All poems copyrighted © Noel K. Anderson
Agreement
A man in my church said,
“I don’t agree with your poem.”
So I drew my lightsaber
And lopped off the bastard’s head.
How can you “not agree” with a poem?
Maybe I should have just quartered him.
Saddam Learns Mercy
Saddam Hussein has moved onto my street.
The local kids and I throw snowballs at his house.
He and his wife sit and drink coffee in their breakfast nook
while he scans the want ads for work.
“Check R for ‘Ruler.’ What, nothing?”
Dreams of mercy for ex-tyrants haunt me
like my dream of sharing Communion with Noriega.
Why should I care about these killers?
Perhaps God wants to be justice enough.
I must learn mercy as well.
2004
Back in the early nineties
I was thinking ahead to the future
and the Millennium turnover.
Not about 2000—or even 2001—but a couple of years past.
After the Big Change, there will be a calmer
time-after-the-big-change
and we will go on counting New Year as before.
I wondered, “What will, say, 2004 feel like?”
Like this. . . .
(As will 3004, 4704, 27,004, and 688,884)
01.07.04 09:56
Real faith is
that which lets us in
on the joke
that is ourselves.
01.24.04 21:26
This house is not settled—
chiefly because it is not yet
sufficiently simplified.
All organization can be seen as a simplification—
equally valid for notes of music
as for new houses with unpacked boxes.
New Habits
I will do no more complaining.
I am tired of counting flaws
and thinking that I deserve so much better.
I will seek to build my heart and mind
on a series of praises
so that my life will grow into
an exclamation instead of an explanation.
Too much explaining leads to complaining,
but many praises lead to. . .
. . .more praise.
Bakersfield
New frames within new frames—
we live between beds and desks
grabbing bits of food and gasoline
in quick stops discovered
somewhere in between.
It is the chaos of shallow water—
wading in rapids, scanning for salmon—
and here, with cold toes, I can’t remember
the smell of pine in the forest
or the sound of a once-familiar company.
Here we work:
each grizzly at its desk looking for fish,
paws parked on the frames’ edges
holding steady.
Yarn
From somewhere in a pile of dust-colored cardboard
came a flash of chartreuse like a shooting star.
The contrast chirped for attention,
Begging for an honorable mention.
That bit of yarn in the pile—
like the memory of a childhood friend
who once made you laugh—
suddenly reveal a precious heart
for no reason other than
it caught your eye
and momentarily stopped you
from not noticing.
Sunday School
Again he raises his hand—face taut with conviction.
He will have his say, by gum,
and justification of his flyaway ideas.
His thoughts all finish in split ends
but he is driven to know.
When he starts in, some classmates roll their eyes
and give me sympathetic looks,
but they don’t realize how much I learn from him.
This sociopathic gadfly makes it clear to me:
no matter what we know or do not know
and despite ourselves, it is true
that people want to believe more.
Better Than Ever
Twelve years ago—where she was,
what she thought, the things earning her passion
and whole attention—all flash into sight
like an embarrassing old photo.
The arrogance of early adulthood
shines out like an unworthy loyalty.
But now—in the new photo—
such good news! Look at her:
she has matured, and her world is
colored by new virtues and self-control.
She looks better now than ever.
Present
Hey you—yeah, you there—
the one reading this—listen:
As you read these words
I am with you.
You know it’s true.
Albeit my present future,
you can tell, can’t you? Just as I am
fully present scraping these lines onto this page,
I am intensely aware of your awareness
of my presence.
I am with you.
Even as you re-read (for now, it is years later)
I am with you—with you all—just the same.
As My Mother Dies
As my mother dies
I pray and burn the candles.
The wetness of wax, tears, and sweat
witnesses to the unreasonable fertility of the moment.
I wipe my nose, my cheeks and feel my heart
melting in grief.
This lovely person—this unique personality
that is my mother—like a short candle in its last flickers,
shines a bright, bright light over all my past.
The future—a future without that light—looks dark indeed.
Three Rules for Life in
This New Millennium
(With Five Addenda)
1. Do something truly good.
2. Do something beautiful.
3. Refuse to discuss anything controversial.
Repeat.
APPENDIX I.
The hardest part
in trying to do
something good
is that it takes
so much
Patience.
APPENDIX II.
Just as there is
a kind of silence
that heals old guilts,
there is a silence
that kills the conscience
through patterned neglect.
Not knowing the difference
runs the risk of confusing
Satan with God.
APPENDIX III.
A candle, wick fat with flame,
sounds a calming drone
through this otherwise empty room—
a simile of remembrance
like the presence of a dear, old friend.
A very dear, very old, very friend.
APPENDIX IV.
What truly merits our fear?
If we say people have a right
to their fears, how in the world
do we justify that right?
APPENDIX V.
Earth Day:
In short,
the earth is a poor substitute
for God.
The Workaholics
They love to work hard and call you
lazy if you can’t keep up.
Secretly hostile
haters of peace,
they love succession and self-elevation.
They strive to become because they are not.
They will never be as big as their ego demands
but they’ll die trying.
Effort is god—work, the palest memory of faith.
Die trying to remember faith.
Die trying.
Duet
A bird chirps outside in the morning darkness
(my windows and walls are not well-sealed).
I sit alone in a small, dark room with but one
little light to read and write beneath.
The bird sings as I scratch out this sentence.
Who is to say we are not intimately connected—
a closely-linked, well-rehearsed duet
of two of the very best of friends?
If I stepped outside, she would fly away, and
if she flew in, I would stop writing.
The kind of closeness we are meant for
is the kind we now have.
For now, we sing together.
FOUR Fools
FOOL 1
The first of fools says, “There is no God.”
The greater fool says, “There can be no God.”
The first makes a conviction of his ignorance;
the second absolute faith of his doubts.
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,”
say the Ancients, but it may be better translated,
“Knowing God as God is the beginning of wisdom.”
Those who confess that God is God
have a new life and new horizons—
a wiser life and destiny.
Fool 2
The Narcissist says,
“There is a God
and he is a lot like me.”
Ask the Narcissist to tell you about God
and hear him speak of himself.
“To be Christlike is to be like me,” he says.
Better faith says,
“I am a miserable sinner
and God is nothing like me.”
Wisdom says,
“I am an awful example—look instead at Christ—
read the gospels.”
Fool 3
Another Christian says,
“I must make myself a good example—
a role-model for the lost and unredeemed,”
by which he means,
“I am superior—set above others.”
Better that his “example” should be
as far away from himself as possible—
as far as Heaven from Earth.
A better witness is spiritual ineptitude
and utter emptiness.
Fool 4
The fool says, “I am full.”
This is the pride that must fall
that truth be told.
The fool over-exults in his own joy,
gloating and glowing with great waves
of self-absorption.
The fool never allows joy to descend
to a place of peace.
Solitude
A ticking clock in a quiet, empty room
and two, good ears to hear it.
The ticking slows then stops,
but the listening and hearing continue.
Sickly
Through a wheeze, a cough,
and a pathetic sniffle comes our
feeble song of praise.
Diseased hearts spin curves
on even the purest of prayers.
Our piety and devotion are sickly,
received at the throne of Heaven
only through the ineffable graciousness
pf the King.
Positive
I lingered at the back of a long line,
waiting to wait for a chance—
a one-in-a-million chance—
to prove my strength by ringing the bell
with the swing of a hammer.
I saw myself winning—
sounding the bell after a thunderous pound—
and hearing the crowd cheer.
Oh yes, I can ring the bell, I do believe!
The very thought that all this waiting
might end up in an otherwise-failed “fine attempt”
eclipses all the good—
the hope, the expectation of joy.
Asleep?
Only the sleeping may awaken.
And who is asleep?
Those who think themselves awake.
Those who believe they are not asleep
are asleep in their dreams.
Only the one who says,
“Surely, I sleep.”
can be awakened.
Four Rules for Human Life
1. Stay calm (God is good).
2. Share your food.
3. Help others.
4. Spread j