The Oil

26 May 2007, 9:02 PM

The oil is thin, but thick
with honeysuckle running down my face-
reminds me of a moment when I thought
I lived outside of grace. I stood
before a man I had yet to call father,
and he pronounced a blessing:

In the name of the Father,
and of the Son,
and of the Holy Spirit…

The scent of antique rose
filled my senses with Reality:
Something bigger than myself was mine;
offered something more than shame to me.

I touch my face, and something somewhere
between rose and honeysuckle glistens
on my fingertips. It soothes the hurts,
imparts a scent I’ll notice long after
I’ve left the Nave, a scent that will remind me
of the cobbled ways I’ve walked
to find the honeysuckle breezes
and the roses, still adorned with thorns,
yet beckoning my spirit nonetheless.

Civilized Haircut

28 May 2007, 10:18 AM

I have this thing against
a civilized haircut. I’ve come to enjoy
all things growing a little more wild
than convention smiles upon.

Reminds me of the days
I never saw- you in Kenya,
growing up in darkest Africa,
going barefoot always,
except when monsoon season
came and left the dusty ground
muddy with the rains of Kenya.

I prefer to see as much of you,
as much of me be free-
free like the wind that sent
the black coats flying,
set the colors and Kerichans
singing in the open fields,
without a care
for a civilized haircut.

Promises

29 May 2007, 8:34 PM

There are promises and lovely things
requiring wisdom to discern- one must
be willing to be the pupil of a harsh,
exacting master if he wants to see
the woundedness turn whole again,
see roses bloom where once the thorns
were all there was to see.

Yet be content, Beloved.

There are promises and lovely things
seen easily with naked eye
without a single squint or double-take.
They come with claps of thunder,
the breaking of a cloud into sheets
of warming rain upon weary, arid fields,
and in the face of such as these,
the most tenacious heartache yields.

What's Your Story

16 May 2007, 8:37 PM

What’s your story?

Surely you didn’t plan this random
rendezvous at McDonald’s, where I wonder
as our eyes hold for a moment,
brief, then falter as I knew they would-
because a mostly white woman my age, ordering
burgers and fries to go cannot hold the eyes
of a middle-aged Mexican man working assembly
in a not-quite-restaurant without breaking
something hidden not-so-deep inside herself-

what’s your story?

How did you manage to get to this country,
much less this dead-end town, even less
this dying franchise, where you shuffle fries
and burgers into boxes for the walking-dead,
most of whom never even notice or look up at you,
much less wonder who you are, who you were
when your laugh lines formed. Did they form
from laughing or from years of troubled grief?

What’s your story?

What’s your name- are you Diego, who lost
his family and his fortune? Luis, who sought
a better life somewhere, anywhere north
of Chihuahua? Are you Tovito, who’s family
is happier here, despite the seeming lack
of dignity, for work is honor, and honor is life,
and life is precious, even here at McDonald’s.
And I walk away still wondering and aching to know,

what's your story?