Death

All things die: the strongest ox that pulls the plow, the laughing girl in the olive tree, the peaceful doves beside the road. All things die—but not my Lord. – All things die, and lie forgotten in the ground and join the elements of earth: the thronging crowds that hear Him preach will soon be […]

Do Not Go Raging Into That Bright Day

While I can never claim to equal Dylan Thomas’s powerful poem, I have long felt there should be a Christian counter to it. This, then, is my answer to “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night.” – Do not to raging into that bright day, for death will collapse and burn at close of […]

Interrupted Elegy

Bald the hill, and bare and raw the hearts and eyes that watched and wept. Empty now, and tramped and trod the dirt dishonored by our feet. A crying sky, and streams and screams and murmured thunder of remorse. Barren now, the wooden stakes crossed in sorrow, stained with loss. — But he was good, […]

Song of the Bereaved

The night is done— Our time When the sun rises on the sea And the smell of brine Draws you and me Out on the sand to run. Today we cannot run— Your night is done, And it is only me Here in our time, Watching the foaming brine As the sun rises on […]

Sunrise

The same wind blows the smell of burning ashes back to the dead, back to the stones. – Busy, crawling worker ants and constant spider, spinning out the web, Dreary, shadowed by the tomb— shadow of death. – An aging man sits praying in a coat, More slender than a stem of frozen ice with grief […]

The Graveyard

crashed— in waving fields of grass and little mounds of dust a chunk of cosmic stone—Heaven’s gift made small beside the marble wall the wall well cut, engraved a monument: – ADAM & RACHEL 1912-1912 – to death. and round the restless wind plays dirges unaccompanied deep into the night and beetles creep and […]

Like Water

In loving memory of my aunt who first saw Jesus with her eyes on March 1st, 2015. Like water passing through your hands and falling down again; like a river flowing near then streaming on again; like chilly rainfall pouring down, refreshing us again, is this simple wooden box, this mound of dirt, the graveside […]

A Pantoum

I thought that I was finished—I was wrong. A Headache night, a little sleep, a hurried day. Classes never ended, a week that lasted long— Waiting eagerly to eat and drink and play. A headache night, a little sleep, a hurried day Became my accepted practice all the time. Waiting eagerly to eat and drink […]