The Accused

Just as he locked the door, as he pocketed the key,
as he glanced over his shoulder, they arrested him.
They tortured him until they tired of it.
‘Look,’ they said,
‘the key is your key, the house is your house,
we accept that now; but why did you put the key
in your pocket as if to hide it from us?’

They let him go, but his name is still on a list.

Yannis Ritsos
translated from the Greek by David Harsent

Thanks, Mr. Sun

I’m thankful the sun starts slow
and glides in a graceful burning
arc across the firmament. I don’t
think I could handle life if ole’ Sol
was a herky-jerky-shakey-jake.
Mr. Sun stays in his own lane,
daily commuting with polite constancy,
never nervous about missing
something like a primo parking spot.
For a fireball it seems to have it all
together, unshyly shining golden on
this blue-born world’s flappable.

John Blase

Aftermath

I think the Rapture is bunk.

But

 imagine an aftermath

of:

Insurance companies getting religion

and declaring the Rapture

an Act of God

as they stiff their policy-holders.

Consider a sight of

 several hundred million children 

gone off to the Kingdom.

Elementary school teachers 

 to teach the ones 

that were left behind.

The one per-centers

texting: WTF

Where did the help go?

The pastor who

didn't get caught up in the clouds

wondering if

 he would have a flock to tend?

Bullies will miss their patsies.

Patrons will remember their bartenders.

High school kids will revere the cheerleader.

And gossips will ask, 

"Why her? /Why him?"

And all the while,

me and you 

will go through

the departed's

fridges and garages

prepping ourselves for

the Final Days.

The Seven Deadly Sins

Forget about the other six, says Pride.
They're only using you.
Admittedly, Lust is a looker,
but you can do better.

And why do they keep bringing us
to this cheesy dive?
The food's so bad that even Gluttony
can't finish his meal.

Notice how Avarice
keeps refilling his glass
whenever he thinks we're not looking,
while Envy eyes your plate.

Hell, we're not even done, and Anger
is already arguing about the bill.
I'm the only one who
ever leaves a decent tip.

Let them all go, the losers!
It's a relief to see Sloth's
fat ass go out the door.
But stick around. I have a story

that not everyone appreciates
about the special satisfaction
of staying on board as the last
grubby lifeboat pushes away.

Dana Gioia

Gifts

The Prodigal Son
All callow thoughtlessness
Outshone his brother

Unfair or unwise
To favor the miscreant
Yet it's instinctive

We value others
For the love that we give them
Not the love returned


Martin Locock 

Small deaths

Jesus suffered the small deaths of life.

Losses of Joseph and John.

Rejected in His hometown.

Being misunderstood

by His followers and the crowds.

Grieving over Lazarus.

Angered by the condition

of His Father’s house.  

Denied by Peter.

Betrayed by Judas.

The bullshit trial.

Which lead to His Big Death

That blessed us 

(as we suffer 

our own small deaths)

never to experience

the curse of a

Big Death.

The Day After Sinatra Married Mia Farrow

So the coffee would stay hot all morning 
Edna, the large-boned Dutch waitress, 
her face and throat flushed from the heat 
would first fill my thermos with boiling water 
in the Circle Diner on Kutztown Road, 
this July morning steamy and loud 
with a highway crew at the counter, 
two grizzled mailmen in the side booth 
and us from the nearby construction site, 
a job I loved for its noise and fresh air, 
screwing big lag bolts into the sills 
of Caloric Stove's new factory warehouse, 
the whirr of the countersink drilling the wood, 
clean white hemlock or spruce

and when one of the mailmen heads for the door 
Edna calls out to him "Hey Jack 
how you think Frank's feeling this morning?" 
Smoke from the grill and the cook's cigar 
clouding the wide glass window: 
Frank, 20 years her senior, 
stepping from Sam Giancana's limo 
or else whispering One For My Baby 
into the spotlight: his death 
in his voice with its flawless control, 
his slanted fedora and raincoat, 
his glittering life we could only imagine

though most of us are laughing by now 
wolfing our hot cakes and eggs 
when the old man yells back, "Tired as hell!" 
pulling his hat down low at the door, 
happy enough to be going to work 
on a Friday under the dawnwashed sky 
of Johnson's Great Society, 
with the Lehigh Valley opening its thighs 
and the weekend gorged with promise.

Joseph Millar

The Gates of Love Budged an Inch

Mark 1:16-20

Just an ordinary day.

Casting for cash.

Mending our tools.

Minding our own business.

Then the Extraordinary enters,

and 

asks us

to join Him 

in finding His lost sheep.

And the fools

run off with Him,

while the rest of us

have to hold the fort

without them.

A Great Leaf

A great leaf, that God and you and I

have covered with writing

turns now, overhead, in strange hands.

We feel the sweep of it like a wind.

We see the brightness of a new page

where everything yet can happen.

Unmoved by us, the fates take its measure

and look at one another, saying nothing.

Rainer Maria Rilke

The Poor Rich Man

News Story /Mark 10:21-23 /Luke 18:22-24

The poor rich man

misheard the gospel.

He thought 

his fellow one percenter

went away mad

instead of sad.

"Oh, My God!"

Not only in church

and nightly by their bedsides

do young girls pray these days.

Wherever they go,

prayer is woven into their talk

like a bright thread of awe.

Even at the pedestrian mall

outbursts of praise

spring unbidden from their glossy lips.

 Billy Collins