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She was five when her mother left her
At the movies with her baby brother and
Never returned which could have been
The end of the story though it’s not—
Who knows why—maybe popcorn or
Her brother, or maybe grace; it’s hard
To find the truth sometimes, but she made
It seem simple how we’re meant to live,
When every day as I arrived she ran
To wrap her arms around me, nuzzling in
Beneath my shirt until she felt us skin to skin.
Then she went still, like water waiting, and,
For a moment, so did I.

in tribute to Elton Trueblood’s 1964 book of that title

After the bad day, I pray for good days
in the world. On good days, women
are safe, brushing out their hair
while waiting for God to say hello.

The world is an unwalled garden
of fruit we enjoy without worrying
about fork-tongued, talking serpents
lying. We taste and see life is good.

On good days, we walk on the paths 
to the rivers. We are never catcalled 
or spat upon, never ordered to leave 
while gazing at stars or figs, pears, 

Photuris

Macho firefly flashes, dances, tacks.
Lady firefly flashes him back,
“For my tea, you’re the whole cup;
You’re so sweet, I could just eat you up.
I’ve no time to kid; I don’t kid.”
And after the mating, she did, she did.

Perhaps we should consider stars as
outposts of heaven. But right here, on our own
lovely planet, the flickers of early light
glance in a bright air along the morning highway
compelling response. At the stoplight I write
an answer, a scribbled line for a new poem.
It  starts to rain. I notice the way a single
drop on a windshield magnifies the whole
landscape. Look close. It is like
a book of revelation.

I bought him at a flea market, near the end
of the day, when everything in the stall
was a dollar. He stood on a table next to
snow globes and dog tags, ceramic mugs
from Paris, France and Gatlinburg.

His right eye and cheek chipped off,
the red of his robe rubbed mostly to white.
What long little roads have you traveled,
poor Jesus? What closets and cardboard boxes
have you consecrated with your presence?

Before the rib,
         before the man in need of help,
                  before swallows, sperm whales, & cows,

before trees made with seeds
         & pollen released in the breeze,
                  before honey bees & butterflies,

If Herbert Howells hadn’t held a tune
in his ear as bombs kept falling on London,
if he hadn’t argued with himself—like
or as?—and come up with a tie (both),
if he hadn’t let his melody make more
of his awkward choice than the psalmist’s point,
we wouldn’t have the flowing rhythm of “Like as
the Hart” to carry us now, or occasion for our choir
to stop rehearsing and hear a pastor
muse that the ancients followed the hart (the heart)
which could sense unseen water (a diviner)

She enters the cottage to find
The corpse laid out for burial,
The family waiting for her to eat
The fresh-baked bread placed
On the body.

Hungry perhaps—the work pays
Little, and she is poor—she chews
And swallows greed, lust, rage,
Taking on sin so the soul slips
Free to rise to heaven, purified.

But what, I wonder, does she feel?
Is it just a job for her, or something
More, a sacred act, so that when
She takes the bread, all that binds her
Falls away.

On the mountain, it’s not necessary to say anything—
to decide what you and I might become.

Here the sun sets for only a moment,
thick cloud of fire and ash

all the oranges and reds we haven’t invented yet—
and the sound of the wind too loud

for human ears to hear.

But holy the smoke, the quaking, the desire
to ascend—to hear the voice that speaks only

in silence.

You can’t paint this, though you will try—
the canvas and birds—the words that are meant to hint,