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Showing posts from June, 2018

Cleaning Out the Drawer

Of all the detritus in this drawer (why did I save this stuff?) amid the paperclips, the capless pens and penless caps,  the rubber bands, the scraps of paper with a title of a book  that someone recommended once, the business cards,  addresses from old envelopes, my daddy’s magnifying glass —again I see him reading as he sat in his upholstered chair—   there is a tape… An old cassette... the label says it's “Prince and Leslie playing.” Underneath the names I’d written “12” and “7.”   Then, past the early '80s tunes they had recorded from the radio —and so I’d never played it through, just thinking, “Well, I’ll listen to the rest someday,” and now that I am cleaning out the drawer I let it play on that old tape recorder that I found while cleaning off a shelf the other day— I hear my children’s voices. “I’m thinking pos-tiv-ly,” the younger drawls. “Prince is gonna…” Crack! A cue stick hits a ball and then more cracks as balls sp

Cursing the Fig Tree

“Rabbi, look! The fig tree that you cursed has withered.” ~ Mark 11:11-26 Jesus, why did you curse that tree? You knew its time had not come— just as yours had not, that day you turned the water into wine at Cana. Oh, that’s right. You said your day had not yet come, but you did it anyway. Your mother asked and you said no, but she knew better than to say, “Oh well, now’s not the time.” Instead she told the stewards, “Do what he says.” O Lord, may I remember always that the time has come. May I be instant when it’s time and When it’s “not yet time” because it is the time for You to live in me. 6/2/18  See also John 2:1-11, II Corinthians 6:2, and II Timothy 4:2 This may be a poem in progress. I’m not sure I won’t be editing it later, but it’s a “do it now” poem, so I decided to go ahead and toss it in here. Maybe this is part of the “Resurrection Clothes” I’m to wear—being ready to act, whether the time seems right or not, when somet