All poems copyrighted © Noel K. Anderson

Walking

How utterly odd, this life–

This toddling toward God

Each step ambling idly,

Each stride straying widely.

An awkward, gawky dance we step

Over brittling bones and chalk we trod

And with each fall we curse the sky

in fits of spit and hisses.

    We foul our furrowed brow

Take our stand  and yet again lean into our walk

Accompanied by angels whose wings cover

Their sacred mouths

To stifle their knowing laughter.

The Bees

A fellowship of mission

afloat on sunny air

alights on fragrant blossoms

to gather pollen there.

Electric buzzing motors

sing light upon the breeze–

a harmony of sweetness

like honey in the trees.

We will not mind their presence

nor fear their little stings

for better is the liveliness

of song their working brings.

Their work is not a burden:

they do not think it odd

to serve their tiny instincts

as though the voice of God.

Take joy you little engines

as on the winds you play;

we praise your mighty Maker

for shaping you that way. 

We too may learn their lesson

of joyous working days,

buzzing through the fragrance

of gratitude and praise.

Darwin’s Funeral

Darwin spoke of growth

through soft lips:

the chemistries of cogitation

mixing through the fragile convolutions

of his fine expanse of brain.

He loved his wife, say those that knew him.

Apparently, his moist and meaty heart

held more than just the blood

of several thousand

lucky monkeys.

With Tongues

These birds praise You.

The blue ones, the black ones,

The tiny hoverers and the redheads–

With each bite they take,

With every ruffle of feather, song or squawk,

With every preen and scratch

They praise Your name.

The trees, fat with green leaves and

Replete with ants, mites and spiders–

These too praise Your name.

The bushes, heavy-laden  with oranges

Like young mothers, all bearing twins on swollen dugs–

All sing the song of praise to You.

Had You but given them tongues

They would put the whole of humanity to shame–

For they, unlike us, would be constant and

Irrepressible in proclaiming Your name and

Giving thanks for the gift of life. 

They would say to men:  

    Jesus,    Jesus,   Jesus be praised!

Ground Zero

NYC 02.02.02

We dined near the ghosts of the towers

On sonnets and flowers, salting our lives with dismay.

Through the bustle of hours

We hunted the powers that haunt these remains of the day.

The Church stood intact

To impugn or distract the agnostic zeitgeist of the age.

Spectators of the impact

Gather to reenact the encaustic remembrance of  rage.

Sixteen acres of waste

Painstakingly erased leaves a blank empty heart of a hole.

Though our nation stands defaced

Our pride may yet be replaced by God, who alone merits control.

Unexpected Changes

Unexpected changes

delivered in derision, monkey-founded,

Based in fey intrusions and settled with non-conclusions.

There seem so few discussions left;

It has all become superior sneers, hyper-hubris

and the stylish insolence of stylish insolents.

The tidal wave favors their course, and we few

who stand in protest embrace humility–

a praise of God’s name on our lips–

as we huddle in the shadow of a great breaker.

The eclipse appears imminent

but we are counting on a greater force

than just gravity and the pulling moon.

Park Cities, Utah

                    03.03.03.

The dove-gray birch

Months ago relinquished

All feathery apparel.

Here they stand

Knee-deep in snow

Their arms upraised

like a congregation of

gently-cooing charismatics

singing praises to God.

There is a shared glow among their heads:

The color of dried blood tinged with gold:

So suffering and triumph go together

In the midst of a great throng–

Even as a single creature–

Standing in the biting cold

And together awaiting

The sun’s warmth

And a green morning

Coming soon.

Mono Lake

This silence is nowhere:

A frozen mirage between deep and depth–

Yet here too sleeps the ghost of the virgin,

The inner peace of the contemplative monk,

The wide dark sphere of genius,

And the distant song of resurrection.

The silence of the dark and still

Breathes the assurance of God’s good will

And these final hours of soul-dark night

Reveals a world comprised by light.

As if we saw an intimate connection

Submitting to Love’s divine correction.

The Grand Absorber

Smiling with open arms and upturned palms

he receives all the junk:

the bile, the sin, the hostility, the resentment,

the self-pity, the fear and perversions–

all we throw at him he absorbs.

Into his skin and into his blood,

even into his heart:

He absorbs the point.

He takes the poison from us.

He is poisoned but does not

lose his peace.

He suffers the pain, and we,

his tormentors, lean in to his face and snarl:

    See how you like it!

He absorbs it all and it kills him.

He takes our poison and death and dies.

We remain

standing over him,

cleaned by his sacrifice,

wondering what we have done.

Palm Sunday

   04.04.04

As a boy in Riverside

I used to pound the palm trees on our parking strip

with a baseball bat.

The pulpy bark gave slightly with each blow

and bounced the bat back pleasantly.

I pounded the bark for hours,

working my way around the trunk

ever working on my swing.

I pounded-out a softened circle and

the bark sloughed off,

scoring a scarry ring all around.

The tree died.

As it was dead, and no one objected,

I pounded several nails into that palm,

just because I could.

Ash Wednesday

These steps belong to the unwinding core

Of anxious thoughts born of frustration and pride.

Each footfall echoes through emptied rooms

Where shame rules the moments’ remembrance..

We walk.  We walk along a line in time

To a tune set thrumming in our hungering hearts–

Each step a forward thrust in a dance

Of unmerited confidence, replete

In clumsy whirls and several falls.

Clouds of dust kicked up from our feet

Cling to our modest garments and stain

What no fuller on earth can bleach to white.

We doff our robes to dance at the altar in shame

And burn our parade regalia in the central fire.

The ashes now smeared on our sweaty brows

Punctuate this season’s labored steps;

We lift our hearts within the dirge

To the God who dies–the Lord of dust

And through His praise our hearts emerge

From endless shame to eternal trust.

Retreated

Through endless dreams of diurnal persistence,

I set my hand to the worn wood

of an ancient plow,

spur on the emaciated mule

to its unimpressive plod

and cut the filthy rind

of cold, hard earth.

I would hold the line,

but like Lot’s wife ask What is life?

and strain to go astray,

to listen for footfalls echoing

from the forbidden  garden,

to look back

into the face of God’s fury,

to veer off this appointed line

which I so readily disappoint.

    The servants come, the servants go,

    working for masters they less-than-half-know.

The stewards of secrets reveal their disease,

roundly denouncing the flesh as they please.

Hard handles under blisters slip,

blood and muscles fail–

all endeavor veers by browsweat blinded.

Weakened knees, swollen and scab-scarred

find rest only in falling to the fresh-turned dirt.

    Kyrie Eleison!

Oh, Lamb of God. . . .

Worshipping

To the rose of fire–

Circling above the brightest stars

Like a thorny wheel adrift in the frame

Of time and substance, mass and matter

Wafting amid chaotic, thunderous clatter

Inherent of nothing and free of desire–

Rises the song

With motive and entropy in urgent ire

Counterpoint harmonies like dancers entwine

Angelic voices through the circling choir

The rhythm and melody flow elegantly braided

As litanies of praises overhead paraded.

We gather as stardust and follow along.

In remembrance we reenact the story

Handed to us by those to whom it was handed

Of pain, death and ultimate glory

We lift up our hearts;

And we are remanded.

Severance

Someday we will again

Share a table like this one

Though not this one.

We are excused and leave this place to separate walks.

Once we walked together, taking many meals in tandem

And refreshed ourselves with each other on the same road.

But the fork parts us and our ways.

On our way we are

On our way to different points.

We walk on apart:

    On, onward and gone.

The rail is split, the coupling released:

The tandem, rhythmic footfalls ended

To echo down separate halls.

I cannot grieve your divergent road

And its final door to wherever it goes;

I only grieve that the garden I enter

I enter without you.

But there are other doors into that same place

And people to meet there.

Once we share in that new fruit

I will not think of you.

I will not need to think of you

I will not think of you as you.

In a Day

In a day He will fix these easy pieces.

For our every baffling puzzle

He will reveal solutions.

Our irresolvable tensions

He will transform to facile reconciliation

and knead again the muddy, blood-stained clay.

A veil draws back to reveal the face of heaven,

a face we have seen on earth but can not name

and yet the bruises pique our memory

of some ancient time and place.

He will reveal the names we have forgotten

and each instance we did mistake

His face for the face of an enemy.

Thanksgiving

One good day, among millions we’ve missed

when stars bent down low

and with great effort have kissed

our hearts as we slept and dreamed

dreams of success–

to wake and live nightmares

of toilsome distress.

One good day, we will awake

and relish the fragrance of

a forgiven mistake.

One day the scales will fall from our eyes

revealing the Hope

we have been taught to despise.

O let it be soon, my Liberty Bell

that your kisses come free

from regret and fare well.

Let our hearts waken

to those stars that bend low

and deeply receive their good will

with good show.

Let us approach this new morning with Joy:

Free from compulsions

to spend and destroy.

Let this Thanksgiving

come from hearts that feel thanks;

Let us return our praise to the light

who shines grace eternal

and sets all to right.

Let us remember with breaking of bread

That life is for living eternally fed.

Starry Morning Bakersfield

“Get up,” she says–I tend to sleep through the music.

The warm darkness of sleep fills the room.

The supple sheets body-heated,

the dog’s slight snore,

the soft curtains closed–

all gently floating peace.

My wife’s blonde hair

spreads over the back of the pillow in glorious wake

like sunlight beaming through the clouds

after a long storm or flashing rapids

falling on the sheets

and the light wakes us.

Out through the front door floats

a soft embrace of still, cool air.

Orion leans back, taking lazy aim

at nothing in the distance.

A tinkling of bells like stars speaking

Call my name.

No, it is only dogtags on a collar.

A wet tongue greets my calf;

Vita stretches at my side,

her whole body tail-wagged.

And I know her movements

as the ticking of a clock.

We wonder for a moment:

        What is this?

She turns back toward the door, perks up her ears

and points her nose at the kitchen.

I too tune in to the needs of the day

listening for whispers of angels at play.

And though I’d prefer to return to my bed

There will be no peace here until she is fed.

As we find our way through this dark house

toward the kitchen,

light the color of angels’ hair

begins glowing through the curtains

And the coffee steams, snoring itself awake.