%1

I do not mind small living. I love the minuteness—
ducks and geese grooming, swans preening lazily,
sharing our rice and beans, spending hours indoors
with lungfuls of room air, going outside for a walk
after the rain. I can suffer wearing a mask, in fact,
prefer it in cold weather with no need for lipstick.
I hold an umbrella by its bamboo handle, just so.
I enjoy the smallness of this life. I love the edges
of souls looking at other faces on a screen, praying
about who and when, and where we are going.

—for Prof. George Mason, who tried to teach me Latin

What my bad sermons made bland, our sanctuary made sweet.

Our house looks out upon a lake
facing northwest some fifty miles
southeast of Lake Superior.

Which means our storms throughout the year
can be seen long before arriving,
rising in clouds like mountain ranges.

I sit along our shoreline watching
these storm fronts move and split and change
to every color, every form. 

I take a book; it might be hours
until the weather will arrive.
And yet I find I can’t read long

Poems. That’s what artist Monique Belitz calls them, artworks built by small pieces, marks, colors, spaces, placement, rhythms—what she refers to as “tesserae of texture.” As visual poems, her works offer poignant scenes related to identity, belonging, and the hope for sanctuary. Each image merges human dignity and frailty within immense and unfamiliar landscapes, which are as beautiful as they are severe and threatening.

Clouds of locusts cover the face of the earth
darkening the land in Somalia, Kenya, Uganda.
A single swarm devours what 35,000 people could eat in one day.
In Washington State, Asian giant hornets behead
thousands upon thousands of honeybees, sting
a beekeeper through sweats, his bee suit, high laced boots.
The ER doctor wears a mask at home and scares his little boy.

Our friend Greg was two weeks shy
of his lingering end when he called to say
he was so sorry we had lost our golden retriever. 
You see, he had lost a retriever himself
and knew the private pain of it.
Then there was John, my former colleague,
who, when given his own death sentence,
found a way to console the young oncologist,
telling her what a good job she had done,
and how he was sure it must have been hard
to share the news. How to account
for such men, such moments? Deflection? 

Matt and Adam talk theology, scripture, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

Andrea Ciponte has found an ideal genre for telling the Scholl siblings’ story.

We walked the dogs this morning.
The long walk we call it:
Where the path splits, go to the right,
Up and down the hills to the lake,
Then turn left. They know the way home.

Early spring. Our breathing
Wraps around our heads,
And we shuffle through
The crisp remains
Of last year’s autumn.

My favorite season, once.
I loved the slant of light, the cool smell of trees
Mixed with notes of books both old and new.