feelings
Dorsey and I drift apart
pulled for a moment by different magnets
I look up I have no words
I beckon her over she crosses the rough stone
I kiss her gently hold her a moment and
point to the small center window
high in the west side of the south wing
Where light breaking through cloud
throws fractured beams
through centuried dust
in an exact way and at an exact angle
that it has never slanted before
and will never slant again
We wander in awe
together and apart
light candles, marvel at the art
Famous labyrinth where penitents
crawled three football fields on their knees
Without knowing it had once been there
I miss the Minotaur in the middle
As evening falls I sit on a stone step
by the central altar
watching
for a long time the sun as it sinks
rising in the West Rose Window
From the center
each ring moving outward
moves towards me in explosion 3D
Again I have no words
The words are
From the unquestionable hand
of the undeniable God
a universe flung forth
in crystal cacophony
and order
9-11
Old movies new
Easterns and Westerns star God
Many tickets sold
CRATER
Giant bowl below sea level
the whole world runs in over the edges
Tulips from Asia Minor by way of Austria
in the fifteenth century
Satisfactie van Amsterdam in 1566
“no one should be persecuted for his faith”
Jews pour in from Spain and Portugal
Huguenots from France, English Protestants
Germans from the Thirty Years War
Diamond cutters pour in from Belgium
Diamonds tumble in from everywhere
Ships are sent around the horn
trade brings back the world
This week in one small town
voices dialogue from five continents
energies seen and unseen come together
are stirred by large and small spoons
Everyone dips their cup into the cauldron
goes home with more