advent journal
hippo, hooray I've done my share of writing about the weight of the world but here are a few weightless words of joy for a day spent walking talking eating laughing building memories in a town where none of us lives yet we created a space of belonging
advent journal
weather report when I was in high school dad told me to be a weatherman “you can be wrong everyday and you never get fired” I walked to coffee this morning in cold sunshine said the sky looked like snow this afternoon and sent the schnauzers out in the rain
advent journal
I have struggled to write tonight. I have been sitting at the screen for a couple of hours and have three or four beginnings to poems that should not be finished. Somewhere in my search for something, I remembered a poem I wrote many years ago--when I was teaching high
advent journal
zoom before the word was a way to talk across the pandemic or sent kids around the room Zoom was the nickname of one who captivated my country with the way he played football I was a child in Zambia kicking soccer balls in the backyard and chanting his name
advent journal
most of our stories go untold to those around us or perhaps they are unheard misunderstood because they we are not fluent in each other it’s unfair I suppose to say anything about most of our stories as though they could be collected in a single volume the library
advent journal
repeating myself if someone says they are going through the motions we take it to mean the motions are meaningless acts of resignation things we can do in our sleep but I would suggest that the story is not so simple the motions are memories or at least they hold
advent journal
measured existence I can measure a cup of flour, pour a pound of sugar but I am at a loss to quantify how much grief weighs how long a heart stays bro- ken how far it is to forgiveness or the speed of the sound of loneliness I cannot serve
advent journal
catching a breath in the small town where we lived before this one one of the houses on our way home filled their yard with inflatable Christmas things Santa snowmen reindeer to name a few each was filled with air and light and made their corner lot the beacon of
advent journal
good time the fallacy of the interstate is that what matters most is getting there the highway knows no place we are nowhere other than traveling yet every exit offers the chance to face the truth of places and faces that are more than drive-bys a reason to remember there
poetry
running out of daylight it’s not that the night bothers me I find comfort in the way the dark wraps itself around lamps and light bulbs like a custom fit suit I love the deep expanse of the night sky reminding me that there will always be more than
poetry
the funeral of reasonable expectations you would think a funeral would be more quiet the din makes it difficult to discern my emotions in these days of venom and vitriol or know what dreams have a chance of survival how then do we hope when so many seem so committed
poetry
banana pudding cookies I was invited by my friend Taylor Davis to be a part of an All Saints celebration at his church. During the past year, they have experienced a season of profound grief that included the deaths of two of their pastors. Taylor asked me to come and